British Christianity: Churches Decline While Islam Grows; Is America Next?

CHRISTIAN POST – OPINION: Gov. Mike Huckabee recently retraced the steps of Pope John Paul II, Margaret Thatcher, and Ronald Reagan with a group of ministers and faith leaders. After touring Parliament, Westminster Abbey, and the Churchill War Rooms, he remarked that both Margaret Thatcher and Winston Churchill were heavily criticized and often dismissed yet they remained steadfast to name and fight evil.

"During two periods of massive global change," Huckabee argued, "if these world leaders had been ambiguous about evil the world would be quite different."

For Churchill, evil was Nazism and fascism. In 1936 he said of Stanley Baldwin's government, "They go on, in strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all-powerful to be impotent."

For Thatcher, evil was socialism and communism. She said, "I am in politics because of the conflict between good and evil, and I believe that in the end good will triumph.

"And what a prize we have to fight for: no less than the chance to banish from our land the dark divisive clouds of Marxist socialism." Ronald Reagan alone stood with her, as the only world leader to call the Soviet Union what it was: "the Evil Empire."

Why did they fight, despite their opponents' incessant impotence, ignorance, and impudence?

According to Huckabee, they fully understood what evil is: "Evil creates oppression and takes from the human soul that which is most like God—because freedom, creativity, and joy all come from God. And when a government devalues human beings, it sins against God."

They also knew what is good. Thatcher said, "We want a society where people are free to make choices, to make mistakes, to be generous and compassionate. This is what we mean by a moral society; not a society where the state is responsible for everything, and no one is responsible for the state." » | Bethany Blankley | CP Op-Ed Contributor | Tuesday, December 09, 2014

Christians Line Up to Break US Box Office for Jesus

The forces of secularisation may be gathering momentum, but all across America this weekend tens of thousands of Christians are mobilising to promote a new film about the life of Jesus

Read the Telegraph article here | Peter Foster, video by Dermot Tatlow | Friday, February 28, 2014
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Focus on Religious Right Hides Dwindling Number of US Churchgoers

This image released by 20th Century Fox shows Diogo
Morgado in a scene from 'Son of God'

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: As research suggests just 25 per cent of Americans now attend church weekly, Republicans must cater for increasingly secular mainstream without alienating evangelical base

This week millions of the religious faithful in America are to be shepherded into the nation's cinemas in order to watch 'Son of God', a conventional Hollywood biopic of Jesus Christ that premieres on Thursday.

Coming after last year's HBO mini-series 'The Bible', which garnered 95 million viewers, it would seem a fair bet that this film is pretty much guaranteed to be another hit.

One Texas congregation alone has bought 9,000 tickets. But such displays of mega-church muscle only serve to conceal how far and how fast the ground has shifted under America's Religious Right over the last decade or so.

It's not that America has suddenly abandoned its faith, but more that a large chunk of previously nominal Christians - the Christmas and wedding-only types - have become much happier to declare themselves in the religious camp marked 'don't really care'. » | Peter Foster in Washington | Saturday, February 22, 2014

Related »

Church Marquee Calls Obama 'Muslim,' 'Communist'
ABC NEWS: A pastor is causing a commotion in his Texas town – and possibly hurting with his non-profit status – because of a politically motivated church marquee.

The Church in the Valley marquee reads, "VOTE FOR THE MORMON, NOT THE MUSLIM! THE CAPITALIST, NOT THE COMMUNIST!"

The sign was an obvious reference to President Barack Obama, who conservatives say is a secret Muslim even though he says he is a Christian and attends church with his family. He said in an August interview with a religious magazine that it's not his job to convince people he's Christian. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is a Mormon. » | Sydney Lupkin | Saturday, October 20, 2012

A Day of Judgment for Liberal Bishops
TELEGRAPH – BLOGS – DAMIAN THOMPSON: The strangest thing happened last week, though few people noticed it. America officially ceased to be a Protestant country. According to the Pew Forum, the percentage of Protestants has dropped to 48 per cent, down from 53 per cent in 2007. That’s a huge shift.

But, before Catholics start punching the air, let me point out that the percentage of Catholics has been flatlining for years at 22 per cent. The big jump is in unaffiliated Americans, including atheists – up from 15 to 20 per cent. These “Nones”, as pollsters call them, are laying waste to the religious landscape of the United States. And Britain.

Here’s the question that intrigues me. Once the old, routine churchgoers have died off, and now that “None” is the default position for liberal-minded young people, what will the churches of the future look like?

We’re beginning to find out. More to the point, the clapped-out Anglican and Catholic bishops of the English-speaking world are finding out, too – and it’s giving them nightmares.

Those youngsters who once went to church out of obligation are now spending Sunday mornings in the supermarket or the gym (body worship is a flourishing faith). That means that the only young people in the pews are true believers who really want to be there. Read on and comment » | Damian Thompson | Friday, October 12, 2012

My comment:

The void will surely be filled by Islam. Islam is a growing, vibrant faith; Christianity is on its last legs. Christians, now often mostly nominal, also don't want children. Women would prefer their independence and careers. The result, of course, is a huge decline in the birthrate. Compare this with the Muslim population. Muslims are family people; they give birth to plenty of children. And as soon as they are born, the father whispers the following in the baby's ear: La illah ila Allah wa Muhammadan rasul ullah. With this going on, the future has to belong to them. The Church, by being so wishy-washy, is giving our heritage away. As, indeed, are our politicians. – © Mark

This comment can also be found here

Why a Bible Belt Conservative Spent a Year Pretending to Be Gay

THE OBSERVER: Timothy Kurek, a graduate of the evangelical Liberty University, decided to 'walk in the shoes' of a gay man and emerged with his faith strengthened

Timothy Kurek grew up hating homosexuality. As a conservative Christian deep in America's Bible belt, he had been taught that being gay was an abomination before God. He went to his right-wing church, saw himself as a soldier for Christ and attended Liberty University, the "evangelical West Point".

But when a Christian friend in a karaoke bar told him how her family had kicked her out when she revealed she was a lesbian, Kurek began to question profoundly his beliefs and religious teaching. Amazingly, the 26-year-old decided to "walk in the shoes" of a gay man in America by pretending to be homosexual.

For an entire year Kurek lived "under cover" as a homosexual in his home town of Nashville. He told his family he was gay, as well as his friends and his church. Only two pals and an aunt – used to keep an eye on how his mother coped with the news – knew his secret. One friend, a gay man called Shawn – whom Kurek describes as a "big black burly teddy bear" – pretended to be his boyfriend. Kurek got a job in a gay cafe, hung out in a gay bar and joined a gay softball league, all the while maintaining his inner identity as a straight Christian.

The result was a remarkable book called The Cross in the Closet, which follows on the tradition of other works such as Black Like Me, by a white man in the 1960s deep south passing as a black American, and 2006'sSelf-Made Man, by Norah Vincent, who details her time spent in disguise living as a man. "In order to walk in their shoes, I had to have the experience of being gay. I had to come out to my friends and family and the world as a gay man," he told the Observer.

Kurek's account of his year being gay is an emotional, honest and at times hilarious account of a journey that begins with him as a strait-laced yet questioning conservative, and ends up with him reaffirming his faith while also embracing the cause of gay equality. » | Paul Harris, New York | Saturday, October 13, 2012