The Newest Evangelical Buzz-Term, "Spiritual Awakening"


Keeping track of the newest technics for bamboozling the public is a never-ending task. Only a couple of years ago, Christians on the right told us there was an unstoppable movement to end all abortions. Women, it said, were coming to realize the one-cell fetus is a human being and abortion is murder. Then, the opposite turned to be the case. Keeping the myth of success alive meant keeping the cash flow alive and jobs secure. 

Now, with polling and church membership showing that orthodox Christianity is sliding away, some new schtick is needed. And, the Christian right is test marketing one, "there is a spiritual awakening going on across the country." You will not find any concrete evidence about this, but who needs it? If crowds like to hear it, shout it out loud.  

In the week's The New Yorker there is yet another of the drumbeat which has become quite constant. The article reviews the various ways intellectual thinking in the U.S. now finds actual evidence of a Jesus not there. Those who have studied the stories of Greek gods find the Jesus story matches to perfection the Greek god stories. The compromise view is that while the Bible cannot be an accurate account of a Jesus, there was so much commotion at the time something significant must have happened even if there was not an actual Jesus. It come to the most powerful and logical conclusion. 

This conclusion is it did not matter whether there was or was not an actual Jesus. Christianity would never have displaced Paganism had not Constantine avoided the assassinations so common among Roman dictators and ruled for a long time. It was the length of his rule that moved Christianity to the front, not a human god. 

The simplistic ideas like "Spiritual Awakening" will not save Christianity. 


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