Right-Wing Evangelicals are Driving Americans to Atheism

"Christian" hate group leader Tony Perkins.

This blog frequently looks at the hypocrisy of evangelical Christians - and far right Catholics - and the manner in which they are driving younger generations in particular away from religion entirely. But hypocrisy is only part of the behavior of these self-anointed "godly folk" and their professional Christian leaders engage in that increasingly makes the case that religion is a net evil in the world (my own personal view) and that "godly Christians" are actually not very nice people. Evangelicals' support of Donald Trump has merely served to underscore these attributes of "conservative Christians."  A piece in Raw Story looks at the exodus from religion and the ways evangelicals are driving more and more Americans to atheism or agnosticism.  Here are excerpts (Note the reference to The Black Collar Crime Blotter which is a must read):

If the Catholic Bishops, their Evangelical Protestant allies, and other Right-wing fundamentalists had the sole objective of decimating religious belief, they couldn’t be doing a better job of it.

Testimonials at sites like ExChristian.net show that people leave religion for a number of reasons, many of which religious leaders have very little control over. Sometimes, for example, people take one too many science classes. Sometimes they find their faith shattered by the suffering in the world – either because of a devastating injury or loss in their own lives or because they experience the realities of another person’s pain in a new way. Sometimes a believer gets intrigued by archaeology or symbology or the study of religion itself. Sometimes a believer simply picks up a copy of the Bible or Koran and discovers faith-shaking contradictions or immoralities there.

But if you read ExChristian testimonials you will notice that quite often church leaders or members do things that either trigger the deconversion process or help it along. They may turn a doubter into a skeptic or a quiet skeptic into an outspoken anti-theist, or as one former Christian calls himself, a de-vangelist.

Here are some top ways Christians push people out the Church door or shove secret skeptics out of the closet. Looking at the list, you can’t help but wonder if the Catholic Bishops and their Evangelical allies are working for the devil.

Gay Baiting. Because of sheer demographics, most gay people are born into religious families. In this country almost half are born into Bible-believing families, many of whom see homosexuality as an abomination.  The condemnation (and self-condemnation) can be excruciating, as we all know from the suicide rate.  Some emotionally battered gays spend their lives fighting or denying who they are, but many eventually find their way to open and affirming congregations or non-religious communities.

Ignorant and mean-spirited attitudes about homosexuality don’t drive just gays out of the Church, they are a huge deconversion issue for straight friends and family members. . . . . Since most people Gen X and younger recognize equal rights for gays as a matter of common humanity, gay baiting is a wedge issue that wedges young people right out of the church. 

Prooftexting.   People who think of the Bible as the literally perfect word of God love to quote excerpts to argue their points.  . . . They then proceed to quote whatever authoritarian, anti-gay, or anti-woman verse makes their point . . .Suppose such a Christian gets confronted with a verse that says, for example, Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man (Numbers 31:17-18), or No man who has any defect may come near [to God in the temple]: no man who is blind or lame, disfigured or deformed;  no man with a crippled foot or hand,  or who is a hunchback or a dwarf, or who has any eye defect, . . . (Leviticus 21:17-23).  . . . Biblical literalists, on the other hand give someone like me an excuse to talk about sexual slavery or bias against handicapped people in the Bible – in front of an audience who have been taught that the good book is uniformly good.  For a wavering believer, the dissonance can be too much. 

Misogyny. For psychological and social reasons females are more inclined toward religious belief than males.  They are more likely to attend church services and to insist on raising their children in a faith community.

Women are the Church’s base constituency, but fortunately for atheists, this fact hasn’t caused conservative Christians to back off of sexism that is justified by – you got it – prooftexting from the Old and New Testaments. . . . . Between 1991 and 2011 the percent of women attending church in a typical week dropped by eleven points, from 55 to 44 percent. 

Hypocrisy.  . . . High profile hypocrites like Ted Haggard or Rush Limbaugh may be loved by their acolytes, but for people who are teetering, they help to build a gut aversion to whatever they espouse.   But often as not, the hypocrisies that pose a threat to faith are small and internal to a single Bible-study or youth group.   Backbiting and social shunning are part of the church-lady stereotype for a reason.   They also leave a bitter taste that makes some church members stop drinking the Kool-aid.

