Posted on 08/29/2019 7:09:59 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
My pastor recently told me that 25 years ago, the first person that people would contact when they faced a marriage crisis was their pastor. Ten years ago, he continued, it was their counselor or psychiatrist. Today, it’s their lawyers.
A recent study conducted by the Associated Press and the University of Chicago concurs. “Doctors, teachers, members of the military,” and scientists are, according to the survey, esteemed “more positively than clergy.” Among infrequent churchgoers, clergy are viewed as negatively as lawyers. (For the record, that last line came from a member of our editorial team who’s been admitted to the bar in two states.)
As my pastor observed, the declining respect for clergy is a trend both in and out of the church, including among those who attend church frequently. While 75 percent of churchgoers “hold clergy in high regard,” they aren’t as positive when it comes to personal attributes and character qualities of their clergy. Barely half consider clergy to be trustworthy, and only slightly more regard them as “honest and intelligent.”
Remember these are people who attend church at least once a month! Among those who seldom or never attend church, the respective numbers on those questions are 23 and 30 percent.
The obvious question is why?
At least a significant part of the answer is cultural. As Religion News Service pointed out, “Historians say public attitudes about clergy have been waning since the 1970s, in tandem with the loss of trust in institutions after the Vietnam War and the Watergate scandal.”
Actually, the decline in trust and disregard for institutions predates Watergate and the end of the Vietnam War. After all, the 1964 Free Speech movement at Berkeley had a signature saying: “We don’t trust anyone over thirty.” It’s a line that came to sum up the view of many Baby Boomers towards all authority. Governmental, parental, and clerical included.
Institutions like governments and churches were, at best, obstacles, and at worst enemies of personal liberation. Though the VW vans that dotted the Woodstock landscape have long since rusted away, the commitment to personal liberation and autonomy has only intensified in the half-century since then.
Today, many Americans embrace expressions of personal liberation that wouldn’t have even occurred to the people dancing to Santana in the New York mud. It’s one thing to think you’re liberated from “the man.” It’s another to think you’re liberated from observable reality.
But, if we Christians are honest with ourselves, we’ll admit that cultural attitudes toward authority and institutions aren’t the only reason for the waning respect when it comes to clergy. Some is the result of self-inflicted wounds.
Scarcely a week goes by without another report of clergy sex-abuse and/or some other horrible conduct. Given the scope and sheer number of these scandals and the fact that they cross denominational lines from Roman Catholic to Protestant to Evangelical, it would be a miracle if regard for the clergy had not diminished.
This is tragic news because so many lives have been devastated, and because so many people personally know someone who’s life has been devastated. I don’t need to tell you that the vast majority of clergy are honest and caring people who have answered the Lord’s call to shepherd His flock and are doing what they do out of love for others. But, their reputation is harmed also.
That’s what makes this such a huge loss—because when done right, clergy can represent, embody, and offer a kind of love that is simply indispensable during the inevitable bad times we face. It’s indispensable to individuals, families, communities, and to our entire nation. Theirs is a role uniquely gifted to the church, and one that cannot be replicated across the spectrum of society. And what they offer is especially missed when it’s needed most.
Why?
The personal greed of the people.
They don’t want to work marriage problems out with their spouse and so they go for the money.
Another reason — the breakup of the family because of contraception (the pill) making procreation and sex meaningless.
Because they forgot to pray together to the Holy Spirit and ask for help day in and day out..
Because their arguments are losers.
Great line!
Another enlightened, compassionate and progressive cultural benefit of the Sexual Revolution.
A great prayer for husband and wife every morning:
We thank you, our Heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ, Your dear Son, that you have kept us this night from harm and danger and pray that you would keep us this day also from sin and every evil that all our doings and lives may please You. For into Your hands we commend ourselves, our bodies and souls and all things. Let your holy angel be with us that the evil foe may have no power over us. Amen.
(Luther’s morning prayer)
"Fellow-citizens, the ark of your covenant is the Declaration of independence. Your Mount Ebal, is the confederacy of separate state sovereignties, and your Mount Gerizim is the Constitution of the United States. In that scene of tremendous and awful solemnity, narrated in the Holy Scriptures, there is not a curse pronounced against the people, upon Mount Ebal, not a blessing promised them upon Mount Gerizim, which your posterity may not suffer or enjoy, from your and their adherence to, or departure from, the principles of the Declaration of Independence, practically interwoven in the Constitution of the United States. Lay up these principles, then, in your hearts, and in your souls – bind them for signs upon your hands, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes – teach them to your children, speaking of them when sitting in your houses, when walking by the way, when lying down and when rising up – write them upon the doorplates of your houses, and upon your gates – cling to them as to the issues of life – adhere to them as to the cords of your eternal salvation. So may your children’s children at the next return of this day of jubilee, after a full century of experience under your national Constitution, celebrate it again in the full enjoyment of all the blessings recognized by you in the commemoration of this day, and of all the blessings promised to the children of Israel upon Mount Gerizim, as the reward of obedience to the law of God." - John Quincy Adams (Final Paragraph - "The Jubilee of the Constitution" A DISCOURSE Delivered at the Request of The New York Historical Society In the City of New York, On Tuesday, the 30th of April, 1839, Being the Fiftieth Anniversary Of the INAUGURATION OF GEORGE WASHINGTON as President of the United States on Thursday, 30th of April, 1789, by John Quincy Adams (Eldest son of John Adams, born in 1767, served as Minister to the Netherlands under President Washington, as minister to Prussia and to Russia, as Secretary of State, and as U.S. Senator. He was the Sixth President of the United States and from 1830 until his death in 1848 served the nation as a United States Congressman)Do any now retired teachers remember when the National Education Association provided booklets and other materials based on Biblical teachings and America's founding documents in order to teach children their rights and responsibilities as good citizens?
Perhaps an examination of this web site may refresh the minds of such teachers. Or, perhaps a reading of this factual account of NEA publications may enlighten others who are younger to understand the degree to which the "progressive" control of education in America may have contributed to our current dilemma.
"Posterity, you will never know how much it cost the present generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it. If you do not, I shall repent in heaven that ever I took half the pains to preserve it." - John Adams - 2nd President of the United States and advocate for the Declaration of Independence
"Ideas have consequences." - Weaver
Good post!
Ministers who would rather take a trip to South America to 'help some tribe' (read vacation) than assist with the concerns of their own flock...
Preachers who care more about kissing the butts of big donors than about offering ethical direction to their churches...
And the list goes on...
We go to church for spiritual growth and guidance...half the time we get 'what's in fashion' liberal crap of the moment.
The big problem that has led to a lack of respect is that the clergy seems to be a lot more liberal then the laity.
Finding clergy in the big four, (Catholic, Lutheran, Methodist and Episcopalian) that actually believes in the Bible is becoming a rarity.
And a good number of them do not even believe there is a God at all.
If they do not believe yet continue to label themselves clergy there is a good reason not to trust or respect them.
Try Chabad.
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