Posted on 11/24/2009 10:59:12 AM PST by Unam Sanctam
Modernist Christianity must eventually die or cease to be Christian. At this time modernism still wears Christian clothes in the mainstream Protestant churches and in parts of the Catholic Church. This cannot last much longer for some very simple reasons:
1. Modernists deny supernaturalism and therefore they are not really religious. Now by 'religion' I mean a transacton with the supernatural. Religion (whether it is primitive people jumping around a campfire or a Solemn High Mass in a Catholic Cathedral) is about an interchange with the other world. It is about salvation of souls, redemption of sin, heaven, hell damnation, the afterlife, angels and demons and all that stuff.
Modernists don't deal in all that. For them religion is a matter of fighting for equal rights, making the world a better place, being kind to everyone and 'spirituality'. It doesn't take very long for people to realize that you don't have to go to church for all that. So people stop going, and that eventually means the death of modernist Christianity. The first generation of modernist Christians will attend church regularly. The second will attend church sometimes. The third almost never. The fourth and fifth will not see any need for worship. They will conclude that if religion is no more than good works, then the religious ritual is redundant.
2. Modernism is essentially individualist and not communal. Each person makes up his own mind about matters. Therefore when it comes to religion the fissiparous nature of modernist religion will become more and more acute. Individuals with firm opinions will form ever smaller and more passionate groups with like minded people and the smaller the groups, the more they will eventually wither and die.
3. Modernism is also subjective and sentimentalist. It eschews doctrine and favors individual spirituality and sentimental responses to doctrines and moral issues. It is not long, therefore, before the individualist and sentimentalist inclinations drive a person from a church that is dogmatic and demanding. Modernists will prefer their own spirituality and emotional experiences to any sort of formal religious commitment. Thus the modern admission, "I'm interested in spritituality but not religion." When this attitude prevails, modernist religion dies.
4. Modernism is historically revisionist. They re-write history according to their prejudices. In religious terms this means they are cut off from tradition. They are therefore cut off from the life-stream of real religion. As they cut themselves off from the tradition they will only have the latest religious gimmick, fad or adaptation to contemporary culture. Such an ephemeral attitude cannot provide for long term sustained religious longevity.
5. Modernists contracept and abort. They don't have enough children to train up in their religion, and those children they do have are often taught that freedom of choice is a higher virtue than commitment or duty in religion. So they will lose the next generation to either real religion or paganism.
6. Modernism makes no great demands for its devotees to be religious. Ask any modernist, "Why should I come to Church?" What would he answer? "You don't have to come to church. It's there if you want it. If it does you good, and makes you feel better, we're here to serve you." Modernist Catholic priests wring their hands and wonder why no one comes to Mass anymore. It's because for forty years they've been saying, "It's not really a mortal sin to miss Mass. You should come because you love God, not because you fear him." While this sentiment may be laudable, they shouldn't therefore be surprised if no one comes to Mass.
7. The modernist himself does not really understand why anyone should be religious. He started out as a religious man believing in sin, redemption and the supernaturalist story. He became modernist gradually and all the time continued his religious practice, but he has never stopped to ask why such a thing should be necessary. If he is honest and asks himself the question he will soon stop the practice of his religion too. Unless, of course, he is a clergyman. If he is a religious professional he would have to get another job, so it is easier to keep the show on the road.
8. Modernists allow for moral degeneracy and that saps the strength out of real religion. Devotees of all supernaturalist religions demand moral purity, self discipline and restraint. Real religion requires self discipline. The modernist sees religion not as self denial but self fulfillment. Hedonists will soon realize that religion--even in its watered down modernist form--is not worth the trouble.
9. Modernists aren't actually much fun. In my experience they're a joyless lot, always on some sort of serious, smug and self righteous campaign, not infrequently with a whiff of the conspiracy theorist about them. That can't last.
10. Modernists are dull. They've so little imagination and are so literal about everything. They do not rejoice over the seeming absurdity of religion. In fact, they are frightfully respectable. They always go with the crowd, especially if that crowd pretends to be 'radical' or 'subversive' in a 'chattering classes' kind of way. That attitude is the kiss of death to real religion.
So, what will happen to modernist Christianity? It will die out or cease to be Christian. The un-Christian forms this will, unfortunately, still borrow Christian terminology and customs, but like some horrid fantastic beast, it will continue to transmogrify into ever more monstrous forms while still continuing to dress in a Christian costume.
These horrors are already with us on the fringe of modernist religion. Expect them to become even more mainstream.
The “Universal Moral Code” post looks like someone spamming for a site that sells posters featuring - of course - the witty sayings of some “Dr.” or other.
In a sense, we are. Jews and Christians alike are willing to die for their beliefs, if need be. But such true martyrdom would, (and did), take place under persecution, not warfare.
In the case of the Crusades, they should be seen in light of the aggressive invasions prior.
"Jainism is far from new."
Zoroastrianism is another fascinating ancient religion. It's parallels with others is remarkable.
Bump!
Human error aside, a person who knows God also knows His will, not think they know it.
"That is what I meant by Religion can pervert the UMC."
And that's what I would call human error.
"Not every atrocity in Abrahamic Religions was committed for self preservation."
Here's where I have to wonder what "in Abrahamic Religions" means. Did God order atrocities, or did they occur due to some other influence?
Huh? It's talking about modernist Christianity (which is basically another name for secular humanism) dying out, not Christianity as a whole.
I vote for the “cease to be Christian” route. The modernist liberals will still have their little club to bolster their practical atheism, with a nominal “christian” name attached - just to make them feel good.
That's nice, but it won't work in practice, unless your definition of "religion" is a very narrow one.
"Morality" is fundamentally meaningless unless you believe that human beings have rights that no human being can take away. That proposition, in turn, requires an agency higher than any human being or human agency to grant those rights.
(After all, you have to have an answer for "why do people have the right to x, y, and z" that's better than, "they just do".)
That higher agency is God. Freedom, in the long run, is incompatible with an atheistic society, for the simple reason that men will always set something up in place of God ... and the most tempting idol to set up is the state. If "all men" are not "endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights," because there is no creator, then those rights will be understood to be granted by the sovereign.
And what the king grants, the king can also take away. The 100 million lives sacrificed to atheistic communism in the 20th century testify to that.
Excellent post.
But mainstream or liberal or "modernist" religion isn't going to die out. However strong and numerous conservative or traditionalist churches become, there are always going to be backsliders -- people born into the religion who like some things but don't accept all the dogmas -- and those people will gravitate to other, less rigorous denominations.
I can sure answer that one for you, The gates of Hell shall not prevail against it. Obviously Jesus meant it because those waiting for centuries for the Catholic Church to go away might as well wish for Jesus to go away.
He’s one to talk.
Thank you, Campion. That was very well put.
You're right, you don't. You can give morals any meaning without God, any meaning whatsoever. What you have said is true.
He is an enthusiastically Catholic priest with an amazing story of conversion. What makes you think he doesn't?
He calls it a story.
... You kept saying it seems red to you, it seems like it seems red to you, you believe it is red, you believe that you believe it is red, and so forth. Not once did you say that it is red. - Raymond Smullyan, An Epistemological Nightmare
I read that in Douglas Hofstadter's, The Mind's Eye, and it has always crystalized for me the point that professions of belief are confessions of doubt. True belief is transparent. When you look at a pen on the desk, you don't think, "The light entering my eyes indicates to me that there is a pen on the desk", you think, "there's my pen". People recognize this and look with wonder and envy on the true belief that children have in the fantastic.
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