Disgusting and Immoral Behavior.   The priest abuse scandal did more for the New Atheist movement than outspoken anti-theists like Christopher Hitchens (God is Not Great), Richard Dawkins (The God Delusion), Sam Harris (The End of Faith) or Bill Maher (Religulous) ever could. To make matters worse—or better, depending on your point of view– Bill Donohue of the Catholic League seems to be doing everything possible to fan those flames:  On top of the abuse itself, followed by cover-ups, he is now insisting that the best defense of Church property is a good offense against the victims, and has vowed to fight them “one by one.”  The Freedom from Religion Foundation publishes a bi-monthly newspaper that includes a regular feature:  The Black Collar Crime Blotter.  It features fraud, drug abuse, sex crimes and more by Protestant as well as Catholic clergy.  The obvious purpose is to move readers from Religion isn’t true to Religion isn’t benign to Religion is abhorrent and needs fighting.  Moral outrage is a powerful emotion.

Science denial. . . . . science denial doesn’t just move believers to nonbelief.  It also rallies opposition ranging from cantankerous bloggers to legal advocates.   It provides fodder for comedians and critics: “If the world was created 6000 years ago, what’s fueling your car?” It may produce some of the most far reaching opposition to religious belief, because science advocates argue that faith, even socially benign faith, is a fundamentally flawed way of knowing.  The Catholic Church, perhaps still licking wounds about Galileo (they apologized finally in the 20^th Century), has managed to avoid embarrassing and easily disproven positions on evolutionary biology.  But one could argue that their atheism-fostering positions on conception and contraception similarly rely on ignorance about or denial of biological science –in this case embryology and the basic fact that most embryos never become persons.

Political meddling. . . . The Religious Right, and now the Catholic Bishops, have brought religion into politics in the ugliest possible way short of holy war, and people who care about the greater good have taken notice.  Lists of ugly Bible verses, articles about the psychology of religion, investigative exposes about Christian machinations in D.C. or rampant proselytizing in the military and public schools –all of these are popular among political progressives because it is impossible to drive progressive change without confronting religious fundamentalism.

Intrusion.  . . . Catholic and Evangelical conservatives have made a high stakes gamble that they can regain authoritarian control over their flocks and hold onto the next generation of believers (and tithers) by asserting orthodox dogmas, making Christian belief an all or nothing proposition.. . . .  the more they resort to strict authoritarianism, insularity and strict interpretation of Iron Age texts, the more people are wounded in the name of God and the more people are outraged.  By making Christian belief an all-or-nothing proposition – they force at least some would-be believers to choose “nothing.”  Anti-theists are all too glad to help.

Hate is Alive and Well: 28 Year Old Gay Man Gunned Down Amidst Homophobic Slurs

Ronald Peters - murdered last week for being  gay.

Hate crimes are up sharply since Donald Trump's election in 2016 (226% the last time I looked).  Gays are among the favored targets of hate crimes given Trump's fanning of the lie that Christians are being persecuted and that gays are the oppressors.   Straight friends likely cannot comprehend the fear one experiences when one hears homophobic slurs directed at them along with threats of violence. I've had that experience and it is beyond disturbing.  (I also was forced from a law firm for being gay and suffered deliberate anti-gay harassment by Norfolk police officers a decade plus ago).  The murder this week of  old Ronald “Trey” Peters who was merely walking to work from a public transit station in Decatur, Georgia, underscores the reality that gays continue to be targets of homophobic violence and that one's social status does not guarantee safety (something lost on my gay Republican "friends"). The Advocate looks at Peter's senseless murder.  Here are excepts:

Atlanta police are investigating if the death of a 28-year-old who was fatally shot on Tuesday in an Atlanta suburb as attackers hurled homophobic slurs was motivated by him being gay. 

Ronald “Trey” Peters was walking to work from a public transit station in Decatur when two men in a car demanded he give them his backpack. One got out of the car and confronted him.

“When Trey jerked away from him and said, ‘It’s my bag, you’re not getting it,’ the driver got out with a louder voice yelling, ‘Give him the fucking bag, fag,” witness Kevin Pickering told Atlanta TV station WGCL. “The passenger walked back toward the vehicle and the driver got out and started firing.” The young man was reportedly shot twice.

Police have classified the shooting as hate-motivated, and no arrests have been made connected to the incident, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. However, Georgia has no hate-crimes laws that cover violence motivated by sexual orientation. 

