FAITH AND AMERICAN CULTURE

The Pew Forum recently released a report entitled, the “US Religious Landscape Survey.”  It is truly a remarkable document, for it reveals the significant impact the Postmodern worldview has had on American thinking and practice when it comes to religious faith and belief.  For example, the study shows that Americans are a religions people:  92% believe in God; 74% believe in life after death; and 63% say their respective scriptures are the word of God.  But the study also demonstrates a broad trend toward tolerance and that many Americans hold a belief that is directly contradicted by the doctrines of their professed faith.  Indeed, 70% of Americans affiliated with a religious denomination said they agreed that “many religions can lead to eternal life.”  Incredibly, 57% of evangelicals agreed with that statement, as did 79% of Catholics.  About 13% of evangelicals do not believe in a personal God!  But the survey likewise confirmed that those who are most conservative in their theology attend worship services most frequently, and for them abortion and gay rights issues remain important issues.  But there is also great confusion:  While 78% of Americans say that there are “absolute standards of right and wrong,” only 29% say that they “rely on their religion to delineate these standards.”

As with the first report from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, this report sheds light on the religious values and practices of Americans.  This second study reveals more about the unaffiliated in America.  Neela Banerjee of the New York Times summarizes this part of the report:  “Like the overwhelming majority of Americans, 70% of the unaffiliated said they believed in God, including one of every five people who identified themselves as atheist and more than half of those who identified as agnostic.”  Further, 9% of atheists report that they are skeptical of evolution.  Atheistic creationists?  At first reading, this sounds absurd.  How can an atheist affirm any kind of a belief in God?  The depth of personal belief is obviously absent in many of these Americans.  Further, this new survey demonstrates a broadening of belief that a majority of people in the US will go to heaven.  The Pew study and other scholars who have studied such findings conclude that this incredibly broad view of salvation and heaven reflects more about doctrinal ignorance than deep-seated beliefs.  Todd Johnson, director of the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, writes:  “It could be that people are not very well educated and they are not expressing mature theological points of view.  It could also be a form of bland secularism.  The real challenge to religious leaders is not to become more entrenched in their views, but to navigate the idea of what their religion is all about and how it relates to others.”  The survey also tried to determine how religious affiliation and practice shaped peoples’ views on culture and politics.  As with the earlier Pew study, it showed that Americans who prayed more frequently and attended worship services more often tended to be more conservative.  For example, 73% of American evangelicals who attend services once a week believe that abortion should be illegal in most or all cases.  Also, 57% of evangelicals agree that “government should do more to help needy Americans, even if it means going deeper into debt.”  More than half believe that stricter environmental laws and regulations are worth the cost. 

In short, perhaps this study illustrates the inadequacy of a survey approach to understanding religious beliefs and practices.  However, no matter how one parses this study, there is confusion in the land.  Perhaps at the vital center of that confusion is that typically Americans see little connection between their personal belief system and their ethical practices on a daily basis.  Americans, including evangelicals, tend to compartmentalize their lives:  I may believe something about God and about His ethical law, but that belief has no relevance to my daily life.  Consider some of these examples:

• First, at Gloucester High School in Massachusetts, a group of teenage girls apparently made a pact to get pregnant.  They had romanticized the whole idea of being pregnant and an unwed mother.  As this summer of 2008 begins, 17 girls at Gloucester are pregnant.  Some are calling this the “Juno effect,” referring to a popular 2008 movie that tended to glamorize unwed motherhood.  What at first seemed like a positive anti-abortion message from this movie, has turned out to be an unintended consequence of free sex and glamorized unwed motherhood.  Gloucester is a heavily Catholic community and has always frowned on public promotion of birth control.  The sex-ed classes preach abstinence but also that teen mothers are encouraged to take their children to a free on-site day care center.  The school and the community has frowned upon the whole idea of handing out birth control pills to high school girls.  There is a disconnect between the strong Catholic faith of these girls and their actions.
• Second, consider the practice of homosexuality and AIDS.  A recent study demonstrates that the number of young homosexual men being newly diagnosed with HIV infection is rising by 12% per year, with the steepest trend among young black men.  The American culture has accommodated to the gay lifestyle, even though all major religions make an ethical judgment that homosexuality is wrong.  But because of the broad appeal of Postmodern tolerance, it is almost impossible to publicly make an ethical judgment about this lifestyle.  Hence, the strong connection between HIV infection and the gay lifestyle.  It is almost at an epidemic proportion among young males, as this study shows.  Again, a disconnect between a clear ethical guideline and the lifestyle choice.  Young men will thereby die because of this disconnect.  Tragically, this 12% increase in HIV infection among gay young men is a metaphor for the ethical crisis in America.
• Finally, consider the state of the mainline Protestant denominations in America.  Most of these are giving serious consideration to breaking with the clear teaching of Scripture on the matter of homosexuality and permit clergy with homosexual partners, and to sanction blessing ceremonies for same-sex couples.  For example, within the United Church of Christ, theological liberals are in clear control and the denomination has endorsed gay marriages for both church and society.  The Evangelical Lutheran Church recently released a draft of a new sexuality policy.  It sidesteps the Bible on this issue and concludes that there is no church consensus on the morality of “committed same-gender relationships.”  This document will be reviewed and then the 2009 assembly will determine whether to allow actively gay and lesbian pastors.  The United Methodist Church has passed an amendment that declares homosexual practice is “incompatible with Christian teaching.”  Although a significant minority of American Methodists disagrees now with that statement, about 40% of Methodists are overseas and they are more conservative.  The Episcopal Church accepts gay clergy and same-sex rituals (e.g., Gene Robinson, Episcopalian bishop with a gay partner).  But American Episcopalians are at a loggerhead with the larger Anglican Communion, which is witnessing a struggle between the southern and the northern hemisphere Anglicans, with the south being far more conservative.  All of these Protestant denominations are in clear violation of Biblical ethics on sexuality and marriage.  Could there be a connection between this ambiguity and the decline in their numbers?

--Episcopal church down 34%
--Evangelical Lutheran Church down 16%
--Presbyterian Church USA down 25%
--United Church of Christ down 38%. 
--United Methodist Church down 25%.

In conclusion, the Pew study identifies a confusion and lack of clarity when it comes to theological understanding and personal beliefs.  That confusion, this Perspective has argued, spills over into several ethical practices and lifestyles within America.  That confusion will continue until evangelicals and Protestant mainlines reaffirm a deep-seated commitment to God’s Word and the clarity of its ethical teaching.  May that deep-seated revival come soon!

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