KM - that is total BS, at least here in Western Washinton, allegedly a secular state. Sin is discussed and understood in every congregation I have heard of, you are quoting wing nut talking points. Again, studies (see Barna, conservative Christian) points out repeatedly that there is very little difference between materialism, divorce, other chicanery regardless of religious belief or lack thereof. It is true that some right wing religious (note I said some) love to do the talk, but as most of us have observed the more they do the talk, the less likely they are to do the walk.
If you're talking about the loons that have inspired this project, then no, they haven't gotten rid of sin. They've relabeled sin to be things they hate, like Democrats, affordable health care, and homosexuals.
I don't know what the mainstream denominations have done, and I'm assuming they aren't behind this kind of fundie nonsense either.
I don't believe these folks could be fundamentalists. Fundamentalists believe the Bible is the inspired word of God and would not mess with it.
Res the general issue of infallibility: Conservatives are no different than liberals, or moderates, or sociopaths, or congenital do-gooders. We all are cafeteria catholics, protestants, fundies, mainliners, etc etc. Whether is it scripture, tradition, the pope - people like what they like, and ignore what they don't. Once you come to realize this, it all becomes a great topic of humor.
KM - that is total BS, at least here in Western Washinton, allegedly a secular state. Sin is discussed and understood in every congregation I have heard of, you are quoting wing nut talking points. Again, studies (see Barna, conservative Christian) points out repeatedly that there is very little difference between materialism, divorce, other chicanery regardless of religious belief or lack thereof. It is true that some right wing religious (note I said some) love to do the talk, but as most of us have observed the more they do the talk, the less likely they are to do the walk.
I don't think I qualify as a wingnut, I'm just describing my experience in the mainline in the Midwest and in northern Virginia, and particularly with the national leadership of my former denomination. And I don't know what the Barna studies have to do with this - I never was trying to contrast the nonreligious with the religious on ethical matters.
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kmw - did not mean to imply you were, just that this has been a talking point of them. What Barna, and everyone else who has studied this, Christianity Today is another conservative example, have something pretty significant to say. When conservatives get on their high horse regarding how they are more moral, and more observant of sinful behavior than 'liberals', they are speaking out of ignorance. Conservatives (some) may talk about the importance of (not) sinning, but no evidence that they behave any better -talk is cheap and does not mean a damn thing if not backed up by action. It is time for conservative religion to get off this particular hobby horse. They only damage their credibility.
ps - I do not think liberals are more moral than conservatives, obviously
Oh, and we're in total agreement- there is a serious problem among Christians when rates of infidelity, divorce, and other social problems are nearly identical between the religious and the nonreligious. Hypocrisy is a major issue, but the solution IMO is not to downplay sin (as I saw in my time in the mainline) but rather to call all to repentance. Church leadership by example is a major factor.
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"If it felt good, you didn't push hard enough. It's supposed to hurt like hell." - Dean Karnazes' track coach, Ultramarathon Man
"My baby's soft and sweet, somewhere between a flower and a gun" - fiction family
Oh, and we're in total agreement- there is a serious problem among Christians when rates of infidelity, divorce, and other social problems are nearly identical between the religious and the nonreligious. Hypocrisy is a major issue, but the solution IMO is not to downplay sin (as I saw in my time in the mainline) but rather to call all to repentance. Church leadership by example is a major factor.
Saw a study done a few months back I will try to find it but it basically showed that at Private Christian High schools the rate of Virginity was higher on average but also the rate of Oral and Anal sex was far more prevalent then at regular Public High schools. My wife showed it to me and I laughed my ass off. I guess its all about perceptions really.
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there is a serious problem among Christians when rates of infidelity, divorce, and other social problems are nearly identical between the religious and the nonreligious.
I don't understand why anyone would think it would be different. Are Christians supposed to be morally superior to everyone else?
And then theres that little thing with high rates of violence and the world's highest incarceration rate despite the U.S. being one of the most religious countries.
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I don't understand why anyone would think it would be different. Are Christians supposed to be morally superior to everyone else?