“Unfortunately, this deadly attack is not a rare or isolated event. Rather, this is the latest in a long string of hate-motivated incidents,” Allison Padilla-Goodman, the Southeast regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, said in a statement.

Peters’s death comes in the wake of at least nine trans women being murdered so far this year alone, and just days after Detroit police announced that a recent triple homicide was motivated by anti-LGBTQ sentiment.

A GoFundMe page has been set up to cover the costs of Peters’s memorial.

“[Trey] was taken from this earth in act of violence, but we will not let hate win!” the page reads. “Trey was always giving so much to others, sharing his talents and energy with those around him. He always was willing to help people and had a huge heart. Now it is our turn to give back in honor of him.”

Ultimately, justification for murdering gays traces back to the Bible, a book that is responsible for unspeakable horrors over the centuries - all done in the name of god or justified by the myths handed down from ignorant Bronze Age herders.  Peters' murder is unspeakable, but so too is the fact that so many are clinging to ignorance and and hate based on carefully selected passages from a book with unknown authors who lacked even a shred of scientific and accurate medical knowledge. 

My condolences to Peters' partner, family and friends.  As for his killers and those who fan the flames of homophobia, I hope they burn in Hell.  And yes, that includes the likes of Franklin Graham who is living proof why one might want to leave Christianity. 

Matt Barber - Still a Hate Merchant and Advertisement for Leaving Christianity

Yesterday this blog an others noted that Matt Barber - Assistant Dean at Liberty University's toxic law school - was promoting a columnist who advocated the execution of gays base, naturally, on the "literal word of God" found in Leviticus and a few other phrases in the Bible.  In apparent reaction to the firestorm that resulted (or perhaps the disclosure that the promoted "columnist" had a lengthy criminal record), Barber took down the post advocating for the murder of gays.  Now, Barber seems to think that he is exonerated from all his promotion of anti-gay violence.  This, of course, is anything but the case given Barber's ugly anti-gay history.  Indeed, if Barber is typical of "godly Christians," then decent people should be hastening to flee Christianity entirely.  A piece at Right Wing Watch reminds us of Barber's true role as a constant hate merchant and the ugliness that he promotes daily. Here are some highlights:

[Philip] Stallings’ column has disappeared, and today Barber tweeted at us, “Wow! Thanks for the tip. We obviously weren’t aware of that & find the position appalling. The answer is life in Christ.”

Well. It’s good to have Matt Barber say he finds the idea of executing gay people appalling. We agree.

But if that’s the case he ought to consider vetting the material he promotes a little more carefully. Just over a week ago we noted that BarbWire had run a column praising Pastor Steven Anderson, who has called for the execution of gays, and has said, “You want to know who the biggest hypocrite in the world is? The biggest hypocrite in the world is the person who believes in the death penalty for murderers and not for homosexuals.”

And given how much anti-gay extremism is promoted by Barber and his Religious Right allies, that got us wondering if anything else short of calling for the killing of gay people would cross the line for Barber.

We collected some other statements that Barber apparently doesn’t find appalling, because they’ve all been in columns promoted on his site:

·       * Gays are degenerates.

·       * Transgender people are demonic.

·      *  Gays “have your children as a target”

·       * Pastors who marry same-sex couples are “servants of Satan.”

·        * “The homosexual leaders are the most vile, vicious, and vitriolic people in the world.”

·      *“ISIS is truly the manifestation of the purest form of the homosexual agenda: sodomizing men as both torture and pleasure, and killing those who disagree with them.”

·      * “The fictional ‘rights’ based on homosexual deviance and the genuine, God-given, First Amendment-protected rights of the vast majority of Americans cannot coexist.”

 

Here are some other things we find appalling that Matt Barber seemingly does not:

 

Jeff Allen, a BarbWire editor, compares the gay rights movement to “a malignant cancer” and says, “Each victory for the homosexual activists represents another nail in America’s coffin.”  Allen has supported brutal anti-gay laws in Uganda, Nigeria, and Ethiopia, which include imprisonment not only for sexual conduct but also for joining social clubs or advocating for equality. Allen was upset when criticized for his “innocent mistake” of calling a fake photo of “NAMBLA for Obama” an example of “the undeniable link between homosexuality and pedophilia.” More Allen: “Satanism, sodomy, and slaughter are each part of the Devil’s sinister agenda to destroy America.”

