Millennials Put Off By Rigid, Judgmental Religion

As the GOP presidential debate continues with the top ten candidates doing everything short of wearing "for sale" signs in terms of their efforts to prostitute themselves to the Christofascists, yet another piece looks at the revulsion Millennials hold towards far right Christianity.  With more and more documentation that the coming generations find judgmental religious extremism repulsive, the GOP and far right denominations nonetheless continue to double down on their hate and bigotry.  A piece in Religion Dispatches looks at this failure to face this reality.  Here are highlights:

In a way, the Christian Post‘s Kevin Shrum is quite right about why young people reject Christianity these days. . . . And if you turn around his last seven bullet points (no, really), he really gets at the problem: people feel like the church is a horribly judgmental place more concerned with keeping its own brand of morality afloat than actually helping anyone in need. You’ll notice that Shrum never says a word about service or ministry. It’s all holiness all the time. Unfortunately for churches like Shrum’s, holiness just isn’t very popular in our culture these days. What people want in spirituality is egalitarianism, an emphasis on the ways in which God welcomes, rather than rejects.

Weirdly, though, the standard conservative religious argument these days is that the churches that demand orthodoxy—another word for holiness—are the ones that do best. That’s even true! Conservative churches do fare better these days than liberal ones, though the sociologists tell me that’s mostly the result of their later adoption of birth control. The cultural trends are the cultural trends, even if they do take longer to catch up with some groups than others.

Trouble is, Shrum’s already stipulated White and Barna’s argument that this is exactly what the “Nones” don’t want. You can’t move to the “narrow way” without getting more judgmental and exclusionary.  . . . . in a pluralistic society, the literally holier-than-thou act is just deadly.

That leaves Shrum with two options: acknowledge that the church as he conceives it wants a bigger slice of a shrinking pie (that is, hope that as Christianity declines in the US, more of the people who remain will be orthodox believers like him); or, as he just about comes out and says directly, he can skip Christian introspection and blame the people leaving the church for their own lack of faith and discipleship.

If that’s the “well-articulated, well-understood Gospel” he wants to proclaim, well, good luck to him.

Will There Be A New Post-Homophobic Christianity?

Photo Illustration by Dair Massey/The Daily Beast

As this blog and countless other Internet and media outlets have noted, the Christofascists' reaction to the U.S. Supreme Court same sex marriage ruling has been beyond hysterical.  None of the dire consequences and a smiting of America by God that have been predicted amidst spittle flecked rants  will ever come to pass, but that will not stop the parasitic professional Christian class from trying to shake loose every last dime that they can from the ignorant and gullible.  Meanwhile, some denominations like the Episcopal Church USA have moved closer to full church weddings for same sex couples.  Some have even speculated that in time, there will be a post-homophobic version of Christianity that will come to predominate.  One such piece is in The Daily Beast.  Here are highlights:

Since the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges that legalized marriage equality in America, some conservative Christians have been downright apoplectic.

Meanwhile,  Rod Dreher of the American Conservative has, in his own words, a more sober analysis of the decision on Time’s website:“

[W]e have to accept that we really are living in a culturally post-Christian nation. The fundamental norms Christians have long been able to depend on no longer exist. To be frank, the court majority may impose on the rest of the nation a view widely shared by elites, but it is also a view shared by a majority of Americans. There will be no widespread popular resistance to Obergefell. This is the new normal.”

To which the vast majority of Americans say, “Hallelujah!” Dreher is correct—the idea of equal treatment for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans (if not its full realization yet) is indeed the new normal in America. Even before the court’s decision, 6 in 10 Americans supported the right of same-sex couples to marry—and over half of Americans said they would be less likely to support any 2016 presidential candidate who opposed marriage equality. 

[S]ome conservatives have tried to paint this cultural evolution—or even revolution—as fundamentally at odds with Christianity. That’s where they’re wrong.

The Episcopalian Church embraced gay marriage last week. Earlier this year, the Presbyterian Church (USA) affirmed its support for marriage equality, joining many other major Christian denominations that officially endorse LGBT rights. And according to an April 2015 poll, majorities of congregants within many Christian faith traditions support marriage equality—including 60 percent of all Catholics, 52 percent of all orthodox Christians and 62 percent of white mainline Protestants. They’re joined by 94 percent of Unitarian Universalists and 77 percent of all Jews.

