Posted on 03/21/2007 3:49:35 PM PDT by SmithL
For a taste of the old South, you can attend a Civil War battle re-enactment. Or you can visit Bob Jones University in Greenville, S.C.
This fundamentalist school - catchphrase: "Brains are no substitute for God" - forbade interracial dating among its students until 2000.
The place is easy to mock, and people often do. The Bob Jones rulebook bans all the things that other students think make college fun: booze, cigarettes, fornication.
Mark Lopez, one of the 4,200 smartly dressed and unfailingly polite students at Bob Jones, says he applied there because he wanted to study "conservative Christian music": that is, old-fashioned music with organs and the like, not Christian rock (too worldly).
As a private university that accepts no federal funds, Bob Jones was free to cling to its old Southern traditions longer than most. Both the founder and his son, Bob Jones junior, were committed segregationists. Like many Southern Christians, they had convinced themselves that it was God's will.
But times change. By 2000, when George W. Bush visited, the university was widely reviled. Bob Jones III, the founder's grandson, calmed the furor by revoking the interracial dating ban. He told an interviewer: "We can't point to a verse in the Bible that says you shouldn't date or marry interracial[ly]."
During slavery and segregation most Southern churches blessed the existing order. Now they are sorry they did. This about-face was traumatic for many, but easy to justify scripturally. Attempts to find biblical backing for separate lunch counters always required a bit of reading between the lines, whereas "Love thy neighbor as thyself" is unambiguous.
So as the South has become less racist, it has lost none of its religiosity. Nearly half of Southerners believe the Bible is the literal word of God - twice the proportion of those in the Northeast or the West who believe that.
Such beliefs have political consequences. Southerners vote for politicians they judge devout. Their faith lends passion to national debates about abortion, homosexuality and bioethics. It affects foreign policy, too: some 56 percent of Southerners think God gave Israel to the Jews.
Within the South, however, Christianity has been a force for reconciliation - and not only because the most persuasive civil-rights crusaders, such as Martin Luther King Jr., were preachers. Charles Wilson of the University of Mississippi argues that religion helped the transition away from Jim Crow, "because it is a language shared by black and white, and because it gives whites a sense of security and continuity amid wrenching change."
At the same time, says James Guth of Furman University in Greenville, S.C., there is a strong trend toward religious diversification in the South. Hispanic immigration has brought more Catholics.
Fundamentalism has spread from rural areas to the affluent suburbs.
Nondenominational megachurches, which caught on later in the South than elsewhere, are spreading fast, and tend to be more racially mixed than traditional ones.
Three miles from Bob Jones University, for example, is the Redemption World Outreach Center. It started in 1991, with a congregation of three. Now it has 8,000 members. Its "Apostle," Ron Carpenter, is like many other Southern preachers - charismatic and given to "hollering." He is white, but his congregation is completely mixed. Black and white worshippers sit together, hug each other and shout, "Now you're preaching!" at the good bits, all in harmony.
Those who wince at Southern piety can always move north. Few do.
In his book "Dixie Rising," Peter Applebome quotes a liberal Yankee in Georgia: "It seems crazy listening to myself say this, but sometimes I think that a lot of the characteristics that come from some of this fundamentalist religious stuff that I hate also cause it to be so pleasant here."
"During slavery and segregation most Southern churches blessed the existing order. Now they are sorry they did. This about-face was traumatic for many, but easy to justify scripturally. Attempts to find biblical backing for separate lunch counters always required a bit of reading between the lines, whereas 'Love thy neighbor as thyself' is unambiguous."
As is that there is neither Jew nor Greek. Peter being admonished for being embarrassed to be seen with Gentiles could also be brought up.
Ya think?
[Fundamentalism has spread from rural areas to the affluent suburbs. . .]
It's also spread to the North, the West, Latin America, Africa and China.
American by birth, Southern by the Grace of God!
I love the South. Can hardly wait to live there someday :)
Y'all come see us, hear? We moved back to Alabama from the most racists, hateful, bigoted, mean, critical, un-American, socialist, homosexual, Marxist, state in the USA, Washington. I lived there 14 years after retiring from the Army. I met my wonderful wife there. She lived in WA from age 10 when her mother moved there from Wisconsin. Until we were married, my wife had never been south, except to visit her sister at the time, who lived in New York City Bay (formerly known as Tampa), Florida. My wife lived in WA state for 45 years. She has been here 8 months. She said this was the greatest move we could have made. She loves the south. She loves the sun. She loves the people. She loves the southern charm. She loves how people treat other people. She cannot believe how PEOPLE ACTUALLY GREET YOU AND SAY HELLO!!! You do that in WA state and people stare at you like, "what do you want?" She said she had never seen so many churches in her life. You know there are two per block here, right? :-) In WA state, you cannot find one but every 40 miles and half of them have homo ministers (guess they don't read all the chapters of the Bible). But, in 8 months, my wife has grown to love the south. I asked her last week, "wanna move back to WA state this summer?" What she said to me, I cannot repeat here!!! :-) But, in a word, NO!!!! "I "ain't" leaving here. I love it here!!!"
So, come on down, there is plenty of room. We even have running water in the house, in door bathrooms, and everyone does own a pair of shoes. Wearing them is optional though!!
That is one of the first things my wife loved about this place. The friendly people. People who went out of their way to be kind and helpful to people. Plus, Alabama has 2 conservative senators in the Senate, and I think like 7 of the 9 congress critters are republicans. Our governor is a republican. I like the guy. Some don't, but hey, he won with like 64% or something like that of the vote. Maybe it was 55%. Anyway, he won big! So, it is nice being back in a conservative state. I have read where Alabama and GA are about the two most conservative states. If that is true. If not, I am sure SOMEONE here is going too tell me that! LOL
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