This spring, BarbWire published a column by former Indiana lawmaker Don Boys recounting his attempt to recriminalize homosexuality. In a similar column a few years earlier, Boys had explained that he wanted to make homosexuality a crime punishable by up to twelve years in prison.

Robert Oscar Lopez wrote for BarbWire that almost every situation “involving a same-sex couple with exclusive custody of small children is adult misconduct at best or a crime against humanity at worst.”

BarbWire publishes notorious anti-gay activist Scott Lively, who wrote this summer that the US and its State Department had become “The Great Satan” of the world for opposing anti-gay legislation overseas. Lively has promoted anti-gay policies in Uganda and around the world.

And that’s just a sampling of the anti-gay extremists who have found a home on BarbWire. Not to mention Barber himself, who says he has been “called by God” to “sound the alarm” about the fact that gay sex is always sinful, and “The wages of sin is death.”

Barber is indeed a foul piece of work.  It is individuals like Barber that make me increasingly not to even the moniker of being a Christian.  

8 Ways Christian Fundamentalists Make People Become Agnostics or Atheists

While surveys have shown that religious fundamentalism tends to inversely related to education levels (Episcopalians and Evangelical Lutherans are among the best educated denominations and least likely to believe in the Bible as inerrant), science, reason and knowledge are not the only things that drive individuals from Christianity.  No, the Catholic hierarchy and their Christian fundamentalist allies are do a great job all on their own as they daily demonstrate that the hallmarks of their style of religion are hate and hypocrisy.  And ironically, their constant jihad against gays is one of the leading reasons why people are increasingly converting to agnosticism or atheism.  Yes indeed, rather than "converting people to God's word" they are driving them away.  An article in AlterNet looks at the leading reasons people walk away from Christianity.  Here are excerpts:

If the Catholic bishops, their conservative Protestant allies, and other right-wing fundamentalists had the sole objective of decimating religious belief, they couldn’t be doing a better job of it.

 

[I]f you read ExChristian testimonials you will notice that quite often church leaders or members do things that either trigger the deconversion process or help it along. They may turn a doubter into a skeptic or a quiet skeptic into an outspoken anti-theist, or as one former Christian calls himself, a "devangelist."Here are some top ways Christians push people out the church door or shove secret skeptics out of the closet. Looking at the list, .you can’t help but wonder if the Catholic bishops, Rick Santorum, Michele Bachmann and their fundamentalist allies are working for the devil.

 1. Gay Baiting.   Ignorant and mean-spirited attitudes about homosexuality don’t drive just gays out of the church, they are a huge deconversion issue for straight friends and family members. When Christians indulge in slurs, devout moms and dads who also love their gay kids find themselves less comfortable in their church home. Young people, many of whom think of the gay rights issue as a no-brainer, put anti-gay churches in the “archaic” category. Since most people Gen X and younger recognize equal rights for gays as a matter of common humanity, gay baiting is a wedge issue that wedges young people right out of the church.

2. Proof texting. People who think of the Bible as the literally perfect word of God love to quote excerpts to argue their points.  .   .   .   .   They proceed to quote whatever authoritarian, anti-gay or anti-woman verse makes their point, like,    .    .    .     .   In doing so, they call into question biblical authority, because the Bible writers so obviously got these issues wrong. Literalists who prooftext are a tremendous asset to those who would like to see Bible worship fade away – because prooftexting on one side of an argument invites the same in return, and it is easy to find quotes from the Bible that are either scientifically absurd or morally repugnant.

3. Misogyny. For psychological and social reasons females are more inclined toward religious belief than males. They are more likely to attend church services and to insist on raising their children in a faith community.   .    .   .    but fortunately for atheists, this fact hasn’t caused conservative Christians to back off of sexism that is justified by – you got it – proof texting from the Old and New Testaments.    .    .    .   Between 1991 and 2011 the percent of women attending church in a typical week dropped by 11 points, from 55 to 44 percent.

4. Hypocrisy. Christians are taught – and many believe—that thanks to the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit they are a moral beacon for society.   .    .    .    But the added pressure on those who call themselves the "righteous” means that believers also are prone to hiding, pretending, posing, and turning a blind eye to their own very human, very normal faults and flaws.  .     .      .    People who desperately want to be sanctified and righteous, “cleansed by the blood of the lamb” – who need to believe that they now merit heaven but that other people’s smallest transgressions merit eternal torture—have a lot of motivation to engage in self-deception and hypocrisy.    .    .   .   Backbiting and social shunning are part of the church-lady stereotype for a reason. They also leave a bitter taste that makes some church members stop drinking the Kool-aid. 

