Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire What Does Declining Church Attendance Mean for Our Society?

And oh, how we see this every day. Well, I do, anyway. Most everyone else who has gone with the flow over the years don't notice a thing wrong.

That's not even a fair question.

If I warn someone of consequences that another has in store for them, how am I threatening them?

How about when Christians restrict the sale of alcohol on Sunday like they do in may places here in the south. Or restrict hunting on Sunday like they do in Virginia. How is that not using the law to force people to participate in your belief that Sunday is a holy day?

So, do these actions (which I have neither participated in nor condone) force you to believe anything at all?

your way or the highway....this is why religion sucks....the only true belief is the one you hold everyone else is wrong...what if you are the one that is wrong?......bob

That's always been the case.
Some just try to justify their actions through the lense of their religion.

Once more, you all know where I stand.

This might be the wrong time to look at church attendance considering most are closed. Besides God is with you all the time.

Generally, it's not intended as a friendly warning, but a threat, and very commonly comes after all the Christians better arguments are expended. Often this is cloaked in the form of Pascals Wager, but it reality, it's the no different from a mob protection racket. "Ya got a nice life here, it would be a shame if something were to happen to it, and you burned forever. Hey kid, don't be stupid like your old man here, you better fall in line, pay your rent or it will happen to you too.".

Additionally, what does it say about the morality of people who would willingly follow such a god? By our legal standards such a god is a criminal. Extortion is a Felony. In what other aspect of your life do you willingly follow a criminal and make criminal threats on his behalf?

And what makes you right, Pope Bob?

What do those random Christians get out of that? Protection racket?! Are you serious?!

You are better than that.

This is why I've pretty much given up arguing with you. You know it's about free will and the fact that choices have consequences. I hope you figure it out someday. It's not a lack of intelligence that you suffer from.

Sincerely, I wish you the best with your temper tantrum against nature.

Your dictum is self-contradictory; do you see that?

I’ve been to churches that put me to sleep because they were so boring and so legalistic and so formal and so lifeless. They oughta make convicts sit through their services as part of their punishment. I like an appealing setting, engaging communication, and helpful content. And I like really good live music and fog machines and colored lights; and I like warehouse type settings with folding chairs and conversational type sermons, where I can bring coffee or ice tea into the worship area during the service. I don’t care for natural light or stained glass or choirs or pews or robes being worn by the pastor. Informal, non-traditional, and laid-back as described above puts me WAY more in the mood to worship Jesus in a building.

In order to reach people that no one else is reaching, you’ve got to do things that no one else is doing. Leading people to become fully devoted followers of Jesus is more easily done in a warm, friendly, enjoyable, casual environment (with high-energy worship music) than it is in a cold, unfriendly, no-fun, formal environment (with boring worship services).

That’s a good point but it also begs the question of how important attendance ever was in the first place given how easily many churches ceased to assemble.

The church service is not supposed to be a concert or a laser light show. (nor is it for "reaching the lost"!. It is for praising God and the edification of the saints). The modern pop-culture nonsense is why I LEFT the church I grew up in. It went "modern" (though so far, no fog machines that I know of...yet).

Christians have a difficult time stepping back and looking at the idea of an omnipotent and omniscient being, creator of everything, choosing to create evil.

Right there's a big hmmmmmmm????

Then, the idea that if someone lives their whole life literally never breaking any of the Christian god's laws, but for some reason either chooses not to believe in Jesus or never even hears about him, they are tortured for eternity after they die.

Seems legit.

Or, one could look around and reasonably conclude that if there is a "creator" there's a pretty good chance it doesn't care a whole lot about those things running around on the third rock from our particular sun, one of trillions of such rocks floating around trillions of stars.

And don't even start thinking about how incredibly messed up it is that all the evil things that happen happen if there is a god that's paying attention. An all-powerful being choosing to allow satan to exist......

Different strokes for different folks.

Tyrone,
Happy Easter to you and all those you love.

Thank you for your kind words. Yes, in certain aspects of my life I'm crushing it, and doing better than ever before. In others parts things are.......interesting, I just don't share my drama's on The Fire or other social medias. I've had my struggles that were not the result of my own doing, and my primary tools for working thought these derive from core tenants of Stoicism and Skepticism, neither of which make any guarantee's to worldly success. Of course Buddhism isn't monolithic, but in general, it makes no promises of worldly success either. Actually, it's promises quit the contrary, that life is suffering and provides idea on how to mitigate how you allow this to affect you.

In my mind, Christianity's just another take on this same dilemma that adds an unnecessary supernatural element. (Now to be fair some forms of Buddhism do worship The Buddha as a God and include an origin story with super natural aspects, but I digress...) I take a more holistic approach to literature during the navigation of life's challenges. I don't limit myself to one philosophy, or one writer of one era, or one discipline, and don't consider any specific one as divinely inspired so I'm able to perform a less biased evaluation of the relevant text and idea.

You will noticed I included Christianity, because sometimes it provides very relevant idea. I'll give you a example. My daughter and her boyfriend were considering a move to another state. His father did not want them to leave for his own selfish reasons, so I sat down with them to discuss. And upon what did this discussion center? Genesis, Chapter 12, verse 1 and 2:

1 Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee:
2 And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:

Sure, it's from the Bible, but on that day, it was the wisdom that best applied to their situation, but of course I skipped the part about Abraham whoring out his wife as his sister, because well, that didn't apply.

I want no part of a congregation that feels no obligation for reaching out to the unchurched, and I want no part of a congregation that feels no obligation for reaching out to the unsaved. The exclusivity of what you describe above is the polar opposite of what Jesus Himself did. The ‘members only’ attitude of what you describe above is the polar opposite of what Jesus Himself did. He was even criticized by the ‘holier than thou’ crowd because of the kind of people He chose to hang out with.

Politics has taken the place of religion in American society/culture.