6 ms·

This is a rosy view of religion, although I accept that is your experience and perspective, and thank you for sharing it. To me, church attendance is about mak

This is a rosy view of religion, although I accept that is your experience and perspective, and thank you for sharing it. To me, church attendance is about making the in/out group very clear. You may feel close to different political views based on your single church or flavor of Christianity, but that's still a pretty limited group. I think church membership has become undesirable because 1) fewer people believe in the supernatural and 2) the stated positions of many major religions on issues of abortion and inclusion.

nine_k 5y ago
It's not about religion per se, but about a common religion which has rituals that make people meet each other more, piercing their bubble of like-mindedness (smaller than the religion). It's like going to a supermarket makes you see people more varied than your family circle and your chosen TV show characters. (It does not nudge you to talk to these people, though.)
- edmundsauto 5y ago
  I am not a religious person or church goer, but are the perspectives really that different? To me, it looks like a church is a self selected group of geographically proximate people who tend to look alike and dress alike. You don't usually see much ethnic diversity in a church photo. It's more diverse than sitting at home, but I think exposure to a few TV shows has more diversity of thought, ethnicity, sexuality, etc., compared to going to church. I'm not saying its bad for people to get together and talk. I see that church was an important mechanism for this in the past. However, I can't get past the negatives (supernatural belief, child abuse, kowtowing to authority, shame, ostracism) to believe it will continue to be a net positive. What we need is more of what I think the Unitarians are after - non denominational community.
  - ceilingcorner 5y ago
    The Catholic Church is probably the single most ethnically diverse organization on the face of the earth. https://www.pewforum.org/2013/02/13/the-global-catholic-population/ https://www.pewforum.org/2013/02/13/the-global-catholic-popu...
    - edmundsauto 5y ago
      Right, but the context here is in people attending their local church. Your point is like saying that America is so diverse - it is, but how much do the different ethnicities actually interact?
      - iammisc 5y ago
        Catholic churches are the most integrated denomination. And Catholics are the group most likely to intermarry between ethnicities. Speaking of my own family, my brother and I are both married to women of different ethnicities (and differing ethnicities at that). Sources: [1] https://www.jbhe.com/2018/07/americas-churches-are-becoming-more-racially-integrated-but-have-a-long-way-to-go/ https://www.jbhe.com/2018/07/americas-churches-are-becoming-... [2] http://blogs.thearda.com/trend/featured/the-ties-that-may-not-bind-race-religion-and-marriage/ http://blogs.thearda.com/trend/featured/the-ties-that-may-no... > The only exceptions were Catholics. Catholics were almost twice as likely to be in an intermarriage and Catholics who attended services more frequently were slightly more likely to be in an intermarriage, the researchers found. It's more than just your local parish though. When I visited Hungary, it was amazing to go to a church where I didn't speak the language, but still be able to feel totally 'at home', because it was a church, and they were saying mass. Even though it was in Hungarian, I understood exactly what was going on. Then when I visited India, which couldn't be further from Hungary, I had the same experience.
        edmundsauto 5y ago
        The takeaway from those articles seems to be that even the most integrated churches are still trailing average neighborhood integration numbers (which are broadly considered problematic). There has been progress, but there is still a ways to go: > Despite progress in church integration, congregations remain far more segregated than the society in general. Dr. Dougherty, an associate professor of sociology at Baylor University, states that “congregations are looking more like their neighborhoods racially and ethnically, but they still lag behind. The average congregation was eight times less diverse racially than its neighborhood in 1998 and four times less diverse in 2012.” The context here is whether churches are a good way for people of diverse backgrounds to engage and interact. I contend that they have unnecessary elements that make them worse than a non-religious community event (supernatural beliefs, explicit conformity of dress and thought, protecting predators, etc.)
  - sunshineforever 5y ago
    I am completely behind this as a person who technically might seem like a stereotypical radical to "one side". Empathy, the "Message of Christ", the Buddhist quest to end suffering, this is the fundamental goal and idea that drives my beliefs. The true revolution is to care for others with love. IMO the crisis of the USA is that there is so much selfish lack of awareness or empathy everywhere. Yes, Republicans are more famous for being psychopathic and heartless but if you think for a second that manyyy of the woke are not needlessly creul to others and uaware of certain aspects of reality than you're not seeing the full picture. I also think we need to abandon most all labels in favor of descriptive beliefs. The label is only 50 percent effective unless it comes with 100 other labels. We are truly never even one of them in our individuality.
    - airstrike 5y ago