5. Disgusting and Immoral Behavior. The priest abuse scandal did more for the New Atheist movement than outspoken anti-theists like Christopher Hitchens (God is Not Great), Richard Dawkins (The God Delusion), Sam Harris (The End of Faith) or Bill Maher (Religulous) ever could.  .    .    .   .   The Freedom from Religion Foundation publishes a bi-monthly newspaper that includes a regular feature: The Black Collar Crime Blotter. It features fraud, drug abuse, sex crimes and more by Protestant as well as Catholic clergy. 

6. Science Denial. One of my former youth group friends had his faith done in by a conversation with a Bible study leader who explained that dinosaur skeletons actually are the bones of the giants described in early books of the Bible.  .   .   .   .   science denial doesn’t just move believers to nonbelief; it also rallies opposition ranging from cantankerous bloggers to legal advocates. It provides fodder for comedians and critics: “If the world was created 6,000 years ago, what’s fueling your car?” It may produce some of the most far-reaching opposition to religious belief, because science advocates argue that faith, even socially benign faith, is a fundamentally flawed way of knowing. 

 7. Political Meddling. If you look at religion-bashing quote-quip-photo-clip-links that circulate Facebook and Twitter, most of them are prompted by church incursions into the political sphere.   .   .   .   .   I myself give George W. Bush credit for transforming me from a politically indifferent, digging-in-the-garden agnostic into a culture warrior. He casually implied that, when going to war, he didn’t need to consult with his own father because he had consulted the big guy in the sky, and my evangelical relatives backed him up on that, and I thought, oh my God, the beliefs I was raised on are killing people. The Religious Right, and now the Catholic bishops, have brought religion into politics in the ugliest possible way short of holy war, and people who care about the greater good have taken notice.

8. Intrusion.  [S]erious intrusions, in deeply personal beginning- and end-of-life decisions, for example, generate reactive anti-theism in people who mostly just want to live and let live.  Catholic and evangelical conservatives have made a high-stakes gamble that they can regain authoritarian control over their flocks and hold onto the next generation of believers (and tithers) by asserting orthodox dogmas, making Christian belief an all-or-nothing proposition.   .   .   .   .   the more they resort to strict authoritarianism, insularity and strict interpretation of Iron Age texts, the more people are wounded in the name of God and the more people are outraged. By making Christian belief an all-or-nothing proposition, they force at least some would-be believers to choose “nothing.” Anti-theists are all too glad to help.

Nowadays, when I hear someone proclaim that they are a Christian - frequently in inappropriate settings where such statements ought not even be made -  it's usually one or more of the foregoing characteristics/actions that springs to mind.  Believe me, it's almost nothing of a positive nature.  Let's hope the bishops and their Christianist allies continue killing Christianity - or at least their foul version of it.

The Growing Trend to "De-Baptize"

Both the Catholic Church and Christianist oriented churches have done much to give religion and Christianity a very ugly, although accurate face. The main tenants come across as based on hate, fear and prejudice and bigotry. The result is that in America, the fast growing religious segment is made up of those who check the "no religion" box on surveys. In Europe among Catholics, a new movement consists of those opting to be "de-baptized" and formally end their membership in the Church which has proven to be a thoroughly morally bankrupt institution with the protection of child rapist by the Church hierarchy the norm rather than the exception. I will concede that I myself contacted the bishop of the diocese in which I reside and demanded that my name be formally removed from Church membership and that I be placed on a list of "do not contact," Why would I want to be part of an institution whose leadership makes Mafia leaders look pious in comparison? Articles in both Opposing Views and the Huffington Post look at the growing exodus of Catholics from the Church. Here are highlights from the HuffPo piece:

PARIS (RNS) A decade ago, Rene Lebouvier requested that his local Catholic church erase his name from the baptismal register. The church noted his demands on the margins of its records and the chapter was closed.

But the clergy abuse scandals rocking Europe, coupled with Pope Benedict XVI's conservative stances on contraception, hardened Lebouvier's views. Last October, a court in Normandy ruled in favor of his lawsuit to have his name permanently deleted from church records -- making the 71-year-old retiree the first Frenchman to be officially "de-baptized."

