How Can We Summarize the New Attitude Toward Christianity: Jaded

I watched the live theater performance of  Elf  last night and something jumped out at me. The story is about Santa and a visit to New York City. Santa's sleigh is no longer powered by reindeer but instead powered by "The Christmas Spirit." But the sleigh would not fly in New York City because of the City's doubts about Christmas and Santa. People of New York were send in the script to be "jaded" about both.

After rousing songs and dances the story ends happily. But, to me, there is a metaphor to Christianity. I think a broad swath of the U. S. public is jaded about the faith. In Europe it is the majority. Apparently the majority of youth in the U.S. falls into the jaded category.

I combined several definitions of "jaded" and like, "To become dull, worn out, weary, apathetic or cynical as from overuse or over exposure."

People in the U.S. and perhaps most places in the world are exposed to more media and propaganda than ever before. They are becoming jaded about all advertising and propaganda. Religion is just another source of propaganda and people have come to see it as no different than the rest.

Add to that all the publicity about sexual abuse, millionaire preachers and hypocrisy and the result is a jaded public.

Another source of the jaded consumer of religious propaganda is popular books like those written by Professor Bart Ehrman. His books and others present evidence that the Bible was written by unknown authors and changed over the centuries by scribes who thought they could improve it. An entire academic community has grown up around critical analysis of the Bible. More critical analysis is on the way and more jaded consumers to follow.

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