In Religion, It's Not "Truth," It's Demographics


Recently a Christian author stated Christianity's circumstances accurately, Christianity is aging out. He suggested that if those now active in local churches really grasped this, they might set different goals or change directions. A church that recognizes it will be history might want to be thinking of its coming legacy. Churches should consider modernizing their thinking about diversity. Every other kind of institution is emphasizing diversity, why can't all of Christianity catch up? A healthy change would be to recognize any demographic's "truth" is about the demographic itself. Different generations believe different "truths."

 Whatever the church might be doing now, recognition of demographics would be helpful. To me, spending lots of money on "youth pastors" seems pointless. There will be a handful of youth that follow their parents into the faith but demographics and decades of experience tell us the numbers will be too small the reverse a rise in the average age of church membership. 

The hypothetical death of Christianity might help uncover errors in the present version. For example, let's say a historian two or three generations from now sat down to write a paper on the demise of Christianity. He/she is not a Christian nor has ever heard much about it. So, the historian spends months reading press reports, church records, public documents and pouring over numbers. The historian also reads the Bible and books written by Christians trying to figure out why it died.   

My guess is the historian would be flummoxed by much of the faith's historical opposition to gay marriage and abortion. The historian would read what religious leaders back then (today) were saying the Bible demanded. Any historian would find a Bible in the library or museum, read it and find the Bible did not say what leaders back then claimed. 

The historian would review that Hitler tried to eliminate the Jews. Nations fought back and Hitler was gone. Slave owners in the U.S. tried to own and mistreat black slaves. Slavery and later segregation were gone. The historian would wonder why Christian leaders would think their faith could treat women and gay/trans people as lessors have public support? 

The historian would conclude the generations who held these mistaken views eventually died off and the next ones viewed our period with regret.

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