XPost: alt.religion.christian.biblestudy, alt.religion.christian   
   roman-catholic, england.religion.misc   
   XPost: free.christians, hk.soc.religion.christianity   
   From: trdell12345@gmail.com   
      
   On Sat, 27 Jan 2018 20:28:36 -0500, Frank  wrote:   
      
   >New Harvard Research Says U.S. Christianity Is Not Shrinking, But   
   >Growing Stronger   
   >Is churchgoing and religious adherence really in ‘widespread decline’   
   >so much so that conservative believers should suffer ‘growing   
   >anxiety’? Absolutely not.   
   > Glenn T. Stanton By Glenn T. Stanton   
   >JANUARY 22, 2018   
   >“Meanwhile, a widespread decline in churchgoing and religious   
   >affiliation had contributed to a growing anxiety among conservative   
   >believers.” Statements like this are uttered with such confidence and   
   >frequency that most Americans accept them as uncontested truisms. This   
   >one emerged just this month in an exceedingly silly article in The   
   >Atlantic on Vice President Mike Pence.   
   >   
   >Religious faith in America is going the way of the Yellow Pages and   
   >travel maps, we keep hearing. It’s just a matter of time until   
   >Christianity’s total and happy extinction, chortle our cultural   
   >elites. Is this true? Is churchgoing and religious adherence really in   
   >“widespread decline” so much so that conservative believers should   
   >suffer “growing anxiety”?   
   >   
   >Two words: Absolutely not.   
   >   
   >New research published late last year by scholars at Harvard   
   >University and Indiana University Bloomington is just the latest to   
   >reveal the myth. This research questioned the “secularization thesis,”   
   >which holds that the United States is following most advanced   
   >industrial nations in the death of their once vibrant faith culture.   
   >Churches becoming mere landmarks, dance halls, boutique hotels,   
   >museums, and all that.   
   >   
   >Not only did their examination find no support for this secularization   
   >in terms of actual practice and belief, the researchers proclaim that   
   >religion continues to enjoy “persistent and exceptional intensity” in   
   >America. These researchers hold our nation “remains an exceptional   
   >outlier and potential counter example to the secularization thesis.”   
   >   
   >What Accounts for the Difference in Perceptions?   
   >How can their findings appear so contrary to what we have been hearing   
   >from so many seemingly informed voices? It comes down primarily to   
   >what kind of faith one is talking about. Not the belief system itself,   
   >per se, but the intensity and seriousness with which people hold and   
   >practice that faith.   
   >   
   >Mainline churches are tanking as if they have super-sized millstones   
   >around their necks. Yes, these churches are hemorrhaging members in   
   >startling numbers, but many of those folks are not leaving   
   >Christianity. They are simply going elsewhere. Because of this   
   >shifting, other very different kinds of churches are holding strong in   
   >crowds and have been for as long as such data has been collected. In   
   >some ways, they are even growing. This is what this new research has   
   >found.   
   >   
   >The percentage of Americans who attend church more than once a week,   
   >pray daily, and accept the Bible as wholly reliable and deeply   
   >instructive to their lives has remained absolutely, steel-bar constant   
   >for the last 50 years or more, right up to today. These authors   
   >describe this continuity as “patently persistent.”   
   >   
   >The percentage of such people is also not small. One in three   
   >Americans prays multiple times a day, while one in 15 do so in other   
   >countries on average. Attending services more than once a week   
   >continues to be twice as high among Americans compared to the next   
   >highest-attending industrial country, and three times higher than the   
   >average comparable nation.   
   >   
   >One-third of Americans hold that the Bible is the actual word of God.   
   >Fewer than 10 percent believe so in similar countries. The United   
   >States “clearly stands out as exceptional,” and this exceptionalism   
   >has not been decreasing over time. In fact, these scholars determine   
   >that the percentages of Americans who are the most vibrant and serious   
   >in their faith is actually increasing a bit, “which is making the   
   >United States even more exceptional over time.”   
   >   
   >This also means, of course, that those who take their faith seriously   
   >are becoming a markedly larger proportion of all religious people. In   
   >1989, 39 percent of those who belonged to a religion held strong   
   >beliefs and practices. Today, these are 47 percent of all the   
   >religiously affiliated. This all has important implications for   
   >politics, indicating that the voting bloc of religious conservatives   
   >is not shrinking, but actually growing among the faithful. The   
   >declining influence of liberal believers at the polls has been   
   >demonstrated in many important elections recently.   
   >   
   >These Are Not Isolated Findings   
   >The findings of these scholars are not outliers. There has been a   
   >growing gulf between the faithful and the dabblers for quite some   
   >time, with the first group growing more numerous. Think about the   
   >church you attend, relative to its belief system. It is extremely   
   >likely that if your church teaches the Bible with seriousness, calls   
   >its people to real discipleship, and encourages daily intimacy with   
   >God, it has multiple services to handle the coming crowds.   
   >   
   >Most decent-size American cities have a treasure trove of such   
   >churches for believers to choose from. This shows no sign of changing.   
   >If, however, your church is theologically liberal or merely lukewarm,   
   >it’s likely laying off staff and wondering how to pay this month’s   
   >light bill. People are navigating toward substantive Christianity.   
   >   
   >The folks at Pew have been reporting for years that while the mainline   
   >churches are in drastic free fall, the group that “shows the most   
   >significant growth is the nondenominational family.” Of course, these   
   >nondenominational churches are 99.9 percent thorough-blooded   
   >evangelical. Pew also notes that “evangelical Protestantism and the   
   >historically black Protestant tradition have been more stable” over   
   >the years, with even a slight uptick in the last decade because many   
   >congregants leaving the mainline churches are migrating to evangelical   
   >churches that hold fast to the fundamentals of the Christian faith.   
   >http://thefederalist.com/2018/01/22/new-harvard-research-says-u   
   s-christianity-not-shrinking-growing-stronger/   
      
      
   This study seems to confirm that the RCC is failing church   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)