The Wall Street Journal has an article titled In Europe, God Is (Not) Dead by Andrew Higgins. Christian groups are growing, faith is more public. Is supply-side economics the explanation?
The Church of Sweden and its finances are described in detail.
It is not simply a matter of monopolies or competition, it is to do with class, the state and inherited authority. Monopoly Churches ceased to be monopolies a long time ago, and arguably when they were monopolies they dovetailed with the state, forms of authority down from national to local, and therefore could get in roughly half of people. The difference with the United States was its lack of “class as status” association with the Churches, and also the need to build community either through localities or ethnic groups or religious persuasions. It is said that American Churches secularised within,… Read more »
Pluralist
“and nowhere is full of the more elderly”
Can you substantiate this? Most churches I have attended and visited seem to have an average age of about 60.
There certainly seem to be far fewer children coming through than middle aged or old people, unless the church is in a catchment area of a sought after church school.
Pluralist,
The much repeated 40 percent figure is quite inflated. It comes from asking people in polls how often they attend services. Checking other sources – actual attendance figures reported by churches themselves, counting people on Sundays in areas deemed demographically representatives, and Dept of Labor time diaries – suggest something a little under 25 percent.
I’m trying to be most generous all around. I am sure the 40% is inflated; it is like saying 10% for the UK. On the charismatic front, or say media church front, these churches have been around for some time now and I’m suggesting that they offer a kind of spirituality from which people, as they grow up and on, leave. Churches outside this charismatic margin have a population well over the 60s. What we showed, in our little study (Longhill, Hull) was not that people grow older and then join, but that this is the end of a population… Read more »
As a follow up to Saturday’s front page story, here is a commentary on the “new new atheists” that appears in Monday’s edition of the Journal.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110010341
Chris: Thanks for the link. Pluralist: You seem to be obsessed with proving that there actually isn’t any good news in the primary article and that Christianity is on its death bed. I have to wonder why? You seem to have a lot in common with the “new” athiests of the linked article, but perhaps I already knew that. In general: I am happy to see Christianity resurgent in any degree in Europe, though the “low” and “ultra-low” forms that seem to be at the heart of a modest resurgence are not my favorites. Still, I have to remind myself,… Read more »
I am not in favour of Christianity at any price. The many forms which suppress the human spirit, inhibit human flourishing, oppress women and hate the body and sexulity are not worth it. Nor are forms which encourage immorality.– Franco’s Spain, the Dutch Reformed South Africa of yesteryear. Bush’s America where they never give the poor a second thought, not withstanding the Beatitudes and the story of Dives and Lazarus.(etc). I do not believe that Jesus came to bring yet another religion. Ethical is as ethical does.The Letter of James seems pretty clear. The Churches continue, largely to ignore his… Read more »
L Roberts,
I agree on the surface w/ everything you said, but it comes off as social commentary. Christ did not have interesting things to say about his society and by extension ours.
Christ spoke about the deep truths of humans – how shattered our nature is by the fall, the we all need healing and we all desire righteousness. He also spoke to the reality of God – He has always loved His creation, He is the only one who can heal us and He wants to help us reclaim our image of Him.
If the new atheists are full of certainty, then I have less in common with them. Actually I think there is an industry in marketing them, that they are performing a dance, and it is all writing, writing and writing, including this journalism. As far as I am concerned, Richard Dawkins is a biologist. He has views on God because he dislikes creationism as a perversion with political power. When occasionally he answers more meaning based questions he does not turn out to be the one track person he is made out to be. Christopher Hitchens is a prose writer:… Read more »
I posted this on my blog too and I must say I was more or less unconvinced. Other than getting bibles back into Swedish hotel rooms, I’m not seeing that much of a resurgence. I agree with Steven that the supply side analogy is minimally true–my suspicion is that churches are not so much competing with each other as the growing ones are adopting more of a market-based services model, with some success. I remember an April 2005 Businessweek piece that talked about how mega-churches were offering dry cleaning and carwashes on Sunday mornings, sort of a one-stop Sunday service.
