Evangelism, Empathy, and Christian Nationalism...

[Sudsy]

I would love to hear what Anabaptist churches represented here are doing regarding evangelism and what kind of results they are seeing. Same goes for non-Anabaptists. Some of us really could use some encouragement and good reports on how the Kingdom of God is growing in our local areas.

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[Bootstrap]

People are giving up on the church because of real hypocrisy. Christians are acting the same way as the institutions we condemn. And that makes modern America a lot like the period just before the Reformation. “When people accept futility and the absurd as normal; the culture is decadent,” when Christians do the same, we are equally decadent.

We need a church that values compassion, truth, and justice. We need a church that looks like Jesus. And that is precisely what is getting lost.

In a study of Catholic disaffiliation in the United Kingdom and North America, sociologist Stephen Bullivant found the scandals to loom large in reasons that people were giving up on the church altogether. This was not simply based on the anger and betrayal that people feel by such atrocities and their cover-ups, although that’s certainly the case. It’s also the case, though, that this abusive and predatory behavior destroys the very things necessary for any religious community: the belonging that comes from membership in a community one can trust.

The scandals and sexual-abuse cover-ups reveal a church that operates with the exact same forms of power maintenance and institutional self-protection as the worst of other institutions with which they are already disillusioned. The church, they find, is just like all the rest.

Cultures have been here before. Jacques Barzun argues that the widespread denunciation of “moral turpitude” in the church in the lead-up to the Reformation was about more than hypocrisy; it was about meaning. “The priest, instead of being a teacher, was ignorant; the monk, instead of helping to save the world by his piety, was an idle profiteer; the bishop, instead of supervising the care of souls in his diocese was a politician and businessman.” The sheer immovability of all this revealed the situation to be not just declining but decadent. “When people accept futility and the absurd as normal; the culture is decadent,” he writes. “The term is not a slur; it is a technical label.”

Moore, Russell. Losing Our Religion (pp. 42-43). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

[Josh]

People are giving up on the church because of real hypocrisy. Christians are acting the same way as the institutions we condemn. And that makes modern America a lot like the period just before the Reformation. “When people accept futility and the absurd as normal; the culture is decadent,” when Christians do the same, we are equally decadent.

We need a church that values compassion, truth, and justice. We need a church that looks like Jesus. And that is precisely what is getting lost.

When you say, “the church”, what do you mean? There isn’t exactly one unified church in America.

The local Catholic parish and bishop there and one of the monks/priests I have met are some of the most compassionate and socially involved people I have met - and also not very involved in partisan politics at all. But I can’t speak for “the church” or even “the Catholic Church” as a whole.

A lot of the so-called “Christian nationalists” are people who don’t even attend church but just have some sort of vague “evangelical” identity. I don’t see very many churches at all pushing “Christian nationalism”. If I were to judge them based on their signs, half of them around me are mainline Protestant and have quite anti Christian nationalist messages in their signs. The more conservative churches just have messages advertising vacation Bible school, messages like “You must be born again”, or a community dinner. I really don’t see this “Christian nationalism” anywhere and if it weren’t for MennoNet I would be barely aware it existed.

[Ken]

People are giving up on the church because of real hypocrisy. Christians are acting the same way as the institutions we condemn. And that makes modern America a lot like the period just before the Reformation. “When people accept futility and the absurd as normal; the culture is decadent,” when Christians do the same, we are equally decadent.

We need a church that values compassion, truth, and justice. We need a church that looks like Jesus. And that is precisely what is getting lost.

In a study of Catholic disaffiliation in the United Kingdom and North America, sociologist Stephen Bullivant found the scandals to loom large in reasons that people were giving up on the church altogether. This was not simply based on the anger and betrayal that people feel by such atrocities and their cover-ups, although that’s certainly the case. It’s also the case, though, that this abusive and predatory behavior destroys the very things necessary for any religious community: the belonging that comes from membership in a community one can trust.

The scandals and sexual-abuse cover-ups reveal a church that operates with the exact same forms of power maintenance and institutional self-protection as the worst of other institutions with which they are already disillusioned. The church, they find, is just like all the rest.