      I keep mentioning this video because it's just so good, but Roger Scruton argued that the world has turned selfish and with it we've lost beauty, which in turns means life has lost its meaning. It's a powerful, profound view and one that I can't shake off my head ever since watching it. > Our language, our music and our manners are increasingly raucous, self-centered, and offensive, as though beauty and good taste have no real place in our lives. > One word is written large on all these ugly things, and that word is “me.” > My profits, my desires, my pleasures. > And art has nothing to say in response to this except, “Yeah, go for it!” > I think we are losing beauty and with it there is the danger that we will lose the meaning of life. https://vimeo.com/128428182 https://vimeo.com/128428182 https://orthosphere.wordpress.com/2017/09/16/roger-scruton-why-beauty-matters/ https://orthosphere.wordpress.com/2017/09/16/roger-scruton-w...
    - iammisc 5y ago
      > Yes, Republicans are more famous for being psychopathic and heartless but if you think for a second that manyyy of the woke are not needlessly creul to others and uaware of certain aspects of reality than you're not seeing the full picture. It's funny because to most republicans, the democrats and the woke are the ones who are psycopathically cruel. This is why I can't help but feel there is an unbridgeable gap in our society. Each party not only thinks the others are misguided, but actually cartoonishly psycopathic villains. It's no wonder everyone's so mad all the time. > I also think we need to abandon most all labels in favor of descriptive beliefs. The label is only 50 percent effective unless it comes with 100 other labels. We are truly never even one of them in our individuality. Except if you tell Republicans about democratic beliefs, they'll still think they're cruel (same is true vice versa I imagine). People actually believe in the things the parties stand for, even if it's not popular to mention that now. I don't understand the feel good centrism. People have real differences in opinion that are not due to what they listened to on Fox or read in Mother Jones. The trick is to both disagree and be decent. I personally believe we've lost that.
  - munificent 5y ago
    > To me, it looks like a church is a self selected group of geographically proximate people who tend to look alike and dress alike. You don't usually see much ethnic diversity in a church photo. I agree any given local church in the US is unlikely to have a ton of ethnic diversity. And, for obvious reasons, it will have almost no religious diversity. They do tend to have a decent amount of professional and socioeconomic diversity, though, which is also valuable.
- watwut 5y ago
  The church I went in as kid was pretty tight socially and people in it were wery like minded. And by all I heard or read about, it is pretty much standard.
iammisc 5y ago
> To me, church attendance is about making the in/out group very clear. You may feel close to different political views based on your single church or flavor of Christianity, but that's still a pretty limited group. It's not really though. I mean, being Catholic (and honestly, I know so little about Protestantism that I don't really feel qualified to speak to it), there are a lot of politics in the church. In 'the Big Sort', the author Bill Bishop talks about how Americans are dividing themselves up by geography, religion (or lack thereof), jobs, education, etc. It's like we're splitting in to two different worlds. I've noticed it at church too. Frankly, the left-leaning Catholics have all left. We chock it up to things like abortion and sexual ethics but I don't buy it. Many right-leaning Catholics have severe disagreements with church preaching, especially on the topics of aid to foreigners, the responsibility of society with regards to health care, views on death penalty's usefulness, etc. The only difference to me, is that conservatives tend to value authority and order more, and thus remain catholic even when the church preaches things they don't like. > 2) the stated positions of many major religions on issues of abortion and inclusion. I guess, but man you should see my conservative friends after the priest gives a homily on immigration. If they left the church because of this, I'd accuse them of idolatry -- placing their views on immigration as more important than God. I accuse my leftist friends who leave because of abortion of the same. Independent of the religious and spiritual aspects, it seems to me to be abandoning your community, that has supported you for many years, simply because of one issue we disagree on. That's like leaving your wife because you can't agree on which style of house to buy -- at some point you need to compromise. It's weird because my left-leaning friend's parents are often still Catholic and have the same view as my family does on remaining part of the church even if what they preach is hard. Whereas my younger friends all left. The sad thing though is that I feel there is a lot of missed out opportunities for shared understanding. Despite classifying these parents as 'left-leaning' and myself being more 'right-leaning', I'd consider these people to be intelligent, thoughtful, and friends. Whereas with my own generation, if you label yourself a leftist, all of a sudden right-wingers are supposed to hate you, and vice versa. It just seems dehumanizing. I'd rather chat about politics in a friendly manner with a shared set of concerns over a doughnut on Sunday morning, than in an angry social media screed. But it seems like my generation prefers the latter. And frankly, from my perspective, it feels like my left-leaning friends simply left while we stayed behind to talk.

