As America tries to catch up with Europe in declining church attendance, some people are actually trying to figure out why no one likes religion anymore.
This article from the Washington Post entitled A Faith for The Nones depicts the vast majority of 20-somethings (called “nones”) who are secular and religiously unaffiliated. Put off by the legalism and political nature of the institutional church, the article describes the unfortunately polarized state of religion in the United States. What is really insightful about this article is that they actually have the right solution! A rare thing indeed.
But Putnam regards the growth of the “nones” as a spike, not a permanent trend. The young, in general, are not committed secularists. “They are not in church, but they might be if a church weren’t like the religious right. . . . There are almost certain to be religious entrepreneurs to fill that niche with a moderate evangelical religion, without political overtones.”
In the diverse, fluid market of American religion there may be a demand, in other words, for grace, hope and reconciliation — for a message of compassion and healing that appeals to people of every political background. It would be revolutionary — but it would not be new.
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Confirms many of our suspicions, doesn’t it Alex? At the same time, am I the only one who notes a certain smugness and self-justification on the part of some ‘nones’ which borders on the obnoxious?
Fueled by Dawkin’s underinformed straw-man theology, some seem to revel in their unbelief, a state which many of us would simply call mis-belief. I was at a conference on Friday where one of the audience members asked a presenter about Nietzsche’s ‘madman’ who ran into the marketplace exclaiming ‘God is dead!’, to which the presenter responded, ‘There are many parts of God in the popular imagination which need to die.’ What he meant was that the culture has imbibed in the idea that Christianity has more to do with politics, social mores, rules, and fairy tales than it does with the things your article mentions and the things Mockingbird symbolizes.
Well said, Dylan!
That’s what they say, and that’s what I’ve always thought, but another truth out there is that the mainline denominations have been an alternative to the religious right and 20 somethings aren’t flocking there either. See this blog post: http://bit.ly/cJ22A on the irreversible decline of the mainlines. The lower the tension with societal norms the more consistent the decline.
There has to be an alternative to the judgmentalism and yet a vibrant, articulated, definable and discernible counter-cultural gospel that brings life.
paulvk, I would also say that the decline of mainlines is because of their political emphasis as oppossed to grace and forgiveness. the Christian right are not the only ones involved in politics, they just have larger congregations. Believe me, if you didn’t read the New York Times on Sunday pop into most ELCA, TEC, PCUSA, churches in NYC and they will fill you in with their own personal anti-bush spin.
Michael Gerson has an interesting preview of an upcoming Putnam book that weights into this discussion. http://bit.ly/7SrHg Confirms how religious right’s campaigns repulsed as well as attracted.
“In the diverse, fluid market of American religion there may be a demand, in other words, for grace, hope and reconciliation”The thing that’s been really interesting for me over the last year is that Christianity doesn’t have to be the vehicle for this. It can give some decent ins to provide those things to people though.
dpotter….you hit the nail mon the head.The truth is so many people can`t see the gospel as love,grace,healing,hope reconciliation etc,cause so many other accumulations in Church and its environs have gotten in the way.
If people flocking to a church = that church is “doing something right”, and people staying away = that church is “doing something wrong”, then Jesus did things right part of the time, and did things wrong part of the time, because he experienced both a massive following and a massive rejection. I just don’t think we can read much into those tea leaves, but I can tell you the option preferred by the church administrator, and the one that makes preachers feel they have a “successful ministry.”