LRoberts your comment is so full of factual errors that I could not even begin to list them. Could I suggest you read a bit more widely? Then you will find that people seldom go for a brand of Christianity that suppresses the spirit (why on earth would they), that Christians have always believed that the body was created by God and that his creation is good, that sex was ordained by God from the beginning and blessed by him, and that the religious in Bush’s America give significantly more to the poor than the non-Christians and that overall the… Read more »
L Roberts I totally agree with your sentiments. People might want to go into a wrangling match about who did or did not honor Jesus’ intentions in which denomination in which nation in which century. There is a truth that the underlying message of some of Jesus’ core visions and dreams and their consistency with the Torah have been ignored or mutilated over the centuries, as well as in this generation When Chris writes “Christ did not have interesting things to say about his society and by extension ours.” I so totally don’t agree with that. Subscribe to Out In… Read more »
Margaret, “people seldom go for a brand of Christianity that suppresses the spirit” Really? Surprising you say this, since such aren’t all that hard to find. “religious in Bush’s America give significantly more to the poor” Throw some money at the poor, that’s OK, but don’t criticize economic policies that make darn well sure they stay poor, don’t criticize the bombing of innocent people, the erosion of the very freedoms they claim to respect, and on and on. Sorry, Margaret, but Bush and the Republicans are extremely poor exemplars of Christianity, I don’t care how many half hoarse fundamentalists he… Read more »
Margaret:
Good post.
Steven
People do go with forms of Christianity that match their view of authority, either diffuse or hierarchical, and from the diffuse end the hierarchical seems to embody values they would rather release to history and leave them there.
“People do go with forms of Christianity that match their view of authority”
A priest friend of mine says that if we truly believed what we claim to believe, we’d go crawling on our hands and kness to the rail for communion. I respond thatif we truly believed what we say we believe, we’d go dancing down the aisle to communion. This dispute in many ways is an argument between the Dancers and the Crawlers.
But, Cheryl, that’s just more social commentary without addressing the real issues behind these actions. Ask yourself “why do we do these things?” The simple answer is sin and our fallen nature. My comment to L Roberts wasn’t that social issues don’t matter, but that they are only antecedent to Christ’s primary work on the cross. In His ministry, Jesus addressed urgent needs when required (healing, comfort, protection from stoning) but ALWAYS brought it back to the issue of sin, faith and forgiveness. Remember the poor will always be with us. Jesus’s charges against the Pharisees weren’t about power plays… Read more »
This reminds me of Erich Fromm’s book Escape From Freedom. People tend to go looking for an authority structure when life gets dramatic, complicated or scary. And with Akinola and the conservatives on the scene everything MUST be dramatic, complicated and scary. That’s NOT new testament Christianity, it’s bondage to principalities and powers.
Saying (or chanting) “Lord, lord ” won’t cut the mustard as Jesus himself is reported to have said. What does cut the mustard he avowed is ” doing the will of my father.” We are told. When the US and UK governments wage illegal and unethical wars where and when they please, no amount of “Lord-Lord” can expunge the deaths of civilians in their own homes, including elderly and infirm folks, and those whom Jesus is said to have called, “these little uns” whom his father especially treasures. Thank Cheryl and Ford for your posts which I found telling and… Read more »
I do not think Jesus is reported to have said a word about being ‘Christ-like’.
“Sin make me focus on my stomach, my checking account, my prestige. But Jesus frees me from sin and frees me to love and serve. The social gospel doesn’t get this and that’s why it has failed.” I tend to agree, Chris, bit I would add that legalistic Evangelicalism also fails because it goes too far the other way. It minimizes the justice side, even dismisses it, in favour of an interpretation that claims it’s all about getting into Heaven when you die. That’s why that message fails for me. See, for instance, Abp Akinola’s famous “human suffering doesn’t matter.”… Read more »
Ford:
I’m a dancer and a crawler. Confession and contrition as well as rejoicing and exultation are intrinsic in Christianity. One cannot reject the cross in favor of the empty tomb, neither has meaning without the other. Consequently, any version of Christianity that doesn’t embrace both is, at least IMHO, deformed.