Perhaps most strikingly, 64 percent of self-identified Millennial evangelicals support same-sex marriage. . . . . they are a portrait of that future—not of a post-Christian America, but a post-homophobic Christianity. That is the “new normal” that Obergefall does not singularly usher in but merely reflects.
Will anti-gay Christians be politically and socially ostracized? I sure hope so. Just as those orthodox Christians who still believe in strict, traditional gender roles have been increasingly mocked as absurd.

There are, of course, still congregations that haven’t caught up with the times. But churches have always been able to use their discretion to decide whom to marry or turn away, and the Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell specifically noted such First Amendment protections for religious institutions.

As for everyone else, including florists and county clerks, yes, you will now have to provide the same services to straight couples that you provide to gay couples. Don’t like it? Find a new job. . . . that doesn’t mean the law is trouncing on religion. It means the law is prioritizing equal treatment for all, as it should.

Liberty, freedom and the ever-bending arc toward equality have won. Intolerance and hate have lost. But this was not a war of liberty versus religion; the war itself took place within religion, including within Christianity itself. And Christianity is ultimately taking the side of equality and liberty, too.

To those who remain in the fringe minority stubbornly mired in hatred and the dark rationalizations of the past, please try to lose gracefully. You are not being exiled. The world is simply moving on without you.

If we are lucky, in time the Christofascists - like the angry aging far right whites of the GOP base - will literally die off.  When that happens, the world will be a better place.

Archbishop of Canterbury: The Church Has Supported Homophobia

While conservative religious denominations continue an increasingly hysterical war against gays in general and the recognition of same sex relations and marriage in particular the irony is that by doing so they are committing a slow moving form of suicide as those under 30 increasingly are simply walking away from such faith traditions.  Justin Webly, the Archbishop of Canterbury(pictured above) seems to be belatedly waking up to this reality, not that his changing views will be welcome among the vitriolically anti-gay African churches that belong to the Anglican communion.  A piece in The Guardian looks at some of Webly's recent remarks.  Most interestingly, he describes homophobia and its perpetuation to be a sin.  Here are highlights:

Justin Welby thinks that it is a huge problem for the church in this country that it is defined by what it's against. "Young people say 'I don't want to hear about a faith that is homophobic'," he told a gathering of leaders from the Evangelical Alliance on Wednesday, many of whom have campaigned hard against gay marriage.

Second, he used the term "homophobia" in an honest way. There are still some evangelicals who claim it is a made-up term that refers to nothing in particular. Not so Welby. Gay marriage was, he said, an attempt to deal with issues of homophobia. "The church has not been good at dealing with it. We have implicitly and even explicitly supported [homophobia] and that demands repentance."

This is, I think, something that he sees as a command from God, rather than an adjustment to the world.
More to the point, he now understands just how dreadful conservative Christian attitudes seem to anyone under 35. "The vast majority of people under 35 think [the church's resistance to gay marriage] is not just incomprehensible but plain wrong and wicked, and they assimilate it to racism and other horrors."

He made clear later that this attitude was found among young evangelicals as well as ordinary people, and that it was reflected in his experience as well as in public opinion polls.

Of course, this isn't really news. It is a recognition of reality much clearer and more forceful than Rowan Williams could have allowed himself, but the only possible audience for his remarks was sitting in front of him. No one outside the church cares in the slightest what its leaders say about sex. Very few people inside care either: according to the YouGov Westminster Faith Debate polls, only 2% of Anglicans take into account the views of religious leaders when making moral decisions.

Some of his evangelical audience will have heard only what he said about voting against the bill. Others will have understood what he also said about how catastrophic this attitude has become for the credibility of Christianity as a moral force in this country.

The perverse side of me hopes the anti-gay zealots continue their homophobic screeds - it is perhaps the quickest way to ensure that over time their denominations will die and lose all credible influence.  All of which would be a very good thing and an improvement for society.

Desmond Tutu: Going to Hell Better than Worship Homophobic God

Desmond Tutu has time and time again shown himself to be a bold voice for LGBT rights and equality and he has now stated that he would rather go to Hell than worship a homophobic god.  His point, of course, is that God isn't homophobic, it's some of his foulest self-proclaimed followers who are.  Indeed, if one is homophobic - or racist, etc. - one is not truly Christian regardless of whatever lip service one may give to false piety and religiosity.   Tutu made his remarks in conjunction with a new United Nations initiative to oppose homophobia and the deprivation of rights to LGBT individuals.  Tutu is the antithesis of bigots and and hate mongers such as Patriarch Kiril in Russia.The Christofascists have utterly perverted Christianity and are killing Christianity in the eyes of many, especially the younger generations who are leaving religion in droves.  ABC News looks at Tutu's latest declarations against homophobes:

CAPE TOWN - South African peace icon Desmond Tutu on Friday said he would rather go to hell than worship a homophobic God, likening the fight against gay prejudice to the anti-apartheid struggle.

