I don't find this artical interesting because its old news. Bible prophecy says that in the last days they will come against the christians and the ministers of god. and that they will succeed for a time. This is simply another marker confirming that we are living in the last days accord to bible scripture.. The bible states that when we see these things, it is about this time that the one world order will come and the Anti-christ will show up soon. He will place his office/ home in the temple mount in jerusalem. The prophecy says that before he moves in there, the temple mount would have been destroyed and rebuilt three times. and after the third time the anti-christ will move there. this prophecy was made thousands of years ago. Now at this very moment they are building the Temple mount for the third time.well if you google Third Temple Mount or Prophecies of the third Temple mount you can get the story. right now as we speak, bulldozer are own site. When it is complete, The one world order should be all neatly packed in place. Then the anti-christ will emerge from Europe. Therefore; seasoned christians are not bothered by the hatred the world will have for us and has in the past. it will get like a horror movie before its all over. many will die. but god still has the last word. In fact many of us are comfortable with knowing that the prophecies of god are true. The bible states that the believers of christ would be saying "come lord come". Because these are all signs that that the rapture of believers is very close. The bible states that we as christians should be in the world but not of the world. We know that this world is not our home. Its a ghetto. No matter how much money one has. Oprah, Bill Gates they are still subjected to living in the ghetto. they fly over the ghetto. they ride their limos through the ghetto,and they have locks upon locks, security and countless cameras around their homes. Why?Because this earth is a ghetto. Christians are very aware of the problem. We believe that god will do it over. secular man believe that we can make new programs, re-educated the masses giving them a new definition of right and wrong, which is believed to take one to a higher conscientousness. Well the problem is not with mankinds intelligence. prophecy says that in these last days mans knowledge would increase. So it has nothing to do with IQ etc. The problem is the masses, through generations has become more and more sick in their souls. there for the only way to deal with a spiritually sick soul is to take it to god in the name of jesus christ. These are the most high soul Doctors LOL. We need spiritual intervention. But many will chose the secular world of science who seem to thrive without caring, giving to obtain glory and not giving in love, the bible says mankind will be selling there pagan gods all over the world. they will see the floods, fires burning trees and grass, the sun will be falling to the earth. And scientist have found out that the sun is beginning to fall to the earth. And the bible says that many unbelievers will still be cursing god. Mankind wants to be gods. But we are fragile. We are intelligence, yet we lack wisdom. Many christians know and understand that there will be many articles like this one and has been many already. And many more will come. scriptures says they hated jesus and they will hate us also. this is just another marker that confirms the coming of christ and that we are living in the last days. Scripture says the true beleivers will say "come lord come" and the unbelievers will be in tremendous fear. The crazy thing is most don't even know why they hate the word of god. which tells them, don't lie, steal, kill etc. most people hate thieves and liars as well as murderers yet they hate the place where this word originated. If I was one of these people, I personally would be checking the condition of my soul. This confusion is the worst kind. to love/hate what is good? I would be afraid for myself.  

We should remember that not all Christians are evangelical also. I do see one good thing. When we reach a point where people are no longer pressured or expected to go to church, maybe even catch some flak for it, then those who do go will be more genuine and sincere about it.

OK, I get it.  You're just a troll.  Took me long enough to figure it out.

Personally, I see fundamentalist faith systems as detrimental to our society and our world.  Progress has always been the engine that has kept humanity moving forward.  The big problem with Evangelicals, is they think they are the sole prorietors of truth....  they have tunnel vision.  They think their way is the only way.  They take revelations (which is now known as a critique of the roman empire) literally.  They yell about their love for jesus, they need to "speak in tongues", roll in the aisles....  It's really very pathetic.  My ex's family was pentacostal, all of her cousins, except for one wanted no part of that faith.  The others, you couldn't even mention god to them because they wanted no part of the insanity their family was a part of.  Her one cousin even married a native canadian.  He had artifacts in his home from his heritage because he was proud of his culture.  Her family would go there and start whining about the evil presences they felt around these artifacts...  why?  Because in my opinion they are ignorant of others and closed-minded.

