Great article! Would love to see more thoughtful debate about this... Sent from my iPhone
> On Jan 7, 2016, at 08:13, BILROJ via Centroids: The Center of the Radical > Centrist Community <[email protected]> wrote: > > message dated 1/7/2016 > > > WSJ > > The God Profusion > > > By > Naomi Schaefer Riley > Jan. 3, 2016 4:57 p.m. ET > God is not dead. Despite the predictions of academics and liberal religious > leaders, the world is becoming more faith-filled, not less. According to > Rodney Stark, the co-director of the Institute for Studies of Religion at > Baylor University, there has been no rise of the “nones”—no increase in the > number of the world’s self-professed atheists and no triumph of reason over > revelation. > > > One of Mr. Stark’s targets in “The Triumph of Faith” is certain modern > polling firms, including the Pew Survey, that routinely announce a > significant increase in the number of Americans claiming no religious > affiliation. As Alan Cooperman, Pew’s director of religion, reported last > year: “The country is becoming less religious as a whole.” Mr. Stark > criticizes the methods of Pew and other firms by asserting that their > response rates are too small to justify the broad claims they make. > > His real battle, though, is with intellectual elites of the West, who have > been declaring the demise of religion for centuries and have been advancing a > secularization thesis for decades. For them, religious belief is a > susceptibility of the illiterate and ignorant. With education, in their view, > people see the foolishness of their ways and abandon their beliefs. Education > is spreading ever further, thanks to affluence and technology: Hence the slow > decline of faith. > > Mr. Stark pushes back against the secularization thesis in several ways. In a > section called “The Myth of Medieval Piety,” he notes, for example, that > during the so-called Dark Ages of Europe—when religion supposedly stifled the > life of the mind and benighted the populace—more than 90% of the population > lived in rural areas, while churches were to be found mostly in towns and > cities: “Therefore hardly anyone could have attended church. Moreover, even > after most Europeans had access to a church, whether Catholic or Protestant, > most people still didn’t attend, and when forced to do so, they often > misbehaved.” > > In short, the poor and less educated are not by definition more pious. As for > the other half of the secularization thesis, Mr. Stark shows that, in one > country after another today, more educated people are choosing religion in > larger numbers than their less educated peers. This is certainly true in the > United States, where college-educated Americans are more likely to attend > religious services than their counterparts with only a high-school diploma. > > Indeed, religious fervor has taken hold in many countries where modernity is > a settled fact. In majority-Muslim countries the percentage of people > attending mosque is highest among those with a college education. Mr. Stark > writes that the people in these countries who are most offended by Western > culture tend not to be village hicks but people living in modernized, urban > areas. > > Scholars like Philip Jenkins have for years observed that in the Southern > Hemisphere religious belief—particularly Christianity and Islam—has been > spreading rapidly. Here Mr. Stark cites a poll that he trusts: the Gallup > World Poll, which has been conducted annually since 2005 and now includes > more than a million interviews from 163 different countries. According to > Gallup, almost all South American countries are now less than 5% secular. > While Catholicism used to be the dominant form of Christianity, because it > was the official religion of the colonizing powers, Protestantism “has become > a major religious presence in most of Latin America.” > > Mr. Stark argues that, in general, the government sponsorship of religion is > a hindrance to the growth of a faith. Monopoly destroys competition, and > competition, he says, causes growth—in religious affiliation as much as in > the marketplace for goods and services. In many places around the globe, the > competition among Muslims, evangelicals, Catholics, Mormons, Jehovah’s > Witnesses and hundreds of smaller religious groups has resulted in an > atmosphere of revival. A smug complacency has been replaced by a fervor to > win souls. > > Not in Europe, however, where the churches, once so important, are now empty. > For the champions of the secularization thesis, such a development is nothing > to complain about: Empty churches are a sign of reason’s progress. Mr. Stark > offers some amusing evidence to the contrary. Drawing on the Gallup poll, he > notes that Europeans hold all sorts of supernatural beliefs. In Austria, 28% > of respondents say they believe in fortune tellers; 32% believe in astrology; > and 33% believe in lucky charms. “More than 20 percent of Swedes believe in > reincarnation,” Mr. Stark writes; “half believe in mental telepathy.” More > than half of Icelanders believe in huldufolk, hidden people like elves and > trolls. It seems as if the former colonial outposts for European missionaries > are now becoming more religious, while Europe itself is becoming interested > in primitive folk beliefs. > > Mr. Stark may criticize the methods of Pew and other polling firms, but there > is no doubt that fewer Americans than ever before claim an association with a > particular sect or denomination. They may be religious by some definition, > but they are “unchurched.” The folks at Pew are not atheist triumphalists. > They do seem to be tracking what Mr. Stark acknowledges to be the “social > consequences” of the changes in the way people identify. > > > And while it is true that the most educated members of American society are > the ones going to church, their attendance and affiliation is likely to > decline in the coming years, in part because of changes in family dynamics. > Americans are getting married at later ages or increasingly not at all. And > it has traditionally been marriage that brings young adults back to religion > or keeps them in the fold. Such changes may be a blip on the global screen, > though. God only knows. > > > -- > -- > Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community > <[email protected]> > Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism > Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org > > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