And then theres that little thing with high rates of violence and the world's highest incarceration rate despite the U.S. being one of the most religious countries.
Its too much guilt and oppression drives them to do naughty naughty things just ask Haggard, Swaggert, and all the rest of the fallen angels.
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When conservatives get on their high horse regarding how they are more moral, and more observant of sinful behavior than 'liberals', they are speaking out of ignorance.
Or they're marketing their brand. Same thing with conservative leaders who say it's unpatriotic to criticize American policy when we have a conservative Republican president but cheer on the tea parties when a liberal Democrat is in the White House.
They don't love America when their guys are in power or hate America when the other side gets a shot at unfucking all the problems their guys created. They just love themselves and their brand.
I don't understand why anyone would think it would be different. Are Christians supposed to be morally superior to everyone else?
Thoughtful persons, Christian or otherwise, put effort into staying married, doing a good job as parents, being kind and doing good to their neighbors. By some of these measures conservative Christians, particular service to community, do better than typical Americans. Churches do a lot to support marriages and children. Some denominations again show some significant results. It is a puzzlement that it has not made all that much difference. I suspect that economic and demographic elements are more significant than what a Church adds to the mix.
I don't understand why anyone would think it would be different. Are Christians supposed to be morally superior to everyone else?
I don't think this is quite fair.
There is a reason why the prayer reads: "lead me not into temptation." I don't believe the moral superiority of believers is amongst the doctrines of any major Christian church.
It is true that one traditional Protestant belief in at least some denominations has been that those who have been saved will reveal it in how they live their lives. There is an ebb and flow of this, and at times it does verge on something similar to what you say.
In the most radical formulation, those who are amongst the elect can do no wrong, for God's will informs all their actions. This, however, has always been considered a dangerous delusion by the major denominations. And there are a number of elements in Christian thinking that run directly counter to this.
First, of course, is the fact that you can never really know that you are, in fact, saved. The feeling of assurance is what believers strive for, because wrestling with your soul's status is highly stressful. However, it is widely recognized that the feeling of assurance is itself very dangerous. It could be a trap one's inflated sense of self sets for one's soul, leading to "complacency" where more striving is needed.
But beyond whether one is, in fact, saved, most denominations consider those who are saved to be still sinful, flawed creatures who must still struggle against their selfish, sinful dispositions. This is why Christians often do not act all that shocked when some prominent person amongst them turns out to have clay feet. Everybody does. Everybody can slip up. I think I read somewhere the term "moral athlete" used to describe Christians. It is well to remember that athletic events are a struggle in which one has to give one's maximum effort to succeed.
It's still interesting at the differences in the behavioral outcomes between:
* "Try to be good but if you can't you've got a Get Out of Jail Free card"
vs.
* "Do your best to be good to others, because this is the only chance you get"
Sounds good on paper, but in practice the former doesn't really instill the values you'd hope in the majority.
Maybe, but the first is pretty near the essence of the Christian view as I understand it. Trying to live a decent moral life is an exceeding difficult job, 24/7, because we all have in us strong forces pushing us in the opposite direction. Even when we do something good, there is often something in it for us, even if it is just a smug sense that we are do-gooders.
Maybe, but the first is pretty near the essence of the Christian view as I understand it. Trying to live a decent moral life is an exceeding difficult job, 24/7, because we all have in us strong forces pushing us in the opposite direction.
It doesn't hurt that Christianity has defined a very arbitrary set of morals that, while they do contain a kernel of rationality, are largely unintuitive and out of place outside the Bronze Age, either.
So of course it's easy to frame things like "got horny cause a girl ran by in spandex" as "evil forces pushing me to immorality".
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Even when we do something good, there is often something in it for us, even if it is just a smug sense that we are do-gooders.
And thus the tautology. Selfishness isn't inherently a bad thing, because there are checks that push us towards altruism at the same time.
It doesn't take much of a paradigm shift to redefine morality so that it *isn't* a constant struggle.
