In today's NY Times, Laurie Goodstein reports that evangelicals worry their teens are abandoning their faith. Gee, there's a shock. Think about it:
• We tell our kids about Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy, but eventually we confess that we were "fibbing" to them. So they're really likely to believe us when we tell them about God — not.
• As the kids get older, we try to teach them to be critical thinkers. When they approach traditional Christian doctrines with that mindset, they see potential problems. They also see the church trying to sweep those problems under the rug, for fear of offending implacably-certain and always-vocal traditionalists, instead of forthrightly reexamining dubious doctrines such as those of the Nicene and Athanasian Creeds; Biblical inerrancy; Christian exclusivity; and so forth.
• Now stir in the secular culture's disregard and even mockery of religion.
• And let's not forget the natural rebelliousness of adolescents.
It should be no surprise that many teens shy away from the religious belief systems of their parents. Unfortunately, the church offers putatively-Christian teens little or nothing by way of a positive, intellectually-credible alternative to fill the resulting vacuum. The surprising thing is that more of them aren't abandoning their faith.
Here's an excerpt from Goodstein's Times piece:
Despite their packed megachurches, their political clout and their increasing visibility on the national stage, evangelical Christian leaders are warning one another that their teenagers are abandoning the faith in droves.
At an unusual series of leadership meetings in 44 cities this fall, more than 6,000 pastors are hearing dire forecasts from some of the biggest names in the conservative evangelical movement.
[...T]here is widespread consensus among evangelical leaders that they risk losing their teenagers. [...]“A lot of my friends are self-proclaimed agnostics or atheists,” said Ms. Dunford, who wears a bracelet with a heart-shaped charm engraved with “tlw,” for “true love waits,” to remind herself of her pledge not to have premarital sex.
[Laurie Goodstein, Evangelicals Fear the Loss of Their Teenagers, NY Times, Fri. Oct. 6, 2006; emphasis added]
D.C., Protestants don't hold to the Athanasian Creed. Most don't even know it exists, I'd bet. I'd never heard of it till about three years ago.
Posted by: bls | October 06, 2006 at 01:04 PM
(Anyway, to argue that the Creeds are at fault, you'd have to show that non-Creedal churches, or those that adhere to Progressive Christianity, are growing while Creedal churches are shrinking.
I don't think the latter is happening, either. The truth, I'm pretty sure, is that this is a culture-wide phenomenon, and affects all denominations. I think, in fact, TEC may be quite well-suited to welcome some of these people in the future, since we generally don't object to doubt.)
Posted by: bls | October 06, 2006 at 01:11 PM
BLS, I mentioned the Creeds only as illustrative examples of dubious doctrines that teenagers simply don't buy. Among others from the evangelical world: Salvation through faith in Jesus alone. Sola scriptura. Biblical inerrancy. Christian exclusivism.
As I say, one reason even progressive, doubt-accepting churches don't attract teens (and adults) the way they should is that they don't have a plausible alternative to offer. Why should I bother getting up on Sunday morning, if all I'm going to get from the church is a metaphorical shrug of the shoulders — especially when so many of the shruggers, out of fear of giving offense, tiptoe so gingerly around the traditionalist claims?
Posted by: D. C. | October 06, 2006 at 01:52 PM
D.C., when I came back to the Church (soon after 9/11, BTW), I didn't pay any attention to doctrine. I barely knew what the Nicene Creed was at that point; I don't remember ever learning about it as a child. Nobody's forced to say the Creed in the Episcopal Church, and almost everybody I know has one sort of un-orthodox belief or other. I'm sure this is true in most religions, in fact, the difference being that in TEC we acknowledge it and talk about it.
What I liked was the music, the ceremony, and the incense. I sat in the back and sang hymns, because they were beautiful. I also liked the people, because they were tolerant and seemed to love the Episcopal way. I think we're all fine with discussing and debating the theology - I think we do that all the time anyway - but it's just not the central reason most people go. They simply want to have an encounter with the Holy - to get in touch with the deep things that religion concerns itself with. I find the theology to be quite fascinating at this point, but not because I "have to" believe it. There's a whole "Christian realist" philosophy that actually makes quite a lot of sense - but people can take it as metaphor just as well, and it does the same work.
But really, the Church has almost no teaching authority any longer, so I don't know why you worry about this. People do what they like in their own lives anyway, as this article notes - and I'd bet in the case of TEC, most people act in highly moral ways. Perhaps the teaching is working, now that I think of it - but in a very subtle way today.
The Church's function is to put people in touch with the living God, and that's all, IMO. It makes sense to me that the Evangelicals would lose people today, because I don't see how they are doing that. They are simply moralizing and, as you say, actively attempting to exclude people.
Posted by: bls | October 06, 2006 at 03:37 PM
BLS, my overarching concern is that too many teens, and adults too, are wandering in the theological wilderness. Many of them have been driven there by well-meaning but dangerous priests, youth ministers, and Sunday school teachers. These worthies insist, gently but implacably, that to be a good Christian, you must give intellectual assent to dubious propositions X, Y, and Z despite their glaring deficiencies in credibility. In some cases, these well-meaning folks work to discourage or even suppress any discussion of different views. I see that happening in my parish and on the traditionalist blogs. IMHO, especially in this day and age, it's seriously harmful.
Posted by: D. C. | October 07, 2006 at 10:43 AM
Well, I'd agree with that - but it really isn't true in most of TEC, I don't think. Most people like the Episcopal Church precisely because of its breadth and tolerance; that was the whole idea, I thought anyway - the very basis of our particular version of the faith. We weren't supposed "to make windows into men's souls," in the famous formula.
Adults ought to be encouraged and enabled to work out their own relationship with God. In my parish, adults worship together and work together and rarely talk about our beliefs; it seems superfluous, really. That's the Episcopal way, I think.
Perhaps the main difference between us is that I never read the "traditionalist" blogs. ;-)
(I think the current "troubles" may be distorting things, maybe?)
Posted by: bls | October 07, 2006 at 10:11 PM