Bible and Public Life

I'm reading to review for a journal the book UnChristian (Baker, 2007) by David Kinnaman. I won't say much about the book at this point, because I've yet to have the review written or published. That being said, there is a passage in the book that really floored me.
In a section about younger adult perceptions of the overly politicized nature of American Christians (read Evangelicals), the author suggests that Younger Americans are "more skeptical than any previous generation of the role of the Bible in public life." I say, okay, that may very well be. But then read what follows:

In one study conducted by the Pew Research Center, young Americans were the least likely age group to say tha the Bible ought to be the most significant influence on the laws of the country, instead favoring the "will of the people" as the best way to determine legal boundaries. This preference for majority rule stems from not knowing the Bible's content, questioning its truth and preferring feelings and expediency to absolutes. Of course, just because the is the perception does not mean that we abandon the idea that the Bible should help us determine the laws of the nation. But we must realize this is an increasingly rare sentiment among the nation's younger population. (David Kinnaman, UnChristian, Baker, 2007, pp. 163-64).

Ponder with me this statement. Younger Americans are less prone than earlier generations to see the Bible as the primary influence on American law, and they do so because they don't know the content of the Bible. That is, they do not have a "Biblical Worldview" as defined by the Barna Group.

Because of this they don't seem to support America being a "Christianized" country -- therefore they're not so keen on posting the Ten Commandments in public buildings or teaching creationism in public schools. They just don't seem to get it, or so it would seem.

Now as you consider this point, consider as well American feelings about Iraq or Iran being Islamic republics. When the Iraqi's suggested that Islam should help define their laws, many Americans objected. They wanted Iraq to be a secular republic -- secular just like . . . we are! How can we have it both ways? How can we desire America to be a "Christianized" nation and then object when a predominantly Muslim country wants to be Islamic and not secular. Do you see a problem here?

Cross-published at Faithfully Liberal

Comments

Drew Tatusko said…
I think this paints an accurate portrayal overall. However, other research has shown that church attendance continues to hover at around 34%. Now this statistic clearly does not reveal a specific worldview as the study you raise might.

But I always pause to contemplate what the term "biblical worldview" might actually mean? Is it the world of a Timothy Dwight or Johnathan Edwards? Or is it the worldview of a Thomas Jefferson or even a Ben Franklin? Since so many proponents of a "Christianized" nation prefer to argue the case rooted in the founders of the nation, I wonder what that actually means.

It certainly must not mean a homogenous understanding of the bible since their views of God's essential relationship to humanity were so divergent.

I think our kids are growing up in a truly pluralistic worldview. This is why I think Stark and Bainbridge's Rational Choice theory rings more and more true. Different groups that hold and advertise different claims to truth are competing in the marketplace of belief and our kids are the ones who have to choose which to go with. It is as much a product as shoes or a college degree.

The trick is thus how to penetrate the veneer of comeptition to uncover the real meaning of it all and I think this is where progressive Christianity in its self-aware critical approach has the edge. It just seems not to have the marketing savvy (although that is clearly emerging) to compete in the religious marketplace as of yet. This is evident even in the diatribes against Christianity of Dawkins, Hitches and Harris who clearly do not have a clear sense of what the progressive strain means within Christianity since as such complicates their simplistic view of Christianity as some monolithic scourge.

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