Teenage Spirituality Poll -- Conservatives are Shocked, Shocked About Low Levels of Belief

The estimable Dr. Kendall Harmon has re-posted an excerpt from a 2003 national survey of youth and religion. The survey indicated that young Episcopalians are less likely than average to believe in God, to feel close to God, etc., and that young people generally are “incredibly inarticulate about their faith, their religious beliefs and practices.” 

Some commenters responded, for example, "That survey should be devastating to ECUSA! It not only is not doing its job with kids, it is turning kids away from religion."   Certainly some Episcopal Sunday school programs leave much to be desired. 

But at least part of the problem with Sunday school programs stems from the flaws in the content that's being taught.

I think it's fair to assume that in general, Episcopalian kids tend to be smart and well-educated.  All their lives, we train them to be critical thinkers; to challenge longstanding assumptions; to be cautious about taking things for granted; to look for empirical evidence instead of relying on wishful thinking.

But then at church, we ask them to accept on faith a lot of assertions about God and Scripture that not only lack empirical support, they simply can’t be reconciled with other things the young people are learning about how the world works.  (This comes, of course, after we’ve first misled them, and then later "enlightened" them, about Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy.)

So it shouldn’t be a big surprise that, when told they should believe Christian dogma because the Bible says so, many young Episcopalians react with skepticism.

(See also Reasons for Doubt.)

Comments

[David Huff]

No! you can't be right! It must be all those awful mainline ECUSA people turning our youth away from religion!

/me smacks himself around

OK, better now ;)

Actually, this may mean we're doing something (at least halfway) right - if this is an indication of critical, skeptical thinking from our teens. Heck, If my son were swallowing a simplistic, literalistic fundamentalism w/o any critical thinking, I'd be very concerned.

Now we just need to improve how we present Christianity in a way that appeals to critical, skeptical thinkers. Something that should be second nature to us Episcopalians (at least to those not of the more extreme AAC/"Network" camp).

[bls]

"Now we just need to improve how we present Christianity in a way that appeals to critical, skeptical thinkers. Something that should be second nature to us Episcopalians (at least to those not of the more extreme AAC/"Network" camp)."

Yes, I agree. But not only to these types of people; my goal is to reach as many different kinds of folks as possible. I actually sort of lean towards the conservative in theology and ecclesiology; I would love it if we could be more evangelical about the Church, too. I'm sort of still inebriated with Christianity, I guess, and I want to spread some of that around.

Certainly, though, the Episcopal Church appeals to people who value freedom of thought; I'm definitely in this category. But you know: people love this Church, in a way you don't see very often elsewhere. Or at least that's how I see it. Maybe this is the place to look for ideas about how to spread the good news about what we've got.

[David Huff]

bls wrote:
But you know: people love this Church, in a way you don't see very often elsewhere.

I absolutely agree. It's why I continue to fight so hard for it in the midst of all this "Network" nonsense in my diocese and elsewhere. It's why I get so incensed when they say such hateful things about GLBT folks, even tho' I'm a straight, white male. This wonderful church should be for everyone, not just the cold-hearted, exculsivist "orthodox."

Conservative, "evangelical" fundamentalists don't have a monopoly on loving the church (something I'm sure you know already :)

Note: I've quoted terms like "orthodox" and "evangelical" because these folks often use them to describe themselves. However, I'm not willing to surrender them to the narrow, stilted definitions the "conservatives" would apply (Oooo, look! another quoted term ;)

[bls]

I guess they're probably doing what they're doing out of their own love for the church, actually. They think they're preserving what they love against the forces of anarchy; they don't realize (and I suppose some don't care) that in doing so, they're making other people into eternal outcasts. Now, if we could just convince them that gay people aren't going to (and aren't trying to!) destroy the Church....

But back to the topic. Why don't we all try to figure out, and write down, what it is we love about the Church and use what we come up with for evangelism? This is a good approach, I think, and if a lot of people did this, we'd get a really broad range of responses. That way, we could appeal to a broad range of people.

This is very simple. We should do it.

[D. C.]

BLS writes: "Why don't we all try to figure out, and write down, what it is we love about the Church and use what we come up with for evangelism?"

Terrific idea, bls. At lunch I'll do a post to get things started.