Who'da thunk?!?
Posted on 10/04/2023 8:00:46 AM PDT by Morgana
Pastors at mainline Protestant churches are much more likely to identify as liberal than their congregants as most of them hold progressive positions on hot-button social issues, according to a new survey.
The Public Religion Research Institute released the results of a study based on responses collected between November 2022 and May 2023 from 3,066 clergy last month.
All respondents belong to one of the seven largest mainline Protestant denominations: the United Methodist Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the American Baptist Churches USA, the Presbyterian Church USA, the Episcopal Church, the United Church of Christ and the Disciples of Christ.
The survey examined the political ideology and partisan affiliation of pastors, comparing such information to data about the views of congregants from the PRRI’s 2022 Health of Congregations Survey. Overall, 55% of pastors identify as liberal, while moderates and conservatives each constitute 22% of respondents.
On the other hand, just 23% of white mainline Protestant churchgoers categorize themselves as liberal. Larger shares of such churchgoers view themselves as moderate (32%) and conservative (43%).
Broken down by specific denomination, the United Church of Christ had the highest share of pastors who identify as liberal (84%), followed by the Presbyterian Church USA (70%), the Episcopal Church (69%), the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (68%) and the Disciples of Christ (62%). Liberals accounted for 44% of the United Methodist Church clergy. Only the American Baptist Churches USA had a majority of clergy (56%) who labeled themselves as conservative.
Looking at partisan affiliation as opposed to political ideology yielded similar findings, with 49% of mainline Protestant clergy affiliating with the Democratic Party compared to just 24% of white mainline Protestant congregants. A plurality of white mainline Protestant churchgoers (36%) identify as Republicans and 35% are independents.
Seventy-one percent of United Church of Christ clergy identified with the Democratic Party, along with 61% of Presbyterian Church USA clergy, 60% of Episcopal Church clergy, 60% of Disciples of Christ clergy and 59% of Evangelical Lutheran Church in America clergy. Democrats made up 38% of the United Methodist Church pastors surveyed, while a narrow plurality (32%) of American Baptist Churches USA clergy were Republicans.
On issues related to LGBT ideology, members of the clergy were also more liberal than white mainline Protestant churchgoers. Ninety percent of pastors surveyed support “nondiscrimination protections” for LGBT people, while 79% favor allowing same-sex couples to marry and 69% oppose allowing faith-based businesses to refuse to provide services for LGBT people if doing so violates their religious beliefs.
Among white mainline Protestant churchgoers, LGBT nondiscrimination protections (77%) and same-sex marriage (72%) also received majority support, while 57% expressed opposition to religiously based service refusals. Near-universal support for LGBT nondiscrimination protections was measured among pastors affiliated with the United Church of Christ (97%), the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (96%), the Episcopal Church (95%) and the Presbyterian Church USA (94%).
Substantially large shares of pastors affiliated with the Disciples of Christ (90%), the United Methodist Church (87%) and American Baptist Churches USA (80%) also favored LGBT nondiscrimination protections. Pastors affiliated with the United Church of Christ (95%), the Presbyterian Church USA (94%), the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (93%) and the Episcopal Church (91%) expressed near-unanimous support for same-sex marriage.
While smaller majorities of clergy associated with the Disciples of Christ (78%) and the United Methodist Church (72%) favored same-sex marriage, just 39% of American Baptist Churches USA pastors did.
Ninety percent of United Church of Christ pastors opposed religiously based service refusals, followed by 79% of Episcopal Church clergy, 78% of those affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the Presbyterian Church USA, 71% of Disciples of Christ pastors and 62% of United Methodist Church pastors.
American Baptist Churches USA pastors were once again the outlier on religiously based service refusals, with just 37% opposing allowing faith-based business owners to refrain from providing services to LGBT individuals if doing so went against their religious beliefs. Differences in opinion between pastors and congregations as well as across different denominations also manifested on the issue of abortion.
Seventy-three percent of mainline Protestant pastors opposed the United States Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, which overturned the Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion nationwide. A smaller share of white mainline Protestant churchgoers (67%) disapproved of the reversal of Roe.
Opposition to the reversal of Roe was highest among the United Church of Christ clergy (91%) but large majorities of Presbyterian Church USA pastors (85%), Evangelical Lutheran Church in America pastors (84%), Episcopal Church pastors (83%), Disciples of Christ clergy (80%) and United Methodist Church pastors (65%) also disapproved of the overturning of Roe. American Baptist Churches USA pastors were the only group of white mainline Protestant clergy where less than half (48%) opposed the Dobbs decision.
Agreed. They are more tyrannical than their more classically liberal flocks.
1) they want to help people
2) they went to seminary, that is to say,college. There are a lot of agnostics teaching but the benefits are good.
“Helping people” in this age is mostly about making them feel good, find happiness. Short term, not eternal.
This age does not acknowledge that life is hard and painful. Accept the struggle and with God’s grace there may be joy.
Ministers lose their faith, sometimes, in college or after. Many Christians know the dark night of the soul and persevere.
But what happens if the dark night lasts, or the faith remains lost but the loss isn’t all that painful?
There are still the bills to be paid, and the satisfaction of helping people, so they stay in ministry.
Look up moral therapeutic deism.
I am a woman, a feminist of sorts, but I do not think women should be ordained ministers. The church becomes feminized and principles get squished in favor of compassion.