"I would refuse to go to a homophobic heaven. No, I would say sorry, I mean I would much rather go to the other place," the retired archbishop said at the launch of a United Nations gay equality campaign in Cape Town.

"I would not worship a God who is homophobic and that is how deeply I feel about this," he said, condemning the use of religious justification for anti-gay prejudice.

Launched by the UN Human Rights Office, the public education campaign "Free and Equal" aims to raise awareness of anti-gay violence and discrimination.

Tutu, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, compared the project to the fight South Africans waged to end the former white racist minority rule, a struggle in which he played a pivotal role.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said same-sex relationships are illegal in more than a third of countries around the world and punishable by death in five.

Even in countries where gay rights are upheld challenges remain, she said, noting that South Africa has "some of the worst cases of homophobic violence" despite having some of the world's best legal protections.

"People are literally paying for their love with their lives," said Pillay.   The campaign, which aims to push for legal reforms and public education against homophobia, will have a strong focus on working with governments.  "I constantly hear governments tell me 'but this is our culture, our tradition and we can't change it'... So we have lots of work to do," said Pillay.

 Kudos to Tutu.  It is good Christians like him that have kept me even nominally hanging on to the Christian moniker.   More like him need to stand up and publicly call out the merchants of hate in the Catholic Church, Russian Orthodox Church, and of course the Southern Baptist Convention.

Wing Nuts Goe Berserk Over Tebow Cancellation of Appearance at Anti-Gay Church

In the grand scheme of things, Tim Tebow and where he decides to make appearances doesn't add up to a hill of beans.  At least not among rational, sentient individuals in touch with objective reality.  But among the Christofascists, Tebow's cancellation of his April appearance at the opening of Robert Jeffress’ $115 million First Baptist Church in Dallas has launched all kinds of spittle spraying batshitery.  And of course, the hate merchants of the "family values" organizations and the professional Christian crowd are blaming the gays - and Satan - on Tebow's decision to avoid appearing at a church best defined by who its senior pastor hates, namely most everyone. And even more bizarrely, Tebow's decision is claimed to reflect an attack on Christianity.  It truly doesn't get any crazier than among the "godly Christian" folk.  Box Turtle Bulletin looks at the insanity.  Here are some excerpts:

Quarterback Tim Tebow recently cancelled an appearance at the opening of Robert Jeffress’ $115 million church after finding out about Jeffress’ controversial reputation.  The good pastor has spoken out against:

• Mormonism (“a heresy from the pit of hell”)

• Judaism (“you can’t be saved being a Jew”)

• Catholicism (“the genius of Satan”)

and, of course,

• Gays (“homosexuality is perverse, it represents a degradation of a person’s mind and if a person will sink that low and there are no restraints from God’s law, then there is no telling to whatever sins he will commit as well”)

Of course, while Jeffress is merely exercising his religious freedom, any attempt to disagree with him is an attack on that freedom:

Denny Burk, a cultural commentator and professor at Boyce College in Louisville, Ken., said Tebow’s decision is a significant event for the nation’s Christian community and could serve as a troubling bellwether.

“This moment will appear to many as another marker of Christianity’s cultural marginalization,” he wrote on his website. “In the broad tolerance of views in our public discourse, who’s in and who’s out? What voices are allowed in the cacophony that is American democracy? Which voices should be excluded? Christian voices have long been a part of the din but moments like these make it seem like those days are coming to an end.”

Pass the smelling salts! I’ll need them when I stop laughing. Apparently disagreeing with Jeffress, deciding not to associate with him, suggesting that others rethink their association with him, is an assault on Jeffress’ liberty — wait, no, that’s not right — is an assault on Christianity itself and American democracy along with it.

See, it’s fine to call someone a Satanic, heretical pervert from the pit of Hell, but if your target calls you a bigot in reply then you get to be all, OMG, Can you believe what he just said??

Over at Civil Commotion, Bob Felton reports on the hissy fit thrown by Baptist Press over Tebow's cancellation and has a few on point comments on why society needs to reject the Christofascist agenda:

Baptist Press is on the case, and affirms that America sure is hard on the godly.

