Evolving Religion in America

G

GT WT

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Atheism up. Mainline Protestant religions down.

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The study does a good job at describing the "What" but not the "How" or "Why". I'm sure some on this board would take an uneducated stab at it. I'm not sure the question is easy.
 
Mainline protestant churches have been decreasing in numbers for quite some time - nothing new. In part, it's because they've embraced more of a liberal theology and have watered down the gospel. Evangelical churches that are not part of the mainline denominations (ex: Southern Baptist is not considered mainline) have not seem similar decreases.
 
i actually saw an interesting documentary on the history channel last night that said the events and miracles people witnessed in the bible were real but that they were caused by aliens and that is how they were interpreted. also compared interesting similarities between civilizations around the world and weird drawings depicting aliens.

this has nothing to do with the post really but i wanted to add it.
 
Actually, the SBC has seen a (slight) drop in membership. (but for a denomination that puts an emphasis on evangelism, anything less than continued growth is bad news.)

And even the denominations that are registering increases are seeing a decline in the rate of increase. Some are blaming it on post-Baby Boom America.

LINK

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NEWDOC is 100% correct. The question of why? is exceedingly hard to answer. Just like any other major historical trend there are a number of resasons both posited and then attempted to be quantified as to the size of their contribution.
Indeed, liberal theologies, but more likely the 'social gospel' is one reason mainline denominations are down. Of course, I am in the fastest shrinking mainline denomination in the US, but we are also one of the fastest growing denominations in around the world. Go figure that one out!
Also, the very nature of what the church is is changing in America. Many believers, including people I knew in seminary, no longer 'attend church.' They meet as small groups in people's homes. They don't get measured by all church going type statistics.
It is all very complex indeed. I also would say that instead of atheism being the big 'winner,' apathy and not really knowing what to believe is what is rising the fastest. This is truly scary to me, because I concur with the sentiments of the old country song, "you got to stand for something, or you'll fall for anything." As a Christian, an atheist is much less 'scary' than someone who has no idea what they believe or why they believe it.
 
I definitely agree with the main thought that the phenomenum of religous belief is very complex and is in itself not measured by the participation in mainline religions. That such institutions go up and down in popularity likely has little to do with the fact that people everywhere all the time are giving rise to what amounts to religious thought.

That what comes naturally to folks is channeled into religious institutions has to do with the availability and purpose of those institutions. They don't cause the belief, they use it.
 
I am not as deep a thinker as many on these boards, but I perceive a shift to the idea that faith and religion are very different things, and you can have a whole lot of one and very little of the other. Any number of scandals involving clergy, particularly television clergy, give proof of this.

My parents were the two most spiritual people I've ever known, yet they were not church-goers.
 
My wife is a non-denominational minister who marries couples on a regular basis. When she meets with a couple, almost ONE HUNDRED PERCENT of the time, they begin by describing themselves as "spiritual, but not religious."

In modern America, a LOT of folks are turned off by religious institutions. They don't like what they see in mass media -- blame that on biased media coverage, or blame it on the type of religious groups that insert themselves into the news, it really doesn't matter -- it's a reality.

But they have faith of some sort. They believe in a higher power. The seek "truth." But modern insitutions often come across as not very tolerant of those who are hesitant and unsure about the journey.

If you only really accept people who profess to know THE answer (e.g., Jesus Christ is my lord and savior), then you aren't very welcoming to those who are just beginning to ask the question.
 
But no one part of an elephant contradicts another part. Rather the parts work together to give us a glimpse of the general animal. I would never say that there can’t be multiple perspectives on God. We see him from different angles, and in different fades of light. But there is an important difference in saying that we see the same God in different ways, versus saying that we are seeing different gods.

But forget the loaded connotations that we carry for “God” for just a minute and consider the following question at face value: Can two contradictory explanations both be true? Or, can you imagine any situation in nature in which two contradictory explanations are both demonstrably true?
 
Coel
You ask if two contradictory ideas can be true. Or something along those lines. Lets set aside the meaning of contradictory for the moment, and focus on true.

I define 'true" as havng the highest possible fidelity with objective reality - the known universe.

Multiple, mutually exclusive theories can have equal fidelity to the observed reality.

So with this pair of assumptions, two contradictory ideas can be judged "true". Yet, this conflicts with our intuitive understanding of the word, which is overwhelmingly singular in origin of meaning.

Many folks would hold that different religious views have different levels of fidelity with reality. My own view is they have different levels of failure in this regard, but thats sort of like polarity and not crucial to the question.

Bottom line, logically, (in both physics and mathmatics) there can exist equally true contradictory propositions. In human culture, this concept is almost always rejected out of hand, especially in religious matters.
 
The "truth" as mentioned above seems to be more along the lines of understanding god in a physical and empirical sense, thus, science is a far better mechanism to achieve this truth than is religion.

You are talking about a philosophical, or metaphysical "truth". You might as well use astrology as your vehicle for this pursuit if you're going to argue for Christianity.

Christianity, most of it anyway, views the bible as the word of god, even the inspired, inerrant word of god. By definition, they are locked into what the text says or how the text is interpreted. Some of the believers are so locked into their ways that they refuse to accept that the earth is more than 10,000 years old or that man and dinosaurs did not co-exist or that the earth really wansn't covered with water during Noah's flood.

In reply to:
Click to expand...
 
Boon
No, I mean't "can". See Godel's proof for the mathmatical possibility. See my post context for the physical possibility.

Its rare. Humans dont' like ambiguity. They especially can't really stomach, naturally, contradictions with equivalent claim to truth. So, we deny its even possible, even though it is possible.

Hardly ever actually happens, and no one admits to it. But its possible.
 
NB,
I'm not positive, but I think Godel showed that it is impossible to prove the consistency of a mathematical type of system. In other words, it is impossible to prove that there don't exist contradictory statements, or there exist statements which cannot be proven true or false from within the system.

that is very different from there existing contradictory statements within a mathematical system. in fact, if that was shown it would be much bigger than godel;s theorem

of course i may be wrong
 
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