However, the problem predates women as church leaders. There were many male ministers pushing abortion rights in the 60s, the Episcopal bishop John Spong was promoting atheism decades ago.
God Eternal...we forget Him.
If you knew what they teach in the liberal seminaries, you’d never let these people near the pulpit.
Indeed.
the reason the pastors are liberal is because the seminaries are liberal. Liberal means theologically that they believe that Jesus is fully man but not fully God.
(This view of christianity robs christianity of all its power and glory and generally renders christians who hold to it to be the most pitied of people. This is why liberal pastors and their congregations generally appear to be so pitiful.)
Liberal theology is a modern version of the ancient arian heresy. The modern version goes back to the unitarians among the founders and descartes in the early 1600’s. He got it from servetus who was burned at the stake by calvin.
The ancient version of the arian heresy was famously resolved at the council of nicea in 324 AD
Its thought that 300 years later that the version of christianity that muhhammed encountered in jerusalem was arian christianity. and that because his view of Jesus bear similarities to the arian texts that comprised the nag hammadi scrolls.
the reason the pastors are liberal is because the seminaries are liberal. Liberal means theologically that they believe that Jesus is fully man but not fully God.
(This view of christianity robs christianity of all its power and glory and generally renders christians who hold to it to be the most pitied of people. This is why liberal pastors and their congregations generally appear to be so pitiful.)
Liberal theology is a modern version of the ancient arian heresy. The modern version goes back to the unitarians among the founders and descartes in the early 1600’s. He got it from servetus who was burned at the stake by calvin.
The ancient version of the arian heresy was famously resolved at the council of nicea in 324 AD
Its thought that 300 years later that the version of christianity that muhhammed encountered in jerusalem was arian christianity. and that because his view of Jesus bear similarities to the arian texts that comprised the nag hammadi scrolls.
A particular instance of clergy being more religious than the average parishioner, if you get my drift.
Infiltrate the churches, and replace revealed religion with “social” religion. Discredit the Bible, and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity, which does not need a “religious crutch.”We were being warned from all directions.
Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of “separation of church and state.”
— Goals #27 and #28 of the 45 communist goals for the USA
Who'da thunk?!?
OK; where from?
Listen my children and you shall hear, Of how much fun it is to be a queer. Oh, some preachers will rant and rave, 'bout how your soul he has to save, But which voice is true - or insincere?
Genesis 18:20-21
20. Then the LORD said, "The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin so grievous
21. that I will go down and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has reached me. If not, I will know."
Genesis 19:4-7
4. Before they had gone to bed, all the men from every part of the city of Sodom--both young and old--surrounded the house.
5. They called to Lot, "Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so that we can have sex with them."
6. Lot went outside to meet them and shut the door behind him
7. and said, "No, my friends. Don't do this wicked thing.
Leviticus niv
18:22 Do not have sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman; that is detestable.
20:13 If a man has sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable.
They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.
Isaiah 3:9 The look on their faces testifies against them;
they parade their sin like Sodom; they do not hide it.
Woe to them! They have brought disaster upon themselves.
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2 Peter 2:13b Their idea of pleasure is to carouse in broad daylight.
They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their pleasures while they feast with you.
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Ezekiel 16:49-50 "`Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom:
She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.
They were haughty and did detestable things before me.
Therefore I did away with them as you have seen.
1. But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them--bringing swift destruction on themselves.
2. Many will follow their shameful ways and will bring the way of truth into disrepute.
3. In their greed these teachers will exploit you with stories they have made up. Their condemnation has long been hanging over them, and their destruction has not been sleeping.
4. For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, putting them into gloomy dungeons to be held for judgment;
5. if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others;
6. if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly;
7. and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the filthy lives of lawless men
8. (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)--
9. if this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue godly men from trials and to hold the unrighteous for the day of judgment, while continuing their punishment.
10. This is especially true of those who follow the corrupt desire of the sinful nature and despise authority. Bold and arrogant, these men are not afraid to slander celestial beings;
11. yet even angels, although they are stronger and more powerful, do not bring slanderous accusations against such beings in the presence of the Lord.
12. But these men blaspheme in matters they do not understand. They are like brute beasts, creatures of instinct, born only to be caught and destroyed, and like beasts they too will perish.
13. They will be paid back with harm for the harm they have done. Their idea of pleasure is to carouse in broad daylight. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their pleasures while they feast with you.
But there IS hope!!!
1 Corinthians 6:9-11
9. Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived:
Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders
10. nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.
11. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
How much BIBLE do you know?
This will determine what 'denomination' you finally select - if any.
The fall back position is this:
The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue.Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so.Many of them therefore believed, with not a few Greek women of high standing as well as men.But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the word of God was proclaimed by Paul at Berea also, they came there too, agitating and stirring up the crowds.Then the brothers immediately sent Paul off on his way to the sea, but Silas and Timothy remained there.Those who conducted Paul brought him as far as Athens, and after receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him as soon as possible, they departed.
I'm gonna tear up and cry.
Exactly right! Genesis 19:9! And what a wicked place Sodom was.
Actually, the full quote is “Never trust a man in a dress or a psychiatrist with a toupee.”
At the time it was first said in the 1970s, a man in a dress referred to priests and fancy-dress pastors as well as trannies and drag queens.
We’ve come a long way, baby!
Oops. I mean’t nondenominational.
And it’s been all downhill.
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