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Christian Popularity
Sept 28, 2007, Wausau, Wi — As I
detailed in my book Christianity and Secularism, throughout the much of the twentieth
century, the rising dominance of secularism, combined with a church that was
form the most part sleeping and unengaged with the culture, has had a
devastating impact on the culture. As a
result the popular culture is now not only dominated by secularism, but it is
also markedly anti-Christian where negative stereotypes of Christianity are the
norm, and outright attacks are common, not only against Christianity and Christians, but even
against Jesus.
The damage
this has done, was demonstrated once again in a recent study by the Barna Group, which showed “one of
the most significant shifts [in American culture] is the declining reputation
of Christianity, especially among young Americans.” One of the studies more disturbing findings
is that ” only 3% of 16 - to 29-year-old non-Christians express favorable views
of evangelicals.”
The study
found that for many young people, even including Christians, Christianity was viewed as judgmental,
hypocritical, old-fashioned, and too involved in politics. Not too surprisingly these are also the
stereotypes that are so common in the popular culture. The study shows that, at
least in the PR war, the secularist are winning.
Combating
these perceptions will be difficult because these perceptions not only reflect
the steady drumbeat of anti-Christian stereotypes, but also that the broader
Christians worldview that once dominate in our society even among those who
were not Christian, has been replace by a secular one.
Take the
first two items on the list, that Christians are judgmental, and
hypocritical. A major problem is that both
of these terms have been radically redefined.
Being judgmental, once referred to someone who was hypercritical,
picking on every little flaw or mistake.
As it is now applied to Christians, it refers those who make virtually
any moral judgment at all. In the
secular world view all morals are relative.
Thus the common argument against Christians asking “who are you to
judge?”
As for
hypocritical, that once referred to someone who claimed that an action was
wrong for others, but it was ok when they did it. The new secular understanding
is that anyone who makes moral judgments, and yet does not live a perfect life
themselves is a hypocrite.
This is one
of the tricks of secularism, take terms
that are commonly seen as negative, and redefine them so that they apply to
things which secularist oppose. For both judgmental and hypocrite, the main
goal is undermine (rather than defeat in open debate) Christian morality. As a
result, under the new secular understandings
of these terms, of course Christians are judgmental hypocrites, so how can we
defend ourselves?
Secularist
have been very successful with these redefinitions, but they have a two huge
weaknesses. First they depend on the fact that the redefinition goes unnoticed,
so that the negativity of the old definition is automatically transferred to
the new meanings. Secondly these new
definitions are not, and cannot be uniformly applied if the negativity is to
remain. In fact, they are applied very
selectively. Thus one ways to defend
against such attacks, is to go straight to the core weakness of the secular
redefinition.
For
example, when the subject of being judgmental came up in my college classes on
critical thinking, I would simply point out that the term had been redefined
and it was important to know whether one was using the older meaning or the
newer one. More importantly I would point out that under the new definition, being
judgmental is not always a bad thing, and in fact that everyone is not only
judgmental in some areas, but that they should be. One example I would give is,
what if someone stole something you valued, such as your IPod. Would you say
that to steal was simply their personal choice and who are you to judge; or
would you be judgmental and say that
they were wrong? Put in such a light
suddenly the entire class would become “judgmental.”
Likewise
for hypocrite, you can point out that there has been a change, and that either
everyone is a hypocrite at which point the term become pretty much meaningless,
or it is being wrongly and very selectively used. Which way will work the best will vary from
individual to individual, and term to
term, but the main goal here is to get onto a level playing field where
everyone is speaking, and hearing the same thing.
Yet this
problem is much deeper than just the redefinition of some terms. For many of
those outside the Church, and even for many Christians, their view of Christianity is one shaped by
the anti-Christian bigotry and falsehoods of skeptics. For example, I have found that even among
Christians the belief in thing like Columbus having to fight the ignorance of
Christians who believed in a flat earth, or that most wars are caused by
religion are very common, even though both completely false. While well schooled in the negative aspects
of Christian history, such as the inquisition,
most have no idea of the important and positive contributions made by
Christians such as the abolition of slavery, nor the intellectual foundations
Christianity provided for things like science and human rights and democracy.
This is Elgin Hushbeck, asking you to Consider Christianity: a Faith Based on Fact.
See www.consider.org for additional information.
The book and press materials are available upon request.
To schedule an interview or to have
Elgin Hushbeck, Jr. speak at your chruch or event
contact Aletheia at 715-849-8328