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Is Christianity Rejected Because It’s a “Low Status” Signifier?
I came across this intriguing post from Patheos’ site. The thesis is that in the aftermath of such things as the Scopes monkey trial, being a Christian has become a marker of low status, and that this explains both its decline and lack of appeal as well as the failure of attempts to “engage the culture” by making it appear hip.
The idea behind the “engaging the culture” movement was that, rather than withdrawing from the surrounding culture as their fundamentalist cousins did, evangelicals should go forth to meet it. The expected outcome of this going forth was a revival of Christian faith.
It sort of makes sense. If enough evangelicals, the idea was, could be trained to engage the surrounding culture, especially in the culture-making arenas of politics, education and the media, eventually these well-placed agents of change could turn things around.
What this plan never took into account is the dynamics of social status. Evangelicals sought to engage the culture by being relevant, by creating works of art, by offering good arguments for their positions. None of these addressed the real problem: that Christian belief simply isn’t cool, and that very few people want to lower their social status by identifying publicly with it.
I suspect that there is some truth to it. Your thoughts?
Published in Religion & Philosophy
No. He doesn’t.
My grandfather was a Christian missionary to India in the Central Provinces, and many of his members (if not most) were Untouchables. Some provinces allowed and encouraged missionaries, as they would bring education and medicine to the people. My grandmother became a nurse.
Like @AndrewKlavan keeps saying, no one reads the whole Bible literally. Faithful Christians just quibble over which bits might be metaphorical or poetic rather than historical. And unfaithful Christians . . . well, maybe I’d better spell it out again.
Adam gets up on a soapbox and says, “The earth was created in six days because Moses said so!”
Beth gets up on a soapbox and says, “The earth is 3.5 billion years old because science says so; the Bible is without error, but Moses wasn’t talking literally about the six days.”
Chris gets up on a soapbox and says, “The earth is 3.5 billion years old because science says so, and Moses or whoever actually wrong Genesis was just wrong, and this is one of the errors in the Bible.”
Adam and Beth agree on the big thing, and disagree on the smaller thing. Adam and Chris agree on the smaller thing. For some reason, we act like it’s Beth and Chris who are on the same side.
Interested in elaborating?
Indeed, it’s a fairly simple literary exercise to demonstrate from the content of their faith that it requires such behavior.
This is why the free exercise of religion really is effected by Leftist standards that religious schools and hospitals fully cooperate with the sexual revolution.
Yes, she seems to have meant that. In any case, Augustine, Plantinga, and nearly every apologist in between meant that.
Care to elaborate?
Well, . . . yes, in some sense and within certain parameters.
The first Christians had a very well established canon of the Torah, the Writings, and the Prophets. (I’m skeptical of the theory sometimes touted by the Catholics that the Apocrypha/Deuterocanon was also fairly well established.)
The first Christians did believe with the benefit of the emerging New Testament–from the early days there was at least an oral tradition, and the apostolic writings were circulated and authenticated from a very early date as we can see from the textual evidence (Colossians 4:16, 2 Peter 3: 15-17, 1 Timothy 5:18, 1 Cor. 15, Galatians 6:11, Galatians 1:11-24, and probably a number of early patristic writings).
And then there was the fact that the new Scriptural texts not only bore apostolic authority but were largely co-extensive with it, and with believing the Gospel. To believe with the benefit of the New Testament was just one mode of believing with the benefit of apostolic testimony and believing the Gospel. Those who had the testimony but did not yet have the writings were little different from those who had the writings but no physical access to the Apostles.
This book is quite good on these matters!
Upon what physical characteristic do you base your concept of “decency?” Got a meter for that? How do you calibrate it?
Mate:’ I’m Catholic, and everybody looks down on us. Including Catholics.’
Me too.
Maybe I’m stupid or a little dim witted as I have only been going to church for over 60 years, but in a Catholic Mass, it seems to me that the most important parts are the reading of the Gospel and the sermon that follows which is usually based somewhat on the Gospel reading of the day.
The Gospel readings that I have heard over and over since childhood are mostly metaphoric examples about how Christ was describing what it meant to “love thy neighbor as thy self”. Simply said about what it is to love and how to do good works, and in his words not always an easy thing to do. Actually loving thy neighbor it turns out in the real world can be a serious challenge at times which requires much contemplation by us dim wits the Catholics.
Not a whole lot about “eschatology” in the Catholic Mass or even the Old Testament. The service is based largely around Christ and what he said.
Now about our betters, the Atheists. Most Atheists I know are very unhappy. They live a life without purpose and as a result are always unhappily searching for meaning and not finding any.
So I guess us dim Catholics seem to live happier fulfilled lives than our alleged intellectual superiors the Atheists, but why is it that these Atheists of such greater intellectual capacity have such difficulty finding happiness? Are they not our intellectual superiors and wouldn’t they of course know better?
