Losing Your Religion.

That's me in the corner
That's me in the spot-light
Losing my religion
Trying to keep up with you
And I don't know if I can do it
Oh no I've said too much
I haven't said enough
R.E.M. Songwriters: Peter Lawrence Buck / Michael E. Mills / William Berry / Michael J. Stipe

More and more people are turning away from their parents’ religion. Younger people are turning away because of all the negativity while older worshipers are saying, “This isn’t the religion that I grew up with!”

We see the courts giving favor to “religion freedom” but as religion declines we see that more as a catchphrase to hide their bigotry behind and the Supreme Court is band major leading the parade. I see this as the last gasp for the far-right Christians.

The far-right Christian religions push the old-time “Fire and Brimstone” religion which more and more people are rejecting. The United Methodists are no longer united.

United Methodists lose one-fifth of U.S. churches in schism over LGBTQ rights
NPR
By Peter Smith, Associated Press
July 6, 2023

More than 6,000 United Methodist congregations — a fifth of the U.S. total — have now received permission to leave the denomination amid a schism over theology and the role of LGBTQ people in the nation’s second-largest Protestant denomination.

Those figures emerge following the close of regular meetings in June for the denomination’s regional bodies, known as annual conferences. The departures began with a trickle in 2019 — when the church created a four-year window of opportunity for U.S. congregations to depart over LGBTQ-related issues — and cascaded to its highest level this year.

[…]

The split has been long in the making, mirroring controversies that have led to splits in other mainline Protestant denominations. United Methodist legislative bodies, known as general conferences, have repeatedly reinforced bans on LGBTQ marriage and ordination, on the strength of coalitions of conservatives in U.S. and overseas churches.

Back in 2008 the Episcopal Church tackled the LGBTQ+ issue…

Episcopal Church Splits Over Gay Equality
The Episcopal Church’s promotion of an openly gay clergyman has created a serious rift within the religious community, threatening the future of the denomination.
The Nation
By Drew Haxby
January 12, 2009


In the past five years, the Episcopal Church has found itself pushed to the forefront of the culture wars. After Gene Robinson, an openly gay man with a longterm partner, was elected Bishop of New Hampshire in 2003, Anglican bishops from all over the world quickly decried the move. Conservative congregations in the US and Canada left the national churches. Some aligned themselves with the Anglican Church of Nigeria and its outspoken homophobic leader, Archbishop Peter Akinola. On December 3 of this year, these conservatives announced the creation of a new denomination, one that will compete openly with the Episcopalians for congregations and tithes. While not recognized by the Anglican Communion, the New York Times described this latest move as “the biggest challenge yet to the authority of the Episcopal Church,” which “threatens the fragile unity of the Anglican Communion.”

The Anglican conservatives have argued that the Episcopal Church acted too rashly in its acceptance of gays and lesbians into the leadership of the church. Archbishop Gregory Venables of the Southern Cone of America, called Gene Robinson’s election “a slap in the face of the Anglican Church around the world.” Reverend Nyhan of St. James the Just described it as “hubris of Biblical proportions, and that’s a polite way of saying diabolical.”

Ripped right down the middle!

Losing their religion: why US churches are on the decline
As the US adjusts to an increasingly non-religious population, thousands of churches are closing each year – probably accelerated by Covid
The Guardian
By Adam Gabbatt
22 January 2023

Churches are closing at rapid numbers in the US, researchers say, as congregations dwindle across the country and a younger generation of Americans abandon Christianity altogether – even as faith continues to dominate American politics.

As the US adjusts to an increasingly non-religious population, thousands of churches are closing each year in the country – a figure that experts believe may have accelerated since the Covid-19 pandemic.

The situation means some hard decisions for pastors, who have to decide when a dwindling congregation is no longer sustainable. But it has also created a boom market for those wanting to buy churches, with former houses of worship now finding new life.

[…]

That aside, closures are often due to a failure of churches to adapt.

“A church will go through a life cycle. At some point, maybe the congregation ages out, maybe they stop reaching young families.

“If the church ages and doesn’t reach young people, or the demographics change and they don’t figure out how to reach the new demographic, that church ends up closing.

