Posted on 09/19/2008 7:18:28 AM PDT by reaganaut1
"What Americans Really Believe," a comprehensive new study released by Baylor University yesterday, shows that traditional Christian religion greatly decreases belief in everything from the efficacy of palm readers to the usefulness of astrology. It also shows that the irreligious and the members of more liberal Protestant denominations, far from being resistant to superstition, tend to be much more likely to believe in the paranormal and in pseudoscience than evangelical Christians.
The Gallup Organization, under contract to Baylor's Institute for Studies of Religion, asked American adults a series of questions to gauge credulity. Do dreams foretell the future? Did ancient advanced civilizations such as Atlantis exist? Can places be haunted? Is it possible to communicate with the dead? Will creatures like Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster someday be discovered by science?
The answers were added up to create an index of belief in occult and the paranormal. While 31% of people who never worship expressed strong belief in these things, only 8% of people who attend a house of worship more than once a week did.
Even among Christians, there were disparities. While 36% of those belonging to the United Church of Christ, Sen. Barack Obama's former denomination, expressed strong beliefs in the paranormal, only 14% of those belonging to the Assemblies of God, Sarah Palin's former denomination, did. In fact, the more traditional and evangelical the respondent, the less likely he was to believe in, for instance, the possibility of communicating with people who are dead.
...
Surprisingly, while increased church attendance and membership in a conservative denomination has a powerful negative effect on paranormal beliefs, higher education doesn't.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Wonder what Obama’s palmreader would tell him to do about the economy........
Leave Bigfoot out of this!
“Surprisingly, while increased church attendance and membership in a conservative denomination has a powerful negative effect on paranormal beliefs, higher education doesn’t.”
Uhm... not surprising at all, really.
Important article. In my opinion, this is indicative of why we are struggling in America. It is why we are a 50-50 nation now, and why 30 years ago a guy like Obama would have never seen the light of day, much less be a serious candidate for president. At this point, unless something changes, the long range trend does not look good.
This is an affirmation of my homeschooling theme:
“Impervious to Nonsense”.
Two major and one minor point of emphasis to accomplish this:
1) Strong Biblical knowledge and worldview.
2) Thorough understanding of Basic Economics, T Sowell style.
3) Probability and statistics (yes, it IS dumb to buy a lottery ticket. No, you’re not more likely to get a tails after getting 5 heads in a row)
Well—that was an interesting read. Thanks for posting it.
What would Chesterson say?
My #9, at your service.
Not surprising at all. At the end of the middle ages and with the rise of the Renaissance and the Reformation, there was a HUGE increase in belief in magic, astrology, witches, and so forth.
The great age of witch burning took place in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, almost entirely in northern Europe, where the religious wars among Christians took place, and ordinary people lost confidence in religion.
When you know what you believe, then you are largely protected against these wild superstitions. But as Chesterton said, people who don’t believe in God don’t believe in nothing—they believe in anything.
For at least some of us who regard Christianity as irrational belief, the gist of that article is something like:
A. The believers in the dominant irrational belief in their culture are less likely than others to accept other irrational beliefs.
B. Large numbers of those not attracted to the dominant irrational belief will be attracted to other forms of irrational belief.
When I was a kid, back in ‘57 or ‘58, I asked an elderly neighbor lady if she believed in ghosts. She said no, and I asked why she didn’t. What she said has always stuck with me. “Those people in heaven don’t want to come back, and those people in hell can’t come back.”
As G.K. Chesterton observed, “When men stop believing in God, they don’t believe in nothing, they’ll believe in anything.”
Of course, evangelical protestants are the least likely to believe in anything ‘paranormal’ since they, while believing in God also have enough post-Renaissance rationalism in their world-view that they deny the efficacy of the intersessions of the saints and are skeptical about miracles wrought by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Ping for reference to a well-thought-out post.
In my short time in the Libertarian movement, I noticed that the most militant, atheistic, Randian libertarians tend to get interested in the occult. "Loompanics" magazine is popular with this crowd. You'll notice a morbid preoccupation with death and the occult.
The leftist looks at the clear midnight sky and revels in all he understands about the cosmos. The Christian looks at the same sky, realizes just how small he is, and marvels in the wonder of God.
True, but ghosts could be some form of demonic manifestation. And it wouldn't be beyond demonic powers to impersonate the dead, whether during seances, as ghosts, or as poltergeists.
I can channel Eleanor Roosevelt.
“Impervious to Nonsense”.
Two major and one minor point of emphasis to accomplish this:
1) Strong Biblical knowledge and worldview.
2) Thorough understanding of Basic Economics, T Sowell style.
3) Probability and statistics (yes, it IS dumb to buy a lottery ticket. No, you’re not more likely to get a tails after getting 5 heads in a row)
This semester my son, a senior in our homeschool, is listening to n audio cd of "The Universe Next Door " an excellent exploration of worldview. He took it to work on his i-phone and listened to it to& from the job site, and at lunch.
He came so excited - he talked my ear off !
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