Chris:
Bravo!!
Curtis:
I don’t think your argument moves in any logical sequence from point A to point B, much less to point C. Perhaps you could flesh it out a bit.
Steven
There are some who do not accept that they have internal paradigms that filter how they perceive the world, or that they participate in collective group think. So in this thread we’ve seen people deny that Jesus’ teachings refer to societal conventions and assumptions, then or now. Others appreciate that Jesus’ purpose was to model what was required to heal ourselves, each other and thus the world. The cross was Creation’s affirmation of his teachings, and it is inextricably tied into his teachings. If Jesus’ teachings are opportunistically shunted to one side as no longer relevant, then such followers have… Read more »
L Roberts, I have to admit your point is a bit too subtle for me to see, much less understand.
Ford, I’m not going to defend ++Akinola point-by-point as I don’t position myself as an advocate for him. In fact, I have a serious issue w/ the statement in “The Road to Lambeth” that claims homosexuality separates people from salvation, but that’s for another time. I agree that evangelicals can slip into legalism. But, Ford, its not an either/or between just legalism and just social issues. In reality it’s neither of those options. I think when we are given faith and experience grace we understand the dross of this world doesn’t matter. But once we do experience grace we begin… Read more »
“I’m a dancer and a crawler. Confession and contrition as well as rejoicing and exultation are intrinsic in Christianity. One cannot reject the cross in favor of the empty tomb, neither has meaning without the other. Consequently, any version of Christianity that doesn’t embrace both is, at least IMHO, deformed.”
Steven, I agree COMPLETELY.
(Stop the presses! Hell freezes over! Pigs, flying! ;-p)
Goran, you around for a CofS comment?
Ford said,
“I respond that if we truly believed what we say we believe, we’d go dancing down the aisle to communion.”
Both are true! The Lutherans call it “Law-and-Gospel.” The Law crushes us and shows us our sin while the Gospel tells of grace and forgiveness. The liturgy has both as well – Confession & Humble Access along side the Great Thanksgiving and Peace.
Cheryl said, “Others appreciate that Jesus’ purpose was to model what was required to heal ourselves, each other and thus the world.” We can’t do any of that healing on our own. “Many of humanity’s worst mistakes have come from failing to recognise that a core assumption in our world views is erroneous or we have become over-reliant on one form of resolving problems.” Exactly. When we try on our own, we get it wrong. Communism gave us Stalin, Mao and Ho Chi Minh. Incredible economic development in the West gave us strained natural resources and likely unsustainable standards of… Read more »
>>>the religious in Bush’s America give significantly more to the poor than the non-Christians Margaret, that study, as widely quoted as it is, is questionable because it counts church tithes as donations to charity. In other words, money donated to install a new sauna in a megachurch’s recreation complex is, for purposes of that study, a donation to charity. In my town, there is a church whose “parsonage” is a $4,300,000 house on the beach, complete with five-car garage and olympic pool. (Prospective members have to turn over a financial statement to the pastor, who decides how much they must… Read more »
“Richard Dawkins is a biologist. He has views on God because he dislikes creationism as a perversion with political power.” Pluralist, I’ve heard him say that the Creationism / Evolution argument is a minor battle compared with the war against the God Hypothesis, as he puts it. His ‘heresy’ seems no more controversial than denying the doctrines of the Trinity, Virgin Birth or Assumption. Just another North Oxford theological dispute – a fireside chat with Alister McGrath. Except he’s taken it to the USA in polemical book-form rather than keep it to the cosy confines of the Dreaming Spires. The… Read more »
Thanks L Roberts; Cheryl Clough you continue to make the best of all these texts into a sense of humans doing the actions you say the Bible shows God wanting through good and difficulty as illustrated in the Bible. A key issue is tribalism and overcoming it for something that brings differences together whilst accepting difference. This includes peoples’ cultures, faiths, sexualities, identities. What I see going on overall is people asking if they can finally be honest now about their differences and identities, but the authorities are saying no because the institution cannot stay together if they are. These… Read more »
I have previously read this claim that “Christians” give more to the poor than “non-Christians,” Americans more than Europeans, etc. (Christians / non-Christians in quotes because what is meant varies from case to case.)