nine_k 5y ago

It's not about religion per se, but about a common religion which has rituals that make people meet each other more, piercing their bubble of like-mindedness (smaller than the religion). It's like going to a supermarket makes you see people more varied than your family circle and your chosen TV show characters. (It does not nudge you to talk to these people, though.)

edmundsauto 5y ago
I am not a religious person or church goer, but are the perspectives really that different? To me, it looks like a church is a self selected group of geographically proximate people who tend to look alike and dress alike. You don't usually see much ethnic diversity in a church photo. It's more diverse than sitting at home, but I think exposure to a few TV shows has more diversity of thought, ethnicity, sexuality, etc., compared to going to church. I'm not saying its bad for people to get together and talk. I see that church was an important mechanism for this in the past. However, I can't get past the negatives (supernatural belief, child abuse, kowtowing to authority, shame, ostracism) to believe it will continue to be a net positive. What we need is more of what I think the Unitarians are after - non denominational community.
- ceilingcorner 5y ago
  The Catholic Church is probably the single most ethnically diverse organization on the face of the earth. https://www.pewforum.org/2013/02/13/the-global-catholic-population/ https://www.pewforum.org/2013/02/13/the-global-catholic-popu...
  - edmundsauto 5y ago
    Right, but the context here is in people attending their local church. Your point is like saying that America is so diverse - it is, but how much do the different ethnicities actually interact?
    - iammisc 5y ago
      Catholic churches are the most integrated denomination. And Catholics are the group most likely to intermarry between ethnicities. Speaking of my own family, my brother and I are both married to women of different ethnicities (and differing ethnicities at that). Sources: [1] https://www.jbhe.com/2018/07/americas-churches-are-becoming-more-racially-integrated-but-have-a-long-way-to-go/ https://www.jbhe.com/2018/07/americas-churches-are-becoming-... [2] http://blogs.thearda.com/trend/featured/the-ties-that-may-not-bind-race-religion-and-marriage/ http://blogs.thearda.com/trend/featured/the-ties-that-may-no... > The only exceptions were Catholics. Catholics were almost twice as likely to be in an intermarriage and Catholics who attended services more frequently were slightly more likely to be in an intermarriage, the researchers found. It's more than just your local parish though. When I visited Hungary, it was amazing to go to a church where I didn't speak the language, but still be able to feel totally 'at home', because it was a church, and they were saying mass. Even though it was in Hungarian, I understood exactly what was going on. Then when I visited India, which couldn't be further from Hungary, I had the same experience.
      - edmundsauto 5y ago
        The takeaway from those articles seems to be that even the most integrated churches are still trailing average neighborhood integration numbers (which are broadly considered problematic). There has been progress, but there is still a ways to go: > Despite progress in church integration, congregations remain far more segregated than the society in general. Dr. Dougherty, an associate professor of sociology at Baylor University, states that “congregations are looking more like their neighborhoods racially and ethnically, but they still lag behind. The average congregation was eight times less diverse racially than its neighborhood in 1998 and four times less diverse in 2012.” The context here is whether churches are a good way for people of diverse backgrounds to engage and interact. I contend that they have unnecessary elements that make them worse than a non-religious community event (supernatural beliefs, explicit conformity of dress and thought, protecting predators, etc.)
- sunshineforever 5y ago
  I am completely behind this as a person who technically might seem like a stereotypical radical to "one side". Empathy, the "Message of Christ", the Buddhist quest to end suffering, this is the fundamental goal and idea that drives my beliefs. The true revolution is to care for others with love. IMO the crisis of the USA is that there is so much selfish lack of awareness or empathy everywhere. Yes, Republicans are more famous for being psychopathic and heartless but if you think for a second that manyyy of the woke are not needlessly creul to others and uaware of certain aspects of reality than you're not seeing the full picture. I also think we need to abandon most all labels in favor of descriptive beliefs. The label is only 50 percent effective unless it comes with 100 other labels. We are truly never even one of them in our individuality.
  - airstrike 5y ago
    I keep mentioning this video because it's just so good, but Roger Scruton argued that the world has turned selfish and with it we've lost beauty, which in turns means life has lost its meaning. It's a powerful, profound view and one that I can't shake off my head ever since watching it. > Our language, our music and our manners are increasingly raucous, self-centered, and offensive, as though beauty and good taste have no real place in our lives. > One word is written large on all these ugly things, and that word is “me.” > My profits, my desires, my pleasures. > And art has nothing to say in response to this except, “Yeah, go for it!” > I think we are losing beauty and with it there is the danger that we will lose the meaning of life. https://vimeo.com/128428182 https://vimeo.com/128428182 https://orthosphere.wordpress.com/2017/09/16/roger-scruton-why-beauty-matters/ https://orthosphere.wordpress.com/2017/09/16/roger-scruton-w...
  - iammisc 5y ago
    > Yes, Republicans are more famous for being psychopathic and heartless but if you think for a second that manyyy of the woke are not needlessly creul to others and uaware of certain aspects of reality than you're not seeing the full picture. It's funny because to most republicans, the democrats and the woke are the ones who are psycopathically cruel. This is why I can't help but feel there is an unbridgeable gap in our society. Each party not only thinks the others are misguided, but actually cartoonishly psycopathic villains. It's no wonder everyone's so mad all the time. > I also think we need to abandon most all labels in favor of descriptive beliefs. The label is only 50 percent effective unless it comes with 100 other labels. We are truly never even one of them in our individuality. Except if you tell Republicans about democratic beliefs, they'll still think they're cruel (same is true vice versa I imagine). People actually believe in the things the parties stand for, even if it's not popular to mention that now. I don't understand the feel good centrism. People have real differences in opinion that are not due to what they listened to on Fox or read in Mother Jones. The trick is to both disagree and be decent. I personally believe we've lost that.
- munificent 5y ago
  > To me, it looks like a church is a self selected group of geographically proximate people who tend to look alike and dress alike. You don't usually see much ethnic diversity in a church photo. I agree any given local church in the US is unlikely to have a ton of ethnic diversity. And, for obvious reasons, it will have almost no religious diversity. They do tend to have a decent amount of professional and socioeconomic diversity, though, which is also valuable.
watwut 5y ago
The church I went in as kid was pretty tight socially and people in it were wery like minded. And by all I heard or read about, it is pretty much standard.