Cultures have been here before. Jacques Barzun argues that the widespread denunciation of “moral turpitude” in the church in the lead-up to the Reformation was about more than hypocrisy; it was about meaning. “The priest, instead of being a teacher, was ignorant; the monk, instead of helping to save the world by his piety, was an idle profiteer; the bishop, instead of supervising the care of souls in his diocese was a politician and businessman.” The sheer immovability of all this revealed the situation to be not just declining but decadent. “When people accept futility and the absurd as normal; the culture is decadent,” he writes. “The term is not a slur; it is a technical label.”

Moore, Russell. Losing Our Religion (pp. 42-43). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Honestly I think it is more politics and less hypocrisy. But that is more my own personal observation.

I would suggest that it is largely the case that when someone's political beliefs and religion clash, it is usually the religion that loses. Or to put it another way, conservatives are leaving liberal churches in droves rather than becoming more liberal. And liberals are leaving conservative churches in droves rather than becoming more conservative.

This is also overlaid on the growing urban/rural split that is happening in this country.

Hypocrisy has always been present in some form since the dawn of time. Jesus speaks to it frequently. What I think is new is the politicization of religion. When churches become little more than the ideological arms of different parties or political movements then they lose what is meant to be Christian.

I'm old enough to remember a time when it wasn't always that way.

[ohio jones]

What I think is new is the politicization of religion. When churches become little more than the ideological arms of different parties or political movements then they lose what is meant to be Christian.

I'm old enough to remember a time when it wasn't always that way.

It's not at all new, even in America (weren't you just writing about the Civil War era?). But I certainly agree that it's antithetical to true Christianity.

[Josh]

What I think is new is the politicization of religion. When churches become little more than the ideological arms of different parties or political movements then they lose what is meant to be Christian.

I'm old enough to remember a time when it wasn't always that way.

It's not at all new, even in America (weren't you just writing about the Civil War era?). But I certainly agree that it's antithetical to true Christianity.

Wait until you hear about what happened in England in 1534 and 1688!

[Bootstrap]

Honestly I think it is more politics and less hypocrisy. But that is more my own personal observation.

I would suggest that it is largely the case that when someone's political beliefs and religion clash, it is usually the religion that loses. Or to put it another way, conservatives are leaving liberal churches in droves rather than becoming more liberal. And liberals are leaving conservative churches in droves rather than becoming more conservative.

I think it's hard to separate politics (as war) from hypocrisy. I think that's different from politics (as policy) - there are very legitimate reasons for Christians to care about policy, justice, etc., but there is less and less discussion of policy and ways for us all to get along in America, and a whole lot of the kind of politics that wants to destroy the other side and rub their nose in it for the gratification of our own side. For a Christian, that is hypocrisy.

I think conservatives are leaving both conservative churches. I think liberals are leaving liberal churches. And either way, I'm not convinced that they are abandoning discipleship to Jesus Christ as the Bible teaches. They are abandoning something else.

I quoted this earlier, but I think it is directly related to this question:

If Christianity is politics, people can get their politics from somewhere else—and fight and fornicate and get drunk too—all without giving up a Sunday morning. And, in fact, many are doing just that—not only among those who are leaving but among those who are “staying” too.

Political scientist Daniel K. Williams writes, “If ‘lapsed evangelical Protestant’ were a denomination, it would be by far the largest religious body in the South.” Again contrary to the myths of progressive secularization, Williams mines the data to show that these de-churched “evangelicals” are not becoming like Swedes, or even like de-churched northeastern cradle Catholics. Their politics haven’t changed (except by becoming more extreme) and their sense of religious identity hasn’t changed either. The data show that they are liberalizing, to be sure, but only on the specific sins they want to commit—especially when it comes to premarital sex.

[Ken]

What I think is new is the politicization of religion. When churches become little more than the ideological arms of different parties or political movements then they lose what is meant to be Christian.

I'm old enough to remember a time when it wasn't always that way.

It's not at all new, even in America (weren't you just writing about the Civil War era?). But I certainly agree that it's antithetical to true Christianity.

Well, for example, take a look at this electoral college map from 1976. Religious conservatism and political conservatism were very much not aligned in the same way as they are today. And most churches were far less political, both on the left and right.

[ohio jones]

Sure, if you limit the frame of reference to one's own lifetime you can paint a different picture than if you take into account a broader scope. Things change over time, but history tends to be cyclical.

[Josh]

Prohibition managed to pass two constitutional amendments (both women’s voting and then prohibition itself) and was an entirely religious movement. I would dare say America was more politically divided on religious lines then.