I have never seen anything to support this claim – merely the claim all on its own.
But whenever I consider the relations of rich and poor, I am reminded of a certain Bishop of Tanganyika who said that one could not worship Jesus in the Tabernacle who sweated him in the slums.
Erika says “Most churches I have attended and visited seem to have an average age of about 60. “ Yes, too many stagnating in the CofE like that….while others down the road (even in England) have hundreds of young people, students and children…..but the vicars with the dwindling groups of pensioners never take responsibility for their failed ideas …… they even blame the CofE churches which do attract lots of young people and families, never making the connection that it is their barren teaching (“believe what you like as long as you are a nice person”) which leaves their churches… Read more »
Hugh on rites de passage
I find people are increasingly putting together their own ceremonies for birth, partnership and death
At a funeral we would rather hear of the life and qualities of the deceased, and celebrate her or his life, and shared love and friendship (etc), than have a load of meaningless theology and ritual sparayed across us.
“I think when we are given faith and experience grace we understand the dross of this world doesn’t matter.” This parallels a series of comments made by one subscriber on 21 December that God does not care about justice in this world. There is a paradigm that God is going to burn up this world and its occupants, replacing it with a new world full of only the pure souls that have Jesus’ support. That is the imagery of Jesus as slayer, not as healer and saviour. Jesus was annointed to redeem this world and its occupants, all of them,… Read more »
Cheryl,
Saying, “the dross of the world doesn’t matter,” is not the same as saying, “the world is dross.”
The article is just one more example of anti Modern Yankee Prejudice into Politics – anti-Islamism and all. Strong on names dropping – week on Context. I think we better ask ourselves w h o this journalist is, and w h o pointed him to the Rev. Professor (into nuffers) Hamberg of “Christian in my own way” fame, and more-Americanized-than-they-know Messrs Piensoho and Swärd (not of a growing Evangelical movement, as this article claims, but of a singular The Evangelical Free Church – very singular in these parts, I assure you; Evangelical is not a word most people would understand… Read more »
As to L Roberts’ “forms which suppress the human spirit, inhibit human flourishing, oppress women and hate the body and sexuality” the very commercial American Rhema Gnosticist Livets Ord is one of the most notorious. As to “just a social gospel”… Christ does have a few “interesting” things about society and power plays and greed and the rest… And yes, the Gospel has been constantly ignored and a new Neo Platonist anti Cosmic Ethics masquerading as religion (often anti Jewish & c.) insinuated in its place. Remember that I can follow this generation by generation down to and beyond the… Read more »
“… that Christians have always believed that the body was created by God and that his creation is good, that sex was ordained by God from the beginning and blessed by him…” This is a BIG lie, Margaret. Chris wrote: “The Lutherans call it “Law-and-Gospel.” O, no we don’t. The L-AND-G is from Phillipp Melanchthon, sometimes called “the Father of all Heresies” ;=) Lutherans distinguish between Law (ever the 10 Commandments) and Gospel. The 1580 Books of Concord/Discord say that Law must not be preached, only the Gospel. Calvinists claim that what Lutherans call “laws of men” (“civil, ritual and… Read more »
Some notes on the “primary” article… “Hedvig Eleonara Church” is Hedvig EleonOra, a famous conservative (no women) stronghold in the fashionable late 19th century part of town. The dome is 19th century, the big octagonal church itself mid 17th century, designed by a French Huguenot who became Court Architect to Queen Christina (who converted and moved to Rome in 1654). Hedvig Eleonora (née Holstein) was the Lutheran Queen of Queen Christina’s 1st cousin and eventual successor (elected in 1650) staunch Calvinist Charles X Gustaf (ex Count of the Palatinate-Cleeburg), much into Apocalyptic Foreign Policies (=War). It is because of his… Read more »