The pastor at First Baptist Dallas, Robert Jeffress, has been nationally prominent in stating his biblical views regarding marriage, homosexuality, and during the presidential campaign last year, Mormonism, according to the Southern Baptist Texan newspaper.

In a statement to the Florida Baptist Witness, Brunson [Tebow's pastor at FBC-Jacksonville] said the media attacks on Jeffress, the church and Tebow are without merit. “Clearly there is a bias in this country when it comes to evangelical Christianity,” he said.

Further, Tebow’s home church and First Baptist Dallas share the same beliefs, Brunson said.

Yeah, yeah — ho-hum. Gay rights have been before the public for more than a decade, endlessly debated — and common sense has prevailed: There just isn’t any reason why gays should not enjoy full marriage equality. Reason. Freeborn adults believe you should have a reason if you’re going to constrict other people’s lives — and “My invisible friend says so” doesn’t pass muster.

Let’s be clear about something: The evangelicals are right about this much — there is a moral issue at stake. But their insistence that we must be guided by a nonsensical old book of unknown provenance instead of our minds puts them on the wrong side of the moral issue. Blind obedience is not morality, but an abdication of morality; it is choosing to live as a dumb farm animal.

What I find most ironic is that it is the hate-filled, ignorance embracing racists and bigots of the Christianist  crowd who are accelerating the decline of Christianity in the developed world.  The more they scream and howl and direct hate and bigotry towards other citizens, the more the younger generations and educated people walk away.  Yet these fanatics cannot see that it is they themselves, not gays, liberals or the media that are the real problem.

Exciting Family News!!

I just found out that my oldest daughter will be having a baby boy sometime around July 1, 2013.  I have an amazing new grand daughter (pictured above) who is just over two months old. Soon I will have a grandson as well!  I find it ironic that the Christofascists try to claim that gays don't have families when in fact we do.  And every time they disseminate lies and malign us they drive our parents, siblings, nieces and nephews and yes, grandchildren away from their hate and fear based form of Christianity.  The further irony is that they claim that gays and secularism are attacking Christianity when it is they themselves who are inflicting the most harm and killing Christianity.

I firmly believe that my grandchildren will be part of a new generation that will fully accept LGBT individuals and that look back in horror at the hate and viciousness that have become the hallmarks of Christianity.   This new generation will see the common humanity in all of us and wonder how Christianity could have become something so evil at the hands of the hate merchants.

Anti-Gay Pastor Equates Gays to Child Molesters, Cannibals,and Rapists

There are times that the hideousness and undisguised animus of the self-styled "godly Christian" set is simply numbing and shocks the conscience.  Or at least the consciences of decent moral people.  And it is clear that this animus goes far beyond a mere statement of religious belief.  Indeed, the desire to encourage attacks on and crimes against LGBT citizens is almost palpable.   And like it or not, because of the refusal of what I refer to as the "good Christians" who cower in silence rather than upset the sensibilities of bigots within their denominations, the hate merchants have become the public face of Christianity.  It is no wonder that the younger generations are walking away from institutional Christianity when despicable levels of hate and bigotry seem to be the only visible attributes of the faith.  An anti-gay pastor in Colorado (pictured above left) has once again highlighted what is fast becoming the predominant public face of Christianity in America.  KOAA.com has coverage of the virulent hate being preached from pulpits in El Paso County, Colorado.  Here are highlights:

A local pastor is causing a national stir equating homosexuals to cannibals, child molesters, rapists, and murderers. Pastor David Beuhner of Christ the King Church in northern El Paso County is calling for discrimination against the gay community as state lawmakers revisit marriage equality this session.

"If we embrace homosexuality, we'll destroy society, we'll destroy families, we'll destroy everything. It's not just that God hates homosexuals, there's a reason why he hates it." That's the line causing national outrage from the LGBT community; Pastor David Beuhner took to the airwaves early this month on his radio show 'Generations' in what he says is a last-ditch effort to save our society from falling off the moral cliff.

"If you break natural laws-- you say you don't believe in gravity, you jump off a building, you're gonna die. Homosexuality has consequences and God designed those consequences," Beuhner told News 5's Jacqui Heinrich in an exclusive interview explaining his on-air remarks.

