The GOP’s Secularism Problem

[eridani]

More Americans than ever are shunning their churches, fed up with the fusion of religion offered by conservatives. Is the GOP base to blame?

http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/10/14/the-gop-s-secularism-problem.html

There’s been much angst on the right over the Republican Party’s growing demographic problems, most memorably by GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham, who said the party was running out of “angry white guys.” But conservatives may be facing another demographic threat as well: declining religiosity, especially among the young. The latest sign came in a Pew study released last week that found that one in five American adults now claims no religion, and that 34 percent of those younger than 30 consider themselves irreligious.

The shift away from religion is especially pronounced among those younger than 30, who began abandoning churches in greater numbers at exactly the moment conservative Christians made gay marriage their signature issue. As the religious right reached its zenith during the Bush administration, even young evangelicals rebelled against the politics of their parents. That reaction came to a head in the 2008 election, when 32 percent of white evangelicals under 30 voted Democratic for the first time to support Barack Obama, twice as much support from them as John Kerry had in 2004.

Some evangelicals are openly worried about the trend. “We made a big mistake in the ’80s by politicizing the gospel,” the late Chuck Colson, a religious-right leader, said before his death. “Now people are realizing it was kind of a mistake.” A few evangelical organizations, like Focus on the Family, have undergone hasty non-partisan rebrandings. Books, magazines, and sermons on how to slow the defection of young believers have become an industry of their own, and attacking the old culture-war paradigm launched the careers of young post-partisan pundits like Gabe Lyons and Jonathan Merritt.

[Skittles]

1. it's a lot easier to fact-check religious nuttery now, too

and even people in tiny towns can find out there's plenty of folk out there who don't fall for it

[Berlum]

2. Huge difference between spirituality and religion

Looks like younger folks get that.

[dballance]

3. Used Car Sales People

Obviously the more intelligent youth in our country realize that what Christian ministers are selling is not much different than the mythology of the Greeks and Romans they learned about in school. Seriously, water to wine, feeding thousands from just a couple of fishes and loaves? How can you tell people that crap as being true any more than you can tell them Zeus and Minerva were just made up?

[Kolesar]

4. When I was young, I thought everybody was a skeptic

I was surprised that the antiestablishment youth culture of the 1970s devolved into superstition and militarism.

[piechartking]

5. At the same time...

I have no problem with people having religious beliefs. I think the problem comes when you decide in your head that, no matter what facts or evidence comes along, you've already settled it, and therefore you will reject new information, even if it's widely accepted as valid.

That problem then leads to other problems, like 1) you discount or refuse to negotiate with anyone coming at you with "dangerous" facts or evidence, and 2) you latch onto others like you and band together in fanatical devotion to a cause.

[Sinistrous]

6. Well said!

And welcome to DU.

[LibertyLover]

7. Nancy L. Cohen's book, Delirium: The Politics of Sex in America

discusses this very topic. It was an eye-opening read and one that confirmed for me that a religious minority is the tyrant in today's America.