iammisc 5y ago

> To me, church attendance is about making the in/out group very clear. You may feel close to different political views based on your single church or flavor of Christianity, but that's still a pretty limited group. It's not really though. I mean, being Catholic (and honestly, I know so little about Protestantism that I don't really feel qualified to speak to it), there are a lot of politics in the church. In 'the Big Sort', the author Bill Bishop talks about how Americans are dividing themselves up by geography, religion (or lack thereof), jobs, education, etc. It's like we're splitting in to two different worlds. I've noticed it at church too. Frankly, the left-leaning Catholics have all left. We chock it up to things like abortion and sexual ethics but I don't buy it. Many right-leaning Catholics have severe disagreements with church preaching, especially on the topics of aid to foreigners, the responsibility of society with regards to health care, views on death penalty's usefulness, etc. The only difference to me, is that conservatives tend to value authority and order more, and thus remain catholic even when the church preaches things they don't like. > 2) the stated positions of many major religions on issues of abortion and inclusion. I guess, but man you should see my conservative friends after the priest gives a homily on immigration. If they left the church because of this, I'd accuse them of idolatry -- placing their views on immigration as more important than God. I accuse my leftist friends who leave because of abortion of the same. Independent of the religious and spiritual aspects, it seems to me to be abandoning your community, that has supported you for many years, simply because of one issue we disagree on. That's like leaving your wife because you can't agree on which style of house to buy -- at some point you need to compromise. It's weird because my left-leaning friend's parents are often still Catholic and have the same view as my family does on remaining part of the church even if what they preach is hard. Whereas my younger friends all left. The sad thing though is that I feel there is a lot of missed out opportunities for shared understanding. Despite classifying these parents as 'left-leaning' and myself being more 'right-leaning', I'd consider these people to be intelligent, thoughtful, and friends. Whereas with my own generation, if you label yourself a leftist, all of a sudden right-wingers are supposed to hate you, and vice versa. It just seems dehumanizing. I'd rather chat about politics in a friendly manner with a shared set of concerns over a doughnut on Sunday morning, than in an angry social media screed. But it seems like my generation prefers the latter. And frankly, from my perspective, it feels like my left-leaning friends simply left while we stayed behind to talk.