Immigration, fertility, and the rise of American civil religion as the most "competitive" faith complicate any simple account of which church body is winning, who is losing, and why.
I really like the language of certain church bodies having infused cultures and infused growth, I think the particular use of this distinction necessitates two others, divinized culture/growth (culture and growth that is primarily focused on the Divine transcendentals and gains growth based off of divine will and practice rather than the normal cultural economies) and refused growth. I think we would all like to think we have a divinized church culture when generally speaking, the day to day life of most congregants congregation to congregation is simply not divinized, it's this appearance of divinization that I think attracts people to pentecostalism and in some ways is what you are hitting at here when it comes to the buy in or adherence to stricter, more active churchways. Infused culture and growth is not necessarily opposed to Divinized church culture and growth but the two do end up at odds from time to time, after all Christ said to baptize all nations, meaning all nations can be baptized. On the other hand I think refused growth and culture is just that, an anti-culture to whatever the infused culture is(not saying this culture is deliberately or actively against the infused culture though) this anti-culture can also be something that is truly Christian(Lutheranism as the Anti-Culture to Catholicism purely based off of the theological virtues it focuses on as opposed to the philosophical virtues of the medieval church) it can also be something that is secular, when thinking of refused growth what comes to mind are certain cultural norms or expectations that determine the refusal of certain types of people and norms in the congregations, this can be good except for when one is refusing converts in this way churches like the Amish church for example will naturally be off-putting to outsiders because it is simply not culturally infused to have certain types of person or lifestyles acceptable to it's church body. Just like light cannot have fellowship with darkness, this also exists within the ACR, if a Christian pastor was to show up at a pride parade and call people to repentance, he would likely be tarred and feathered for his appearance there. in this way I think all three of these distinctions probably exist at the same level within all political bodies at all times (politics being the outflowing of the economic as free association drives similar households to align with one another within the classical liberal frameworks which we live in) I think the problem we are seeing here is that according to the word of God, divinization is supposed to direct and guide cultural normativity and is supposed to precede infused and refused cultures, due to the fallenness of man this necessarily is going to cause all of these distinctions to be in opposition to one another at various points in time. The goal then is to create a church culture and church body which has harmony amongst these 3 cultures in its self actualization, this I think gets to a core argument that the LCMS is undergoing right now which is, "What is self-actualization for the church?" is self actualization merely the continuance of sacramental services and confessional adherence or is it in redefining what culture is and should be? (obviously former is more in line with what scripture teaches, while the latter is attempting to solve the problem by creating a whole new category of culture or redefining the infused/refused categories which already exist and none of these proposed solutions solve the issue, they just start it over again) while these two positions are in a constant dialectical battle with eachother others fall by the wayside, many church fathers and lutheran fathers view the church's self actualization as an act of Divine will skirting human ethical prescriptions to benefit future outcomes of which current generations are incapable of knowing, or amongst the proto-lutherans who view the actualization of the church as an apocalyptic divine service of the neighbor in suffering. What can be fundamentally said is that because the church militant is active in a fallen world the call of the church militant is to remain doctrinally faithful, preach repentance, and administer sacraments and the forgiveness of sins and by this do warfare with the devil. Any church which deviates from this teleological basis forfeits its cultural position as a church and by consequence its growth.
it is no wonder then that anti-chuches and false churches immitate this divinely created cultural order that God has made to guide the social affiliations that constitute churches.
Kinda went on a rant there, but let me know what you think!
Over the past 10 years or so I have made it a part of my Christian outreach to move away from siloed implementations of "church" and to actively seek out brothers and sisters who happily exist in the "invisible" ecclesia, wherever they might be. I don't have statistics for this, but in my experience, there are a lot more followers of Jesus in the bucket that is often pejoratively termed "nones" than many in the mainstream want to acknowledge (hence my identification with Gary Larsen's furry little mammal in the cartoon opposite snickering dinosaurs who are ill-prepared for the coming climate change) . These refugees are in general agreement regarding the basics of Christianity's tree including the inerrancy of scripture and moral requirements of discipleship, but they have intentionally eschewed the thousands of leaves and twigs of modern Christian practice and polity. They're looking for Jesus and simple fellowship and accountability. The pushing and shoving over social issues like race, sexuality, women's roles, blah, blah, blah interfere with a simple expression of the Acts 2 fellowship and worship they are seeking.
Reasons they've left Christian icons behind are varied, but it seems to me that many are simply tired of the seemingly unstoppable drift inside Christianity's increasingly inert structures toward whatever has become the latest religio/cultural fad. Many in mainline bastions will sniff that they have accepted less-than-robust systemic theologies. Perhaps, but the consistent message I'm hearing is these "nones" are wishing to anchor in the solid bedrock of Christ without a whole boatload of additional requirements that mainline churches seem to feel driven to add to the the growing list of what it takes to be in their good graces. They sincerely desire to be followers of "The Way" rather than "Church.com"
Just one observation. Undoubtedly each reader's mileage will vary.