I’m probably generally on the leftist’s side with respect to some of the sexual revolution issues you’re referring to but I’d support these institutions choice to – for example – refuse adoptions to same sex couples so long as they are in fact private institutions. If, as so often happens, they are a mix of religious and public in the sense that they take public funding, my sympathy for their religious liberty argument runs out. If you take the king’s schilling . . .
Christianity was low status from the beginning. Jesus partied with the low lifes , and commented that it was as difficult for the rich to get to heaven as it was for a camel to get through the eye of a needle. And he died on a cross, as shameful a thing as can be imagined. The only thing Christianity has going for it is truth, and truth is no longer valued.
Lovely bit of over generalizing and snark. Not worthy of a response. Thanks for that.
And? The claim is that Christianity is being rejected by the elite -I’m telling you that there are elite, here and abroad, accepting the religion at far higher rates than the people who are non-elite. As a Christian, I would like to see more of everyone accept the faith, but that’s neither here nor there on the factual claim. There’s also survey evidence in the US (possibly international, too, but I don’t know) indicating that the highest drops in religious observance and behavior are among the working class -but that adherence and even orthodoxy are still fairly high among the rich and educated.
Which is to say, we’re actually talking about an intra-elite fight -or at this point, possibly an inter-elite fight.
Snark aside they have done studies that show that religious folks do tend to be happier and healthier, then our secular brothers and sisters. Most atheists I know aren’t the happiest folks. Nietzsche was probably one of the more reflective atheist philosophers where he took the argument that there is no god to its logical conclusion, and by all measures he was a pretty miserable person.
They also had the benefit of being able to just go talk to Peter, or James, other disciples, or one of many others who must have witnessed directly at least some of what they were hearing about. As oral traditions go, it was a short one. What they were passing on was less an ancient story than it was recent news. If there were obvious fabrications in the basic story, hard to believe it would have caught on so well. Within only a couple of generations things were being written down. Not to say that proves anything definitively, but it is something to consider.
Within Christianity, it may also be the younger denominations. I get the feeling that Baptists care more about the End Times than Lutherans, than Catholics.
36 But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only. — Matthew 24:36
Given that, what does it mean to “care?”
About two thirds are Scheduled caste (16% of total population) and scheduled tribe (10%) according to:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_in_India
The left is all in favor of individualism when it comes into conflict with family or self-help communities. For example, why do the leftists talk about childhood poverty rates instead of families living in poverty? It’s because they have more control if their programs treat children without reference to their families. In the battle between families and the state over who raises the children, they want it to be the state. Why does the left oppose a common language for interactions with the government? Because for practical purpose that would require immigrants to interact with the government as families or other social groups rather than as autonomous individuals. Those family and community relationships are a threat to the leftists’ agenda.
Also, the Christian teachings come down on both sides of the individual vs community dichotomy (if you think it’s really a dichotomy. I don’t necessarily). Christianity’s emphasis on the value of the individual, starting with the individual’s eternal soul, has been an important influence. But there are also places in Christian scriptures where the community is emphasized. And there is this exchange from Act 16:
In those days and in many societies (and even until, say, the early 19th century) a household meant a larger community than just a nuclear family, or even three-generation family. It’s not quite like some preachers say, “God has no grandchildren.”
Right—why is that? Seriously. Why can’t we have goodness and decency for their own sakes?
Why are human beings simultaneously wonderful (creative, loving, ingenious, brilliant) and horrible (Hitler)? Why do even good people do bone-headed, stupid, immoral, rotten things? And O’ Lordy, why do I do bone-headed, stupid, immoral, rotten things?
“Love your neighbor as yourself” should be the simplest, easiest, most banal and most intuitively obvious instruction possible…and yet, it turns out to be incredibly difficult, enough so that “love God with all your heart, mind etc.” really is “like unto it” if only in its sheer impossibility.
So the ultimate and urgent problem to be addressed by the Bible (IMHO) isn’t “what happens after we die,” but “why can’t we just do goodness and decency, kindness, mercy, justice rolling down like the waters and peace like an ever flowing stream when we actually want to?”
Yeah, that might be a good objection in many situations–when the institution is funded by the government or something. But in the recent case about the MO playground, where the state gave out rubber playground flooring to free for everyone except for the disapproved religious community’s facility, the state was in the wrong.
Somewhere between lies the receiving of federal money for your students’ scholarships.
Yes. It’s good inductive evidence. As historical evidence for historical claims go, the Gospel was remarkably well evidenced in the early days for precisely these as well as other reasons. As historical evidence for historical claims go, that good evidence carries over remarkably well into the permanent historical record.
So, this evening I received an award for being a Maine Woman of Achievement and the certificate given to me—nicely calligraph-ied—says “Women are seeking their own image of themselves nurtured from within rather than imposed from without.” It’s from someone named Pauli Murray, dated 1970.
I read it, and thought “well, no. That isn’t what I’m seeking.”
