America believes in God and rejects evolution
Well . . . not America exactly . . . since a country is simply a non-cognitive designation of a particular people group where the sum of the parts make up the whole.
However, the people have spoken once again in an interesting Newsweek poll referred to here. I never quite know how to internalize these findings, but here is a basic run down with my extremely insightful and godly comments in brackets:
90% of Americans believe in God. [Does this make us a Christian nation? I don't think so. Ask people to define "God."]
66% have no doubts about God’s existence. [Two hundred million people in America have no doubts as to God's existence? I am not sure about that. I don't even think I can find that high of a percentage in the Evangelical Church.]
11% believe in God but have some doubts. [At least they are honest.]
3% are atheists. [If the number is this small, it would seem that atheists are very outspoken. Interestingly, this is about the same percentage of atheists in all of cumulative history.]
50% reject the theory of evolution. [This is interesting. I guess the indoctrination of the public schools is finding common sense an formidable foe.]
82% identify themselves as Christian. [I wonder how they would respond if asked What does it mean to be Christian? The percentage of those who identify with the biblical and historic Christian faith would undoubtedly be much lower.]
62% of registered voters said they would not vote for a candidate who was an atheist. [Well, not to be intolerant or prejudice, but this is more than reasonable. What would the atheistic basis for morality, civility, honesty, accountability, and direction in the presidency be? There is none.]
Thoughts?
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- None Found
Scott Arnold on 02 Apr 2007 at 5:45 pm #
Perhaps this if further evidence of a “General Calling”!
Seriously, it seems to me that people really want to believe in God - they just don’t necessarily want to believe in the God of the Bible. God’s revelation of Himself to all in nature and elsewhere is simply indisputable - as believers we see this every day. But if these people don’t get exposed to the message of the Gospel and the truth of Scripture they are simply left to believe in, well… something.
As a previous “Sunday Christian”, and before I actually began reading the Bible, I was one of the above who “believed” in God. But I also believed the pluralistic view that many paths, religions, etc could possibly lead to the one true God. I didn’t see this as being contrary to the Gospel message or the Bible at all - because I hadn’t taken the time to spend time with those things. Instead I let the world define them for me. Once I did begin to read the Bible, my many errors became very plain to see. My guess is that a very high percentage of the above are very similar to where I was at that time. I know for certain there are many at my old church like that.
This actually goes back to some of what we are learning in IT-10 right now. Presenting the Gospel to others today is not just a matter of showing them the appropriate Scriptures and calling it a day. I can’t remember who the scholar was, but someone said that we must first convince many of “the truth of the truth.” I think the above percentages bear that out.
Lot’s of work to do!
Chad Winters on 03 Apr 2007 at 10:16 am #
Unfortunately, I think what people answer on surveys usually has little to do with what they actually believe or how they actually live their lives. The same people who answer yes will vote to keep God out of any public view and cheer on Rosie while they watch the View
kolabok21 on 03 Apr 2007 at 6:19 pm #
It is interesting how one generation
JoanieD on 03 Apr 2007 at 8:56 pm #
I was brought up as a Catholic and as a young girl had a profound love for and faith in Jesus. As I got older, I started doubting and did TM for a while and then became a “mild” born-again type of Christian. Then I became involved with Charistmatic Catholics. Then I found Centering Prayer as taught by Catholic monk, Thomas Keating. I used that form of prayer and attended Catholic church for a while and then stopped going to church, but kept praying and reading, including the Bible and I also read within other religious traditions as well. Whenever reading any other religious traditions, though, I would run everything through the question, “What would Jesus say about this?” I always saw Jesus as the one with the Truth. He was the one in which the love abided.
And that is where I remain. I read the Bible, I pray, I trust in Jesus, even when I may not understand all about him and all about God. But, here is the thing…when Jesus said, “No man comes to the Father but by me” what exactly does that mean? We know it can’t mean that anyone who just says, “Jesus, I believe in you” will come to the Father because Jesus said many people will say they called to him, but he will say that they did not follow his command to love so they are NOT his followers and would not be in his Kingdom. So it is love that is all important. Does that mean that anyone who is good to their family and people around them will be in the Kingdom? I think Jesus expects more than this. I think he expects that we must love the “unlovable.” THAT is the difficult thing. That is when we really need his spirit working in us. And for people who were taught about Jesus in a very bad, abusive way, how could we expect them to believe in Jesus the way we might hope they could? And people who have been raised in other religious traditions often find it very difficult to just “slough off” all that they were taught. But many of these people still seek God honestly in their hearts and who are we to say that God will not reach out to them with his Spirit? Are we going to tell God that he can only touch people who say the right phrases and read the right books, etc? Far be it from me to do that.
I am NOT saying that one religion is “as good” as the other. But I do believe that Jesus will touch people who seek Him, even if they do not know who it is they really seek. Jesus said about the Roman centurian who asked him to heal (…was it his servant? his daughter) that he had not found greater faith anywhere yet than in this man. He didn’t say the man had to convert before he could respond to this man’s needs and desires and faith.
Sorry I went on a bit here!
C Michael Patton on 09 Apr 2007 at 3:16 pm #
Joanie,
I really appreciate and identify with your stuggle. While I am not an inclusivist who believes that God saves people outside the knowledge of the Gospel (I believe that Romans 10:13-17), I do understand how it can be an issues. We do cover these issues in our Soteriology class in The Theology Program.
JoanieD on 11 Apr 2007 at 4:26 pm #
Michael, I downloaded the free powerpoint you provide at The Theology Program, and I did see the slide there mentioning inclusivist. I see where it says that since we allow that young children will be with God when they die and that the Old Testament prophets will be with God, that it is a bit difficult to be convincing to inclusivists that they are wrong about what you would call “anonymous” Christians also being saved through Jesus. I understand that and understand that you would not want to move too far away from the central message of the Gospel message. But then I think of people like Mahatma Gandhi who spoke and acted more like a follower of Jesus than any Christians I have known. I know that he studied in England and maybe, in fact, he WAS a “closet” Christian! Maybe to help his country of India, though, he didn’t feel free to express the full extent of his beliefs. I have no idea, really. I just know that we can not really know what is in the heart of another person and know how God responds to that person.
I am slowly making my way through finding what you have on your website. I have listened to all but one of the radio talks you gave about the differences between Catholicism and evangelical Protestant Christianity. I think you did a great job with that. I was brought up as a Catholic, but all the points that you point out as being not agreed upon by the Protestants are ones that I also took issue with the Catholic Church. So I guess I am not REALLY a Catholic. It was the culture I was formed by, though, and I do appreciate some aspects of the teachings and I like that the church allows for many different types of expressions of the faith throughout the world, ie, contemplatives (that’s most like me), activists, teachers, and more.
I will continue reading and listening as I can. I also was impressed by the little book by J.B. Phillips, Your God Is Too Small. I looked for it this morning among my many “religious” books and couldn’t find it but it’s here somewhere. I would like to read that one again.
Take care.
C Michael Patton on 13 Apr 2007 at 1:20 am #
Joanie, we deal with inclusivism in the Soteriology notebook, but, unfortunately the videos for that session are not available. It is session 11 and we have not recorded it yet.