When someone pays for something, it has much more value than if they got it for free. A child who paid for their bike (or phone) tends to treat it better than someone who had it given to them. Similarly, earning a place in church through tithing, study, dedication, sacrifice, etc. holds more value than grace given.
--
Secondly and equally important is prestige. People who have worked and sacrificed to be part of a group take great pride in their membership status. Call it the "country club effect," if you will.
Many people treat their church like an exclusive club. Come as you are, but be prepared to earn the right to stay.
--
The challenge is getting the next generation to see that there is value in paying those dues. In Wisconsin fewer than 50% of people between 18 and 29 consider themselves Christian. For the past several decades, the nones/dones have been increasing at about .5 per year.
Three years ago, I started compiling what I saw as the overarching beliefs and practices of what you're calling "American Civil Religion." I've called it "modern American spirituality." Selections from my notes follow as a complement to the anthropological work you've done in this article.
I think it's broadly appropriate to speak of two major sects within the ACR as we look at the right/left divide in America (your "urban professionals" and "exurban/rural workers").
- - -
SOTERIOLOGY OF MAS
Reincarnation
Realization of individual potential classified as “salvation”?
ESCHATOLOGY
Presence of ancestor spirits watching over the individual - Related? “Your angel” / “guardian angel”
Focus on the actions of humans bringing about the “end” of what is known - For conservatives, societal change and erosion of morals into anarchy - For liberals, disastrous climate change and dystopia
ETHICS
Tolerance; “judge not” - Moreso on the left
Focus on exterior justice over/against individual righteousness - Both a left and right thing
“Science” - Not exclusive to the left, but more common. Still, anecdotally, the scientistic worldview is seen in right-leaning individuals
RITUALS
Elf on the shelf?
“Visualizing” / law of attraction practices
Blessings of objects
THEOLOGY
Gnostic god of emanations at work through minor spirits
“The universe” as a god-figure
Deification of public figures - Occurs on the left and right.
“Deification” in the very same way that Augustus was deified. On the right, people are aware that they’re only supposed to “believe” in Jesus. On the left, people deny the existence of a god. Yet what else do you call the canonization of our cultural saints?
LBJ and the Demonicrat-controlled Congress betrayed the United States of America when they passed the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. This Act was the death knell for any more substantial immigrants from Western Europe, and within a generation started the decline of Christian-based (or at least Christian-associated) culture in the United States.
Although this Act provided a source of cheap unskilled labor for American industry, immigration now shifted to those with more non-Western culture and nonChristian background. Assimilation of these people into American culture over a few generations has been slower, or not at all, especially with the decline in the standards and quality of public education since the 1970s.
I really like the language of certain church bodies having infused cultures and infused growth, I think the particular use of this distinction necessitates two others, divinized culture/growth (culture and growth that is primarily focused on the Divine transcendentals and gains growth based off of divine will and practice rather than the normal cultural economies) and refused growth. I think we would all like to think we have a divinized church culture when generally speaking, the day to day life of most congregants congregation to congregation is simply not divinized, it's this appearance of divinization that I think attracts people to pentecostalism and in some ways is what you are hitting at here when it comes to the buy in or adherence to stricter, more active churchways. Infused culture and growth is not necessarily opposed to Divinized church culture and growth but the two do end up at odds from time to time, after all Christ said to baptize all nations, meaning all nations can be baptized. On the other hand I think refused growth and culture is just that, an anti-culture to whatever the infused culture is(not saying this culture is deliberately or actively against the infused culture though) this anti-culture can also be something that is truly Christian(Lutheranism as the Anti-Culture to Catholicism purely based off of the theological virtues it focuses on as opposed to the philosophical virtues of the medieval church) it can also be something that is secular, when thinking of refused growth what comes to mind are certain cultural norms or expectations that determine the refusal of certain types of people and norms in the congregations, this can be good except for when one is refusing converts in this way churches like the Amish church for example will naturally be off-putting to outsiders because it is simply not culturally infused to have certain types of person or lifestyles acceptable to it's church body. Just like light cannot have fellowship with darkness, this also exists within the ACR, if a Christian pastor was to show up at a pride parade and call people to repentance, he would likely be tarred and feathered for his appearance there. in this way I think all three of these distinctions probably exist at the same level within all political bodies at all times (politics being the outflowing of the economic as free association drives similar households to align with one another within the classical liberal frameworks which we live in) I think the problem we are seeing here is that according to the word of God, divinization is supposed to direct and guide cultural normativity and is supposed to precede infused and refused cultures, due to the fallenness of man this necessarily is going to cause all of these distinctions to be in opposition to one another at various points in time. The goal then is to create a church culture and church body which has harmony amongst these 3 cultures in its self actualization, this I think gets to a core argument that the LCMS is undergoing right now which is, "What is self-actualization for the church?" is self actualization merely the continuance of sacramental services and confessional adherence or is it in redefining what culture is and should be? (obviously former is more in line with what scripture teaches, while the latter is attempting to solve the problem by creating a whole new category of culture or redefining the infused/refused categories which already exist and none of these proposed solutions solve the issue, they just start it over again) while these two positions are in a constant dialectical battle with eachother others fall by the wayside, many church fathers and lutheran fathers view the church's self actualization as an act of Divine will skirting human ethical prescriptions to benefit future outcomes of which current generations are incapable of knowing, or amongst the proto-lutherans who view the actualization of the church as an apocalyptic divine service of the neighbor in suffering. What can be fundamentally said is that because the church militant is active in a fallen world the call of the church militant is to remain doctrinally faithful, preach repentance, and administer sacraments and the forgiveness of sins and by this do warfare with the devil. Any church which deviates from this teleological basis forfeits its cultural position as a church and by consequence its growth.
it is no wonder then that anti-chuches and false churches immitate this divinely created cultural order that God has made to guide the social affiliations that constitute churches.