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But beyond whether one is, in fact, saved, most denominations consider those who are saved to be still sinful, flawed creatures who must still struggle against their selfish, sinful dispositions. This is why Christians often do not act all that shocked when some prominent person amongst them turns out to have clay feet. Everybody does. Everybody can slip up.
I've grown up in a Protestant church and don't really see that at all.
Seems to me like every time a prominent church leader is "outed" in some hypocrisy, many are shocked.
Because like you said, they're all struggling stressfully for their salvation. And if the leaders are making the "big" sins and clearly not qualifying for the prize, what hope do they have?
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Because like you said, they're all struggling stressfully for their salvation. And if the leaders are making the "big" sins and clearly not qualifying for the prize, what hope do they have?
They can always take whats behind curtain number 3!
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They can always take whats behind curtain number 3!
I wish, but that's truly not an option for most of them. Combine eschatological fear with extreme social/family pressures to hold to doctrine, and they're pretty much locked in the room looking at the "Salvation" and "Damnation" doors. The William Wallace FREEDAHM door is covered up.
I don't consider myself above this nor immune to it in any way. While RedWifey and I believe we have chosen door #3, we sure haven't told our family and church friends about it. So we try to quietly love people from inside the place while simultaneously disagreeing with most of them on what they consider to be core issues. It's like a stealth liberation effort, with a good dose of our own self-preservation and conflict avoidance.
We try to do it humbly though, because none of us really know if we're right anyway.
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I wonder how many of your fellow congregants feel the same way, but are afraid to mention it?
The big thing I learned as a Catholic is that people who go to the same church on Sundays generally act on their beliefs in very different ways, according to their own values.
Three-quarters of Catholics either never go to confession or go once a year or less, so you have to think the overwhelming majority have found a system of behavior they can live with, or at least not feel too guilty about.
Vast numbers of religious people do not worry or think in terms of salvation. We are called to love justice, do good, be thankful etc. Let God, fate etc. take care of afterlife, salvation. Usually such people assume God, fate etc is good.
That's an excellent question, Lou, and I've thought a lot about it. But I don't really have any data to support my opinions to follow (although Barna does great work in this area and some of it is on my reading list).
In general I think people are people, regardless of religion (as RobLL noted earlier). And in general, most people don't get all riled up about any religion's claims of divine inspiration and rules for life, even if it's the religion of their family legacy. Of the 1,000 people whom are members at our church, I'd say most fit into this "meh" category of caring about the details of doctrine and denominationalism.
But I don't ever get to talk to those people at church, because they show up late and leave as soon as possible, never hanging around for class studies or special events. My conversations mostly happen with the more "dedicated" and they usually care more about the finer points our church teaches.
For example, our church's website has a "What We Believe" page with 26 points on it. I'm onboard with 10. My guess is that most church members have several items on the list that they don't care about.
This is the dominant trend, IMO, and I'd say America is on its way to looking more like Europe in the way of religion. But every trend has a simultaneous, smaller, energetic counter-trend, and we are certainly seeing that from the fundamentalist groups.
I'm the fourth generation in my family who has attended the same small denomination, and this is a point of great pride from my parents and grandparents. No kids have "strayed" so far.
But if I had to guess, I'd say that at least one of my three kids will be the first to leave the denomination. If RedWifey and I don't beat them to it, anyway.
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I'm the fourth generation in my family who has attended the same small denomination, and this is a point of great pride from my parents and grandparents. No kids have "strayed" so far.
My wife's family has that same multigenerational attachment to their church. Both her grandfathers were ministers, along with a few uncles. They're extremely doctrinaire in the specifics of their beliefs, so there's not much room for conversation.
My wife takes the kids to the church when she can, but I think everyone understands she's doing that for her parents' happiness, not because our kids enjoy it or share any of the church's specific beliefs.
The only part I find disturbing is the sense that the church's most politically conservative members, including my in-laws, have conflated their religious beliefs with secular politics. To them, it's become a seamless belief system: God is good, Obama is bad.