As the Colorado legislature reopens the issue of marriage equality this session, Beuhner is speaking out not just against civil unions, but calling for discrimination against gays, equating them to cannibals, rapists, and child molesters. "The word of god is quite clear. He's destroyed every culture that has embraced homosexuality. The sin is similar to that of cannibalism and child molestation in the sense that it's a sin against society," Beuhner said. "I'm calling for discrimination against adulterers, rapists, murderers, homosexuals. Yes, we must discriminate as a society."

"God's law to the civil magistrate in terms of homosexuality says you should remove the abomination from the land, so that's God's instruction to the people who work up in the capitol who make our laws. That's what they're going to be held accountable for," he said.

Can't you just feel the "love"?  And Beuhner not only proves that he's an asshole and a bigot, but he also shows himself to be an ignorant ass as well when he repeats the Christofascist canard that God has "destroyed every culture that embraced homosexuality."   As this blog has noted before, one of the factors that destroyed the western Roman Empire - most likely the culture Beuhner was referring to -  was Christianity and the Church, not the gays.  And ridiculousness of his claims become even more clear when one considers that the Classical Greek/Roman period lasted five (5) times longer than the period that the United States has existed or the fact that the Persian Empire (before the rise of Islam) lasted over 1,200 years.  And that's just the beginning of the empires that accepted homosexuality.   If one looks at China, which may soon eclipse America, the various dynasties of imperial China lasted over 3,900 years (see the image below) versus America's paltry 237 years of existence.  Not surprisingly, Beuhner's church views the Bible as follows:

We acknowledge the Bible, which includes all sixty-six books of the Old and New Testaments, to be the infallible and inerrant Word of God, sufficient for doctrine, reproof, correction, and instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Beuhner is an ignorant, bigoted ass and one wonders how his knuckles are a bloody mess dragging on the ground as they must.  Yet his kind of thinking passes for intelligent discourse in today's GOP.  If Christianity is not going to be fated to ultimately die, the "good Christians" need to directly challenge the Beuhners of the world and stop their hijacking of the faith.

Young men sipping tea and having sex. Individual panel from a hand scroll on homosexual themes, paint on silk; China, Qing Dynasty (eighteenth to nineteenth centuries); Kinsey Institute, Bloomington, Indiana, United States

Christianists and the Non-Existence of Adam and Eve

As noted before on this blog, new advances in the human genome have more or less conclusively confirmed that the Adam and Eve of the Bible did not exist as historical people.  For those not obsessed with Biblical literalism, this reality is perhaps not unavoidably fatal to their faith/religious belief construct.  But for those who foolishly continue to claim that the Bible is literally true in every respect - except, of course for those inconvenient passages such as the ones that condemn divorce, instruct the wealthy to give all they have to the poor, etc., that they ignore with abandon -  the non-existence of Adam and Eve as historical figures threatens to destroy their entire artificial faith world.  As Bob Felton at Civil Common notes, some of the extremists in the Southern Baptist Convention are in a particular dither over the collapse of the Adam and Eve myth:

Hey! What do you know? Albert Mohler and a buddy are giving a talk next April about the historicity of Adam and Eve.

Are Adam and Eve Historical Figures?
Recent challenges to the historicity of Adam in evangelical settings make it essential that we discuss the necessity of our first parent’s existence and origin according to the biblical record. Mohler and Chapell will discuss both the importance of Adam to our understanding of humanity, our world and salvation, as well as, the “field and fences” of what should be considered consistent with biblical fidelity.

The answer is … No. Adam and Eve were not historical figures.  Y’all are not going to believe I’m saying this, because it’s no secret that I loathe Mohler unreservedly, but he is right about at least this much: Adam and Eve are necessary, absolutely indispensable, to the Christian narrative.

• IF no Adam and Eve, then …
  
• No Fall, and …
  
• No such thing as Original Sin, and …
  
• Jesus doesn’t save us from our Just Cosmic Death Sentence.

Read Augustine, Aquinas, Calvin, Kierkegaard … Adam and Even are not a poor metaphor for the idea that we could all be nicer to each other. No. In Christian theology, that couple’s actual criminal guilt is transmitted from parent to child and at the very instant of your ‘ensoulment’ you were sentenced to eternal torture because of that guilt.

 Bob is correct.  Without Adam and Eve, the entire far right Christian - and that includes reactionary Catholics like the current Pope - face seeing their entire story line collapse.  And as science and knowledge continue to progress and expand, the challenges to Christianity will only intensify.  Bishop John Shelby Spong has correctly argued that unless Christianity changes, it will ultimately die.  Those unintentionally leading the charge to kill it are the Mohlers and Benedict XVI's of the world.