Maybe it’s not meant to be taken as oracular, an utterance of Oprah, sonorous and gong-accompanied. More like one of those anodyne remarks that get embroidered on pillows, e.g. “Women are like teabags; you can only tell how strong they are when they’re in hot water” or “Live, Laugh, Love.”
I am not seeking an image of myself, my own or anyone else’s. I am seeking God.
What more efficient way is there to convey what I mean? I am quite sure that my friend Cato (who is a darling man and doesn’t need to improve) and Majestyk (ditto, though I’ve not actually met him) know what I mean when I say this: that I don’t want to Live Laugh Love or be a teabag in hot water or nurture an image of myself, but I do absolutely want to love as God loves, or at least get as close as I can before I die?
(Also, FYI, I’m content to let God handle the details when I shuffle off this mortal coil; whatever it is, I’m sure it’s fine.)
Yes, that’s what I was thinking of. Testimony, much of it oral, was how the Gospel spread. People believed it was honest testimony – truthful in its essentials, and it must have been fairly consistent. But they did not require belief in exactly these words, and not other words, in order to convey the gist. I have a hard time picturing early Christians being bothered by “catching the testimony in a lie” on the kind of minor conflicts in testimony any honest witnesses might have. The gist of the story seemed right. Corroborating details seemed honest (if not 100% factual).
The rise of printing makes it possible to take a legalistic approach to the recorded testimony, to cross-examine it in a way that’s too literalistic and beside the point, and therefore, in reaction, to also defend it in a way that’s too literalistic and beside the point.
That’s why I’m not bothered when people say, “I believe the gist of the Christian story, but I wonder whether some of the details really happened as they say.” While God is certainly powerful enough to ensure that no accounts not in 100% accordance with what really happened made their way into the Bible, it seems unnecessary to believe that’s how the Bible works, because total accuracy really isn’t what you expect from honest testimony to begin with.
No, “Love your neighbor as yourself” is like “Love the Lord your G-d.” Not vice versa. I think if you check the Greek you’ll see there’s an asymmetry, a resemblance of neighbor-love to G-d-love and not vice versa. A resemblance rooted in the creation of man as image of G-d. The New Testament language will mirror the Old Testament language on that creation.
I say “I think.” Because I jotted down notes and haven’t finished dealing with them. I’m hoping to cover this in a future Ricochet post!
No, the ultimate and urgent problem to be addressed by the Bible is one that the Bible tells about: sin and the problems that come with it–the breaking of creation and the just punishment for sin. People who zoom in on personal after-death punishment for sin and personal eschatology are getting a lot of the Bible right; they just tend to neglect a lot of the rest. People who zoom in on the goodness and healing of creation are just the same only with different parts of the Bible.
And the same for those who talk about all the love-of-G-d-and-neighbor stuff separate from the eschatology. The prophecy “let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” parallels the river of Ezekiel and the “living water” in the Gospel of John, and all of these passages are about the love of G-d and neighbor, about the plan of redemption through the Messiah, and about eschatology.
Indeed. Epistemologically speaking, it’s just silly to expect total accuracy on these grounds.
Total accuracy is to be considered when considering the doctrines of inerrancy and infallibility and so on.
Epistemologically speaking, what we’re talking about is just history–historical claims, subject to historical evidentiary standards, known by those standards.
But if that knowledge leads to knowledge of the Messiahship of Jesus and to a doctrine of Scripture, fine and dandy. And if that further knowledge entails some Proposition X, fine and dandy. If Proposition X should have something to do with total accuracy of such-and-such a testimony in such-and-such a sphere, I don’t see the problem.
But it doesn’t come up here.
(Epistemologically speaking.)
(Unless the Holy Spirit happens to assure us of the truth of Scripture by a kind of spiritual perception independent of the evidence and we take the Bible’s total truthfulness as a premise. That’s also fine. Epistemologically speaking.)
Yes, that seems right.
At the risk of generalizing (which I would never, ever risk doing), I’d say the Left favors radical individualism in sexual ethics and radical communitarianism in economics.
Yes, and the Sons of Recab in the book of Jeremiah!
Eh, if salvation restores the marred image of God to its authentic glory, then there is a sense in which seeking salvation is seeking “the real image of yourself nurtured from within”. That’s likely giving the quote too much credit, but seeking God has historically been described in this way from time to time, noting that, in returning to God, you also return to your true self, nurtured by God from within.
I agree that not picturing the water as eschatological robs it of its power.
Some people are oriented toward a practical faith that finds the visionary power of faith inherently less interesting. That’s fine. Others of us, without that visionary power, why live? Yeah, I mean that question pretty literally, too.
Not everyone is interested in faith in the same way, so I don’t see much point in deciding for everyone whose way ought to be the right way. Flannery O’Connor couldn’t stand Christian mystics – she described herself as too practical-minded to not find their mysticism, well, a little creepy. Likewise, there are Christians who find her articulation of Christianity a little creepy. Similarly, some people may not crave a vision of the eschatological waters, while others might need that vision to make sense of things.