I say the sooner it does off and they merge with more moderate flavours of christianity the better.  Religion itelf is not bad, but blind faith is.  My case in point....  Just read tonton's post above.  He even said that scientists have found the sun is falling towards the earth.....  I think that shows a lack of true understanding of our world.  The earth moves closer and farther away from our sun with the seasons.  In the Northern hemispheres winter, the earth is at its closest -in the norhern hemispheres summer the eart is at it's furthest.  I am not saying I know more about our world, but I am not delluded into thinking that I know more than  the next guy.  That is the main problem here....  evangelicals think they know better than everyone else. 

Brad's ego,

That was a very brave article that Michael Spencer wrote, and it was particularly brave of CSM to publish it.

There is, of course, a growing wave of anti-religious backlash in the US, stirred by a number of stances that have been taken, primarily by Evangelicals.  It is now becoming more acceptable to label yourself an atheist, and even an anti-theist, which I lean towards as well.

Look at Internet culture.  Take a stand for an Evangelical cause on a neutral site like YouTube - better have a thick skin, because you'll get pounded with negative comments.  The young people, and I'm including 30-somethings, are far less religious and less trusting of all authority (especially religious authority) than the previous generation.  I don't think that's a bad thing.

Moderate religion gets cut more slack, because the views are not as hateful or extreme.  I'm not convinced moderate religion does people more good than, say, yoga, but at least it is not hate masquerading as love.

At their annual meeting last year, the Southern Baptists announced that they expected to close half of their congregations in the next two decades.

http://blog.christianitytoday.com/ctliveblog/archives/2008/06/the_next_b...

While Quebec is twenty years further down the road of secularism than the rest of Canada, the USA is a decade behind us, but the rate of their secularism is going to be much swifter.

Some great comments people (and thanks TonTon for keeping us in check with the self-fulfilling prophecy - I suppose your the first to receive the chip in your VISA card that sells your soul to the devil).

In addition to your thoughts - how does a UCC congregant feel about this whole evangelical notion that their are only "evangelical" Christians on one hand and "marginal" Christians on the other. As an ex-evangelical, I was more than well aware of the atmosphere that "mainstream" Christianity was just another word for "nominal" Christianity in my circles - I actually helped propagate it (not that I had ever met a so-called "nominal Christian"). Frankly, it is kind of insulting, is it not?

tonton, may I make a suggestion. Your posts are very hard to read. Change the font size.

The trend toward secularization of society appears to be universal. Curiously enough, this trend seems to be accompanied by an increasing interest in spirituality.

Perhaps people are becoming more spiritual and less religious?

If this is a trend toward a spiritualization of human culture, then I welcome and embrace it.

I agree.  Look at the resurgence of tarot cards and astrology and "new age" spirituality.  If I am totally honest here, I am a spiritual person, but I think more of the theory of Gaiea than of god.  I think that humans are spiritual, but we are looking in the wrong directions.  I knew a pentacostal pastor, and he gave me a "gifting" test once, I was curious and he wanted to see if I had any spiritual gifts.  It was a website (i did this 10 years ago, I wish I could remember the address if it even still exists),  and he came up with me having the gift of wisdom.  A penta costal said an atheist had the gift of wisdom..... 

Brad, for  an ex-evangelical, you are a wise man too.

Arminius, do you mean people are becoming more spiritually independent and less institutionally dependent? By most definitions of "religion," I would find it hard to find someone who is "spiritual" without being "religious."

Not to be a pain. :D

Hi Brad:

Of course all religious people are spiritual, but more and more people seek and find spiritual fulfilment and expression outside of organized or institutionalized religion. That's what people generally mean when they say: "I'm spiritual but not religious."

Yes, I did recognize what you were saying, but I am just wondering whether we should not be conscious of this oft-quoted dichotamy. In my experience, there seems to be a subtle sense of unwarranted amount of pious superiority or elitism by people who claim to be "spiritual" but not "religious." I mean, is it not simply a way to say "look at me, I am really really religious"? Or, "I'm not like those people who can' think for themselves"? Maybe I'm being overly negative, I just don't know who really qualifies under the "religious" - as oppose to the "spiritual" - category.

Yes, Brad, I agree with what you are saying. And I don't think you are overly negative.

Dogmatic and doctrinal religion can be a turnoff to people who are experientially spiritual. To them, the experience of spirituality is what spirituality is all about, whereas people who believe in doctrine define spirituality as the belief in the truthfulness of a particular doctrine.

Thus, the "spritual" people would be experientially spiritual, while the "religious" people would be believers in doctrine. One can, of course, be both, and most believers in doctrine probably are experientially spiritual as well.