Lebouvier's case is among a growing wave of de-baptisms in Europe, one of the most visible manifestations of the continent's secular drift. Websites offering informal de-baptism certificates have mushroomed. Other Christians are formally breaking from the church by opting out of state church taxes.

[E]xperts and secular activists count the numbers of de-baptisms in the tens of thousands. It's a phenomenon that has touched Protestant as well as Catholic communities.

Still, Lebouvier's case may create a precedent. The local bishop of Coutances, Stanislas Lalanne, has appealed the court ruling, a process that could take years. . . . if Lebouvier wins, de-baptism could become standard practice here, and trigger copycat lawsuits across Europe. "The church is afraid the movement might amplify," said Marc Blondel, president of the Paris-based National Federation of Freethinkers, who says he will launch another de-baptism drive if Lebouvier prevails.

In neighboring Belgium, which has been hit hard by the church sex scandals, de-baptism requests in the French-speaking region alone soared to roughly 2,000 in 2010, compared to 66 two years earlier, according to the Brussels Federation of Friends of Secular Morality. The numbers of people reportedly leaving the Dutch church reportedly shot up 25 percent.

In Britain, a de-baptism certificate offered as a joke by the National Secular Society has since turned serious after tens of thousands of people downloaded it.

In Germany, a record 181,000 Catholics formally split from the Catholic Church in 2011 -- the first time that Catholic defections outpaced Protestants leaving. Rather than requesting de-baptisms, Germans fill out government paperwork saying they no longer want to pay church taxes. . . . they don't want to be connected with the church hierarchy,"

The bigger worry, experts say, are plummeting rates of new baptisms. Half a century ago, for example, 90 percent of French children were baptized, said Sorbonne University religion professor Philippe Portier. Today, roughly one in three are. The church considers de-baptisms a very marginal phenomena and its strategy right now is to resist it," Portier said. "It is much more active when it comes to reversing the drop in (new) baptisms. . .

The Catholic Church has brought these growing defections upon itself through the hierarchy's immorality and the Church's efforts to cling to 13th century science and beliefs. Nothing sends a message to the corrupt Church leaders than having members of the laity "vote with their feet." I hope the "de-baptism" trend grows and that new baptisms continue to plummet. Only then will a toxic institution perhaps begin to reform itself. I hope more sheeple in the pews in America will open their eyes and likewise formally exit the Church.

American Catholic Church’s Crisis of Attrition

There is an interesting article in Commonweal Magazine that looks at a silent crisis in the Roman Catholic Church in America that the U. S. bishops and the Vatican seem to be deliberately ignoring. What is it? The huge numbers of people leaving the Catholic Church. Indeed, the anti-gay, pro-discrimination stances of the corrupt, bitter old men in Rome and cathedrals around the USA seem to be fueling the defections. Personally, I see the huge number of people leaving the Church to be a positive since only falling membership numbers - and more importantly, declining revenues, are the only things that matter to the Vatican and the Nazi Pope. Eventually, the Church will have to change or effectively withdraw for the modern world and become a third world religion as educated populations give up on the Church and its 12th century mind set. Here are some story highlights:
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[T]he Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life’s U.S. Religious Landscape Survey, based on interviews with a representative sample of thirty-five thousand adult Americans, reported that one out of every three adult Americans who were raised Catholic have left the church. If these ex-Catholics were to form a single church, they would constitute the second largest church in the nation.
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Thomas Reese, SJ, the former editor of America, recently described this loss of one-third of those raised Catholic as “a disaster.” He added, “You wonder if the bishops have noticed.” I wonder too. As far as I know, there has never been any systematic discussion of these findings at the meetings of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. They will meet again in mid-November, with an agenda that will deal with many things—but not with these devastating losses.
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Last summer, for example, conservative Catholic New York Times columnist Ross Douthat wrote in the Atlantic that “for millions in Europe and America,” Catholicism is “finished”—“permanently associated with sexual scandal, rather than the gospel of Jesus Christ.” The word “finished” evidently struck a nerve. Many commentators on blogs, apart from the predictably querulous or bitter, poignantly described how for themselves or family members a once-strong Catholic faith was reaching some point of no return.
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According to the Pew survey, about half of that one-third leaving the church enter the ranks of the fastest-growing religious group in the nation, the “nones,” people who tell pollsters they have no particular religious affiliation . . . Catholics becoming unaffiliated stressed disagreement with church teachings, both general teachings and church positions on specific issues like abortion, homosexuality, and treatment of women, and to a lesser extent clerical celibacy. In open-ended questioning, they also stressed hypocrisy and other moral and spiritual failures of church leaders and fellow Catholics.
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“Catholicism,” the Pew study found, “has lost more people to other religions or to no religion at all than any other single religious group.”
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I suspect that the trend will continue, if not accelerate, as the Church hierarchy becomes more and more reactionary and as a result less and less relevant in a modern world where science and objective fact undercut a warped theology.