Kinda went on a rant there, but let me know what you think!
Over the past 10 years or so I have made it a part of my Christian outreach to move away from siloed implementations of "church" and to actively seek out brothers and sisters who happily exist in the "invisible" ecclesia, wherever they might be. I don't have statistics for this, but in my experience, there are a lot more followers of Jesus in the bucket that is often pejoratively termed "nones" than many in the mainstream want to acknowledge (hence my identification with Gary Larsen's furry little mammal in the cartoon opposite snickering dinosaurs who are ill-prepared for the coming climate change) . These refugees are in general agreement regarding the basics of Christianity's tree including the inerrancy of scripture and moral requirements of discipleship, but they have intentionally eschewed the thousands of leaves and twigs of modern Christian practice and polity. They're looking for Jesus and simple fellowship and accountability. The pushing and shoving over social issues like race, sexuality, women's roles, blah, blah, blah interfere with a simple expression of the Acts 2 fellowship and worship they are seeking.
Reasons they've left Christian icons behind are varied, but it seems to me that many are simply tired of the seemingly unstoppable drift inside Christianity's increasingly inert structures toward whatever has become the latest religio/cultural fad. Many in mainline bastions will sniff that they have accepted less-than-robust systemic theologies. Perhaps, but the consistent message I'm hearing is these "nones" are wishing to anchor in the solid bedrock of Christ without a whole boatload of additional requirements that mainline churches seem to feel driven to add to the the growing list of what it takes to be in their good graces. They sincerely desire to be followers of "The Way" rather than "Church.com"
Just one observation. Undoubtedly each reader's mileage will vary.
These are pretty commonly understood principles.
When someone pays for something, it has much more value than if they got it for free. A child who paid for their bike (or phone) tends to treat it better than someone who had it given to them. Similarly, earning a place in church through tithing, study, dedication, sacrifice, etc. holds more value than grace given.
--
Secondly and equally important is prestige. People who have worked and sacrificed to be part of a group take great pride in their membership status. Call it the "country club effect," if you will.
Many people treat their church like an exclusive club. Come as you are, but be prepared to earn the right to stay.
--
The challenge is getting the next generation to see that there is value in paying those dues. In Wisconsin fewer than 50% of people between 18 and 29 consider themselves Christian. For the past several decades, the nones/dones have been increasing at about .5 per year.
Three years ago, I started compiling what I saw as the overarching beliefs and practices of what you're calling "American Civil Religion." I've called it "modern American spirituality." Selections from my notes follow as a complement to the anthropological work you've done in this article.
I think it's broadly appropriate to speak of two major sects within the ACR as we look at the right/left divide in America (your "urban professionals" and "exurban/rural workers").
- - -
SOTERIOLOGY OF MAS
Reincarnation
Realization of individual potential classified as “salvation”?
ESCHATOLOGY
Presence of ancestor spirits watching over the individual - Related? “Your angel” / “guardian angel”
Focus on the actions of humans bringing about the “end” of what is known - For conservatives, societal change and erosion of morals into anarchy - For liberals, disastrous climate change and dystopia
ETHICS
Tolerance; “judge not” - Moreso on the left
Focus on exterior justice over/against individual righteousness - Both a left and right thing
“Science” - Not exclusive to the left, but more common. Still, anecdotally, the scientistic worldview is seen in right-leaning individuals
RITUALS
Elf on the shelf?
“Visualizing” / law of attraction practices
Blessings of objects
THEOLOGY
Gnostic god of emanations at work through minor spirits
“The universe” as a god-figure
Deification of public figures - Occurs on the left and right.
“Deification” in the very same way that Augustus was deified. On the right, people are aware that they’re only supposed to “believe” in Jesus. On the left, people deny the existence of a god. Yet what else do you call the canonization of our cultural saints?
- - -
Thank you for this article.
LBJ and the Demonicrat-controlled Congress betrayed the United States of America when they passed the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. This Act was the death knell for any more substantial immigrants from Western Europe, and within a generation started the decline of Christian-based (or at least Christian-associated) culture in the United States.
Although this Act provided a source of cheap unskilled labor for American industry, immigration now shifted to those with more non-Western culture and nonChristian background. Assimilation of these people into American culture over a few generations has been slower, or not at all, especially with the decline in the standards and quality of public education since the 1970s.