There is no “state levy”, the Inland Revenue assists in collecting the Church Fee from the Church of Sweden, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Stockholm and whoever wants to pay for this (commercial) service. Burials is a separate legislation (1994) administered by the Church. It is strictly non confessional. There are Jewish, Muslim, Sikh & c. areas in all larger (city) burial grounds. This is a stark innovation; we never had anything like Highgate cemetery in Hampstead, London. It was not the Church of Sweden but his Bishop (Gothenburg) who pulled Mr Ekman’s (Livets Ord) collar (the Rhema thing came… Read more »
GLBTs are considered dross by some. They might not matter to you, but they do to me and they do to God. Psalm 84:3 “Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may have her young—a place near your altar, O LORD” parallels Jesus words at Matthew 6, which includes “Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?” Is not any human (whether of sound mind and… Read more »
And remember, that pístis xristoû in Romans means adamantly not OUR Faith IN Christ, but Christ’s faith-ful-ness towards us.
Thanks foir this Goran. I like it ! Do you tell me which verse n chapter. Thanksa lot.
Cheryl, who in THIS conversation is calling people dross? I’m not doing that. I never brought up sexuality because we weren’t talking about it. Yes, some people can’t get past others’ sexuality and I’d argue using a string of letters to describe a fairly diverse set of people is one expression of how some on BOTH sides make sexuality an idol. I’m merely saying that if we reject Christ’s teaching about our relationship with God, then His teachings about inter-human relationships should be rejected as well. It’s only after I understand he vertical righteousness that I’m even aware of the… Read more »
It is rarely ideas that account for levels of attendance in a church: more like location and the overlap between spirituality and entertainment. As for people over 60 in a congregation, or even greater, I think we should be aware how little there is for people in todays media saturated “youth” culture for older people, and if older people find company and others to talk to in churches then these churches are doing a good job. Many older people have heard it all before, and do not want some over enthused vicar ramming some narrow message down their throats, so… Read more »
Goran, I heard about the Law-and-Gospel concept from a Missouri Synod (very evangelical) theology prof. but I wasn’t aware of the original source of the idea and some of Melanchthon’s ideas (clearly M.’s thinking had some issues). The prof made a very clear distinction between Law and Gospel, similar to my understanding of Paul. The prof’s assertion was that Law shows us God’s standard, illustrates our sin and we are condemned by the Law. If we only have Law we’d crawl down the aisle to the communion rail every Sunday. The Gospel on the other hand, shows us God’s love,… Read more »
“When we reduce Christ to just saying “interesting” things about society we actually reduce His teaching to nothing more than what thousands of others have said and millions of other s have ignored.”
As a recently quoted efriend says, “a pot of message”. I’m with you on this Chris, to do justice is the work of the Gospel, but the Gospel is about other things as well.
Chris In this forum there is an understanding that it is not simply a conversation between two people. It is a public discussion and as an idea is contemplated, there is an awareness that readers might consider who is affected or how to apply scriptures in a certain context. One of the things I have loved in the last few months is watching souls reaffirming God’s inclusive nature, and what is family. There are those who say that we are to copy the divine family of mother and father, and that any other version is unbiblical. Such readings would denounce… Read more »
Would Joshua be rescued from the fires of hell? Yes, of course, as was Jesus at his death. As we did Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego (Daniel 3:16-30) A king threw them into a blazing furnace because they refused to worship his idol and stated “If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand”. The fourth soul who came out was the same presence from the fire around Mt Sinai. What we have seen in recent years is actually an assassination attempt. Certain… Read more »