Posted on 03/09/2009 9:39:53 AM PDT by Alex Murphy
There will always be far fewer on the narrow road than there are on the wide road.
Big government replaces religion and the family as the central, stablizing fixture in society.
Let’s not follow the way of western Europe.
It’s because Christianity requires you to govern yourself. Atheism allows you to run hog wild and do whatever floats your boat. So whichj do you think a bunch of fat, lazy, decadent American slobs are going to choose?
some have been chosen by God to members of the elect and to heed the Gospel call and others have not.
It only takes a shift of a few percent to wreak havoc in a society, or conversely to stabilize and return it to relative health.
We lose the political wars because we first lost the spiritual ones. Win the spiritual war and the politics will follow. In fact, win the spiritual and the politics become ever so much less important.
Good analysis. Add to (1) however, that education is more and more in the hands of practical as well as theoretical atheists.
All have been called....but just a few answer.
“The negative portrayal of Christianity in the culture by the media”
This is by far the biggest reason for the decline in religion. All studies show that the more likely someone is to be influenced by the media, the less likely they are to believe in spirituality, religion and traditional morality. The self-indulgent lifestyle celebrated by the media is not compatible with the values of traditional religion.
The Word of God, the Rock of Ages hasn’t changed with the times, but corrupt mankind sure has, only to become more and more rotten to the core with sin.
Somewhere along the way in the future I predict that many who have gone the route of non-monotheistic faith will have created such a void in their lives they’ll look for something to give them a sense of order (even if it’s Satanic), like islam.
I don’t think that atheists generally run wild, because this world is all that they have. Having accepted, in theory, the idea of oblivion, they choose instead the “gods”, small goods that allow them to get through from day today: their careers, the accumulation of money, Instead of religious rituals, they have routines, which give them a sense of security. Instead of faith, they have the “truths” of modern psychology, which rescues them from depression and allows them merely to be unhappy in a world that is, untilmately, meaningless. Life as pain management.
This is a reminder for me as a Christian debating politics. With so much deceit and propaganda, it's a challenge to fight the spiritual battle over the political battle.
Yes, which is why Islam has made such inroads among the black prison population.
I think that there are other reasons not addressed by the author.
1. Organizations used to respect Wednesday night as church night and Sunday morning as a time for church. Now they don’t.
2. Kid’s sports run 24/7 now. Tournaments and games during Sunday morning, Wednesday evening, etc.
3. TV dominates a too much of our life. In some sense, TV events have turned most weekends into holidays. Just ask the the advertising execs for cable channels.
4. If you are too busy to go to church, you are too busy. Period. No exceptions.
I don’t know the answer to these. Chruches can offer a great deal in terms of sports leagues that can help bring more people into the church.
I will say that most of the mainline churches that I have attended had become feminized and were a bit uncomfortable for guys and the attendance reflected that. My current church is male friendly. We hunt, we shoot, we fish, we go duck hunting, and we hold competitive barbecues frequently.
A breath of fresh air.
Let’s see ... decades of MSM and liberals trashing the Christian faith and removing it from any public venue, and fewer people identify with it? How did that happen? </sarcasm>
While I was raised Lutheran-Presbyterian, I’ve been an atheist for over a decade.
Why? Because I finished the fourth grade. Taken literally, Christianity is a collection of preposterous stories and hocus pocus. Ethically, Christianity teaches effeminate, sacrificial self-loathing— I’d rather have a beer with Christopher Hitchens than Andrew Sullivan.
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