Americans Are Leaving Christianity at Rate Four Times That of Those Joining

There are those who attack me for saying that the Christianists are killing Christianity, but a new survey done by the Barna Group confirms that Americans are leaving Christianity at a rate four times greater than the rate of those converting to Christianity. Not surprisingly, among the driving factors are the perception that religious leaders are hypocrites and disagreement with church positions on specific issues such as homosexuality, abortion or birth control. In other bad news for the Christianists, another Barna study documents the decline in teenagers' involvement in Christian related activities.

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Sooner or later a belief system that rejects knowledge, encourages hatred towards others, and is lead by pompous, money and power mad leaders is going to run into trouble. To be clear, I do not condemn all Christians or all Christian denominations. However, the far right elements of Christianity in the USA leading the so-called culture wars are the ones getting the media coverage and in the process sending out a truly ugly image to the world. This ugly form of Christianity deserves to die and, frankly, the sooner the better. The Barna study results also show that religion/faith are anything but immutable - something that may yet bite the Christianists in the ass when they argue against civil equality for LGBT Americans. Here are highlights from the Barna survey analysis:
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Anne Rice is not alone. She shares a spiritual profile with nearly 60 million other adults nationwide. In the Barna study, the matter of faith switching was explored in several ways. . . . nearly one-quarter of adults (23%) had moved from one faith or faith tradition to another.
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The most common type of spiritual shift was from those who were Christian, Protestant or Catholic in childhood to those who currently report being atheist, agnostic or some other faith. In total, this group represents about one out of every eight adults (12%), a category that might be described as ex-Christians. Converts to Christianity (those converting from another faith or from non-belief as a child to the Christian faith as an adult) represent 3% of the population.
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The most common reasons for moving away from Christianity included life experiences, such as gaining new knowledge or education; feeling disillusioned with church and religion; feeling the church is hypocritical; having negative experiences in churches; being in disagreement with Christianity about specific issues such as homosexuality, abortion or birth control; feeling the church is too authoritarian; wanting to express their faith outside of church; and searching for a new faith or wanting to experience other religions.
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With respect to declining teenager involvement, the Barna Group found among other things as follows:
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Sunday school participation has declined from 35% of all teenagers in 1997 to 30% of teens in the current study; small group attendance was down from 30% to 21%; the proportion of teens who reported donating any of their own money to church has softened from 35% to 26% over the last dozen years; and even the typically ubiquitous practice of prayer has dropped from 81% to 71% among teens since 1997.
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[E]ven when compared to past behavior among self-identified Catholic teens, today’s young Catholics exhibit diminished religious engagement. The current data show that Catholic teens are less likely to attend Sunday school, small groups, and to donate than were Catholic teenagers 12 years ago.
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I hope Benedict XVI, James Dobson, Tony Perkins and others who traffic in intolerance and the denigration of others are pleased with their handiwork. People are watching and the nasty, un-Christian, Pharisee like behavior is not going unnoticed.

Count Me Out: Defection from the Roman Catholic Church - Update

I did a post recently about a website named "Count Me Out" which focuses on Catholics seeking to leave the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland. I've received reader comments and e-mails on the post which caused me to do a little research and it turns out that the process described on the website tracks a policy called "ACTUS FORMALIS DEFECTIONIS AB ECCLESIA CATHOLICA" released by the Vatican in 2006. That pronouncement - which seems aimed at making it difficult to be deleted from the Catholic head count - can be found here. Merely, being a so-called lapsed Catholic does not take one off of the Church's membership rolls. Indeed, short of formal, legalistic action, one more or less remains a Catholic on the Church's books until death. One reader from Texas sent me details on his experience in formally getting removed from the Church membership rolls:

