Posted on 06/28/2005 9:19:57 AM PDT by voletti
THIS week, for the fourth year in a row, President George Bush broke from affairs of state to address the Southern Baptist Convention. He promised the strict evangelical group, which has 16m members, that he would work hard to ban gay marriage and abortion, and that their “family values” were his values, too.
In the 1960s, many liberal Americans thought they had banned religion from the public square for good. Yet nowadays the president, the secretary of state and the House speaker accept the evangelical label. A packed prayer breakfast takes place every Thursday in Congress. And liberals regularly contend that one of America's two great parties is bent on creating a theocracy—backed by a solid core of somewhere between a quarter and a third of the population.
Why is the religious right as powerful as it is? The question puzzles even Americans. Their country, as a whole, is not getting more religious. The gap between it and European countries has increased, but largely because of Europe's growing godlessness. Most Americans say that religion is very important (60%) or fairly important (26%) in their lives, but Karlyn Bowman, a polling analyst at the American Enterprise Institute, points out that the figures were 75% and 20% in 1952.
What has changed is, first, the make-up of Protestant America and, second, the realignment of religious America's politics. The generally liberal mainline churches have declined, while harder outfits like the Southern Baptists have spurted forward. White evangelicals, who see the Bible as the literal truth (or darned close to it), now make up 26% of the population.
It is not just a matter of numbers but of confidence. Born-again Christians are no longer rural hicks; they are richer and better educated than the average American.
(Excerpt) Read more at economist.com ...
You make a good point...and this is why I don't identify with any particular denomination or school of theology or "influence." Such things are the invention of man, the product of man's finite mind, and as such they divide the Body of Christ. God never intended us to divide ourselves into groups which put particular emphasis on one aspect of scripture over another.
Nor leave your dang cigarettes at the bar. :)
Perhaps health concerns had a teeny bit to do with quitting the cancer sticks.
I agree.
You know, Evangelicals and Catholics are just two different things. Sure, the Vangies find the Mackeral-snappers offensive and magical thinking, but the Vangelists have their own mysticism with the snake-handling, and the speaking in tongues, and even the praying over people and name it and claim it and praying for health and making up prayers all the time, and multiple baptisms and all that garbage.
So that sinful business goes both ways. Either one of them can get a decent size crowd out in the street if they get their corporate knickers in a knot about one thing or another.
A Mormon once told me it was really grape juice.
My apologies for misreading you.
I grew up in a Southern Baptist church thinking drinking and gambling were sins (I knew smoking was bad, especially for one's health, but never considered it a sin). Upon maturing a little I realized drinking wasn't a sin after all but could *become* sinful if taken past a certain point, i.e. past the point of remaining sober. I wouldn't say gambling is automatically a sin but is a temptation toward that tendency due to what may (often) be sinful motivations of greed and envy, not to mention the negative impact it has on other people. Though to sum up, neither drinking nor gambling can be used as determinants of salvation.
Not sure what you're referring to re. beads and moonpies. Mardi Gras? If so, I've never understood its purpose and consider it unworthy of being in any way related to biblical Christianity.
What you say is so true. Episcopals are now nothing but apostates, and Baptists et.al, while sacramentally confused are spiritually correct on most of the important issues esp. regarding life and death.
Mother Angelica is very much alive. Better watch out with that EWTN watching... that's how they got their hooks in me!!!
I believe I am safe to say that independent Bible-believing Baptists firmly believe that President Bush should shut down the borders TODAY to ILLEGAL aliens, and we believe that it could be done. We believe that either liberal influences or one-world (globalist) influences on the President tie his hands.
We believe if the President's values were our values, he would have cried out that he has no respect for that porn star who sat at a Republican fundraiser.
Does the President drink alcoholic beverages? He's no good example in that regard to my children.
Did you read the text of Mrs. Bush's remarks at the recent event where she all but roasted and embarrassed him? Remarks about the desparate housewives, and so forth that revealed neither of them have Biblical convictions concerning home life.
Bush made the statement that Christians and Muslims worship the same God. Islam teaches that Allah has NO son. Christians believe Christ is the only begotten Son of God.
I recommend to you that you check the web site of the Constitution Party. www.constitutionparty.com
I would disagree with your position on gambling. Games of chance are referenced and rejected in scripture. Trust your first instincts.
I clarified that in a later post. It was wrong for me to smoke because I was working with kids and the health factors. I have never ever harped on others to quit smoking, well except for my dad but that was to keep him from blowing himself up with the oxygen. ;)
You know the old joke: King James, if it was good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for me. Mark my words, somone will show slavish devotion for the KJV and outright contempt for any other translation in answer to your question.
You don't want people to be looking at you and going "guess I'll never get to heaven if I can't be perfect like her".
"Sin boldy, repent more boldly still." Luther
Yeah they're thinking about allowing the Queer'an as an object for muzzies to swear on even though it gives them explicit permission to lie to the infidels.
Okay, even moderate smoking is wrong but from a health standpoint which is why I don't smoke.
That would mean all those casino boats in Mississippi will have to shut down for lack of patrons.
Are you seriously going to make the contention that the Mississippi Gulf Coast is a part of the Bible Belt. Especially when it actually voted for Kennedy in 1960 but didn't vote for Baptist Jimmy Carter in 1976
Almost all Mississippi casinos are in areas that are either heavily Catholic or heavily Black (the exception being the Choctaws in Neshoba County)
"The hardest drinking and biggest consumers of tobacco are in the Bible Belt"
Most of that is done in metropolitan areas which often have a diversity of religion. Not to mention, there are many Methodists in the South, and in general, Methodists usually don't have a problem with tobacco or alcohol.
And finally, regarding Mississippi, most of the patrons for the boats in Biloxi do not come from SBC Mississippi. They come from Jackson, Mobile, New Orleans and Pensacola, as well as other major Southern cities.
Freedom is one of the hardest things for Christians to get a grasp of; for fear of sinning, some Christians shy away from freedom and tend toward legalism. Other Christians, tired of the crushing burden of legalism, fully embrace freedom, but it takes on the likeness of license ("doing what I want to do"). It is the mature Christian who exercises freedom with responsibility, and under surrender to God.
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