But not all experientially spiritual people are believers in doctrine. Although I do belong to the United Church, I do not believe in any doctrines. My spirituality is entirely experiential. And my intrepretations of my spiritual experience are speculative and metaphorical. Only the experience is true.

Brad, I remember when I was growing up that I would listen to only one kind of music. Even though I was exposed to many, many different kinds, I would only listen to the same things that most of my peers would listen to. My father who had a great love of the opera and various other styles would often say that some day I too would come to appreciate the variety that the world offered me as I grew older. And he was right. As I matured I increased the diversity of my musical experiences.

It seems to me that the evangelical movement has and will have it's own set of "growing pains". Rather than predicting it's downfall, I sense that some will mature and grow as the congregations also become oversaturated with one way of thinking that doesn't necessarily provide all the answers. Just as the United Church "emerges" into a new comfort zone, many churches will also have to continually reevaluate their relevance and their thinking. Hopefully this will all be done with Jesus as the axis for which any shift occurs, because after all, his teachings are the reason Christianity exists in the first place.

The article further states,

"Our young people have deep beliefs about the culture war, but do not know why they should obey scripture, the essentials of theology, or the experience of spiritual discipline and community. Coming generations of Christians are going to be monumentally ignorant and unprepared for culture-wide pressures."

Now again I have to disagree with this. One of the things I do think evangelicals do right is to prepare young people with a working knowledge of the bible that breeds familiarity. I actually believe evangelical young people read their Bibles more than most churches---granted one may argue as to how they are understanding it. They carry their bibles into church and open them for reference. I do not underestimate young peoples intelligence to eventually question what they have learned (no matter what faith they are in) even to eventually leave "religion" temporarily during their twenty's/thirties, only to find that they may some day return to some faith when they realize that "going it alone" or self direction isn't all it was cracked up to be. My point is you may start out listening to Joyce Meyer or someone similar, but you do eventually outgrow the teacher and you look for more substance. Some evangelical churches are only good for "planting the seed" and some are able to progress to a higher level of understanding and some are not. As one grows the questions become more complicated.

It is hard for mainstream churches to watch the growing pains and very easy to criticize, dispite the mainstream churches having their own set of problems that evangelicals like to criticize. Let's just say, that any Christian church that doesn't reflect the love of Jesus to a secular world as something that is wonderful and enticing has major problems. Whether it's evangelical or not.

Rather than believe in the eventual end of Christianity or belief in God, I truly believe that after the "rise" of secularism, that Christ/God/It will once more take centre stage as the ultimate answer for our existence. I tend to believe that this auther is short sighted and unduly influenced by immediate circumstances that remind me of someone carrying "it's the end of the world" signs whenever we experience global chaos.

God has existed forever, he's omnipresent and everlasting. There's nothing we can do, even not believing, will not cause Him/Her/It/ to leave or go away.

Thanks for the thoughts waterfall - definitely some things to think about.

I've read Spencer's articles several times over and while I can't help but think there is a little bit of a pity party at play here, I don't think his predictions had much to do with his suggestions. Spencer is a gifted writer and I think he knew that his title/hook would grab attention, but there is not much to suggest that he is right (nor does he make a case for it). Instead, he wants to offer a shallow church some suggestions for maturity.

But whether this inevitable evolution is something like what Luther had hoped for with the Church (a renewed Biblicalism) or what Roman Catholicism actually went through 500 years ago (bitter division and irrelevance) is another story. An aspect of evangelicalism will go nuttier than it ever was (the New Fundamentalists), another will collapse into secular humanism, and others will keep on keeping on, albeit in a different form. Christianity adapts and evolves because culture adapts and evolves. Perhaps one day a new myth will replace our consciousness, but for now it is the most effective one in the western world.

We are in the time of where everything is up for graps - the church needs to have its every 500 year rummage sale - see what goes and what we want to hold onto - within the evangelical movement there is an active rethinking moving to more mainstream in social issues - more open to others in the mainstream - and the mainstream is finding the need for spiritual practices as a ground for being.

By the way sociologically this issue is - the priesthood of one as some form of spirituality - the I invent this ( this is a socialogical comment) and the issue of all deep spiritual practices have some home in a tradition - what is called religion.

This means spirituality freed from context becomes me and a religion that does not listen to the spirit moving dies.