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I did this last year and the Dallas Diocese made me jump through hoops to do it. I wrote to them asking for information on the process and was repeatedly told that I should come in for a chat about my decision to formerly leave the church, which I refused to do (I had no desire to be preached at or made to feel guilty for my decision). Finally, after I sent them a formal letter stating my intent to leave the church and why, they gave me the information that I needed. I still haven't heard back from the parish of my baptism regarding the letters I had to send them.
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Basically it's a three step process, or so they told me. 1)You need to send them a letter manifesting your internal decision to leave and directed to a suitable church authority (for me it was a parish I had never, ever, attended); 2) Their formal acknowledgment of the letter; 3) Involves notifying the parish of your baptism (you need a copy of your baptismal certificate) and you should request in writing that the pastor make a notation into the baptismal register which indicates your "departure from the Catholic Church by a formal act." You will need to send a copy of their formal acknowledgment (step 2) to them [the parish] as well.

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Out of curiosity - as well as a desire to make sure that I wasn't being used to falsely inflate Church membership figures, I sent off a letter today to the Bishop of the Diocese of Richmond. I will post an update on whatever response I receive from the Bishop and happily share any forms I receive with any readers that want them. Here's the body of my letter:
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Dear Bishop Lorenzo:
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I ceased attending the Roman Catholic Church in 2001. Since that time I have joined the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Because of (1) the gross failure of the Catholic Church to discipline the bishops, cardinals and –in my opinion Popes – who were involved in the enabling and cover up of sexual abuse against minors and (2) the Church’s activities in limiting the CIVIL law rights of same sex couples (e.g., Proposition 8, Question no.1 in Maine, etc.), I wish to formally severe any and all ties that would allow me to in any manner be considered a Roman Catholic.
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I have in my possession a form that appears to be in the process of being utilized by a web site (http://www.countmeout.ie/how/) for those in Ireland who wish to declare their formal defection from the Catholic Church. I would appreciate it if you could provide me with the requisite form or forms for me to accomplish this goal. I have a number of others who are interested in pursuing this process and I will forward them the copies of the form/forms. If there is a website where the forms are available, please furnish me with the web address. A copy of my Baptismal Certificate is attached for your reference.

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I know a large number of LGBT individuals who have walked away from the Catholic Church. It would be a shame to allow the Church to number us all as still Catholic in order to hide the fact that people are leaving because of the Church's corruption and anti-gay policies.

Survey Shows Decrease in Louisiana Catholics

I have maintained for some time that the Roman Catholic Church's refusal to address the issue of bishops and cardinals who enabled and/or covered up the sexual abuse of minors by priests and other Catholic clergy would eventually take a toll on Church membership and such seems to be the case in Louisiana based on a new American Religious Identification Survey that shows a significant drop in the number of residents identifying as Catholic. At least so reports the Daily Reveille. Given the Church hierarchy's continued rejection of modern knowledge on numerous issues - including sexual orientation - I suspect that the decline will continue except in backwards and uneducated parts of the world where the Vatican can still get away with its old ways and man made dogmas. Here are some story highlights:

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Scott Louque grew up indoctrinated in the Roman Catholic Church. After 22 years in the faith, the agricultural business senior abandoned his upbringing looking for something more. American Religious Identification Survey shows the population of Catholics in Louisiana has decreased 16 percent compared to survey figures gathered in 1990.“Younger people by and large are more likely not to identify with their parents’ religion,” said religious studies assistant professor Michael Pasquier said.

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This generational gap, along with migration of citizens out of Louisiana for economic reasons, has played a major part in this reduction of number of Catholics in the state, Pasquier said.

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Pasquier said the root cause for the priest shortage comes from changing social climate after World War II movement giving people new social causes to participate in besides religion.Catholics found different ways to benefit society like participating in or against the civil rights movement instead of trying to do good to society by joining an order in the church, Pasquier said.“Today, the reason for the[priest] shortage continuing has a lot to do with the sex abuse scandals which perpetuate a distrust of the priesthood,” Pasquier said.

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The reality s that modern, educated citizens will find it increasingly difficult to cling to the 13th century view of the world, science and sexuality favored by Pope Benedict XVI and similar bitter old queens in dresses at the Vatican. If Catholics continue to vote with their feet, perhaps some day change will come to the Church. However, I am not holding my breath to see it happen in my lifetime.