On the bright side, they don't believe liberals are going to hell, because there's an escape clause for people who aren't intelligent enough to understand the difference between truth and propaganda. We don't get into the best parts of heaven, but at least we aren't condemned to hell.
My wife's family has that same multigenerational attachment to their church. Both her grandfathers were ministers, along with a few uncles. They're extremely doctrinaire in the specifics of their beliefs, so there's not much room for conversation.
Wow, that's exactly my family! Ministers, deacons and elders (leaders) all throughout on both mine and RW's side.
When we moved churches a few years ago (left a place I was a deacon) my grandfather asked where we were looking to join. I listed a few places and mistakenly included some names outside the denomination. He immediately rattled off the specifics of the beliefs that he thought mattered (baptism, communion, style of worship, role of women, etc...) and said that there's really no other church that meets that criteria. Assuming I had that identical list.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lou Schuler
The only part I find disturbing is the sense that the church's most politically conservative members, including my in-laws, have conflated their religious beliefs with secular politics. To them, it's become a seamless belief system: God is good, Obama is bad.
On the bright side, they don't believe liberals are going to hell, because there's an escape clause for people who aren't intelligent enough to understand the difference between truth and propaganda. We don't get into the best parts of heaven, but at least we aren't condemned to hell.
So we've got that going for us, which is nice.
You nailed it again. The more conservative my family member is, the more angry and outspoken they seem to be about politics, with no room left for discussion. The legislative/economic issues are as clear and non-negotiable to them as the church rules are.
So to stir up some stuff I wrote this:
Quote:
Originally Posted by RedLefty
-- Jesus lived in a society of oppression, slavery, legal prostitution and unfair taxation. He apparently only spoke to one of these issues (taxes, which he said to pay unto Caesar). He focused on people, not politics. Why should his followers do any different?
-- When churches send missionaries to foreign countries with socialist/communist governments (China, Eastern Europe), are the missionaries sent with a political agenda? No, I've never seen that. They're sent to serve those in need. Why should the local missionaries (church members) do any different?
-- A common theme of the bible, especially the New Testament, is that once we know we are loved by God, there is no threat from man. Paul wrote of his contentment with life, and his security that came from God's grace. It's hard for Christians to realize and demonstrate this deep-seated security if they're constantly upset over things like taxes and health insurance.
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RE: Politics, I've still yet to figure out how so many mainstream Christians have seamlessly rolled minarchist pro-capitalist outlooks into their faith.
Seriously. That just strikes me as the ultimate dissonance.
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Vast numbers of religious people do not worry or think in terms of salvation. We are called to love justice, do good, be thankful etc. Let God, fate etc. take care of afterlife, salvation. Usually such people assume God, fate etc is good.
Well, I don't know anything about the general beliefs of "religious people." But my understanding of essential Christian doctrine is that due to our inherent sinful natures, we all need God's grace to be saved, that no one cannot achieve salvation through one's own efforts.
Now, I recognize that there have been a lot of refinements and changes of emphasis since the doctrine I am most familiar with, which is the theology of those who came to be called the Congregationalists of the 1600s and 1700s in New England. But this is still bedrock theology in Protestant circles. My understanding is that Catholics, for all their interceding Saints and purchased or earned indulgences, also at bottom believe this.
I don't see how Salvation can be anything other than the central focus in any Christian church. Else, what was all that messy business of the Crucifixion about?
Try reading Matthew, chapters 5-7. The Sermon on the Mount. Some of us think the whole history of Christendom has been devoted to explaining why is doesn't mean what it says. Very little about worrying about salvation. Or the Lords Prayer (found in a fore mentioned), asks for one's daily bread, no plea regarding the afterlife, it is startlingly focused on the present. Salvation is assumed but not the focus of the Sermon on the Mount - the focus is (for want of a better term) learning to have a gentle and good heart, and being forbearing of and charitable toward others (and I suspect of one's self). I would not claim that this has been the view of the majority over time, but it has been the major theme of the gospels, and of some Christians for all of history.
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