“Yes, there’s financial pressures that will close a church, but oftentimes, it’s more that they didn’t figure out how to change when the community changed, or they didn’t have enough young people to continue the congregation for the next generation.”

As children grow up along side of trans students, gay students, and others who are not like them they begin to see them as friends, not the enemies of their parents generation and that is one reason the Republicans are trying to force LGBTQ+ students back into the closets, they fear the normalization of LGBTQ students and other minorities. When Johnny grows up with Latinx and trans, they are rejecting their parents’ animosity toward us.

***

This is such a decisive issue I want another view, so I asked Google’s Bard AI what it thought about this topic:

Are affirming churches growing and non-affirming churches shrinking?

Yes, affirming churches are generally growing while non-affirming churches are shrinking. This is supported by a number of studies, including:

•     A 2022 study by the Pew Research Center found that 29% of Americans say their religious congregation is welcoming and affirming of LGBTQ people, up from 22% in 2017.
•     A 2021 study by the Public Religion Research Institute found that 68% of Americans say people of all sexual orientations and gender identities should be welcome in religious congregations.
•     A 2020 study by the University of Chicago found that affirming churches are more likely to grow than non-affirming churches.

There are a number of reasons for this trend. First, younger generations are more likely to be accepting of LGBTQ people than older generations. A 2022 Gallup poll found that 71% of Americans under the age of 30 say same-sex marriage should be legal, compared to 55% of Americans over the age of 65.

Second, many LGBTQ people have felt excluded from traditional religious communities. Affirming churches offer a space where LGBTQ people can be themselves and feel welcome and included.

Third, affirming churches are often more innovative and adaptable than non-affirming churches. They are more likely to use technology to reach people and to offer new and creative ways to worship and learn.

Of course, there are still many non-affirming churches in the United States. However, the trend is clear: affirming churches are growing while non-affirming churches are shrinking. This is a good thing for LGBTQ people and for society as a whole.

A friend had this posted on her Facebook page...

When Einstein gave lectures at U.S. universities, the recurring question that students asked him most was:

- Do you believe in God?

And he always answered:

- I believe in the God of Spinoza.

Baruch de Spinoza was a Dutch philosopher considered one of the great rationalists of 17th century philosophy, along with Descartes.

(Spinoza) : God would say:

Stop praying.

What I want you to do is go out into the world and enjoy your life. I want you to sing, have fun and enjoy everything I've made for you.

Stop going into those dark, cold temples that you built yourself and saying they are my house. My house is in the mountains, in the woods, rivers, lakes, beaches. That's where I live and there I express my love for you.

Stop blaming me for your miserable life; I never told you there was anything wrong with you or that you were a sinner, or that your sexuality was a bad thing. Sex is a gift I have given you and with which you can express your love, your ecstasy, your joy. So don't blame me for everything they made you believe.

Stop reading alleged sacred scriptures that have nothing to do with me. If you can't read me in a sunrise, in a landscape, in the look of your friends, in your son's eyes... ➤ you will find me in no book!

Stop asking me "will you tell me how to do my job?" Stop being so scared of me. I do not judge you or criticize you, nor get angry, or bothered. I am pure love.

Stop asking for forgiveness, there's nothing to forgive. If I made you... I filled you with passions, limitations, pleasures, feelings, needs, inconsistencies... free will. How can I blame you if you respond to something I put in you? How can I punish you for being the way you are, if I'm the one who made you? Do you think I could create a place to burn all my children who behave badly for the rest of eternity? What kind of god would do that?

Respect your peers and don't do what you don't want for yourself. All I ask is that you pay attention in your life, that alertness is your guide.

My beloved, this life is not a test, not a step on the way, not a rehearsal, nor a prelude to paradise. This life is the only thing here and now and it is all you need.

I have set you absolutely free, no prizes or punishments, no sins or virtues, no one carries a marker, no one keeps a record.

You are absolutely free to create in your life. Heaven or hell.

➤ I can't tell you if there's anything after this life but I can give you a tip. Live as if there is not. As if this is your only chance to enjoy, to love, to exist.

So, if there's nothing after, then you will have enjoyed the opportunity I gave you. And if there is, rest assured that I won't ask if you behaved right or wrong, I'll ask. Did you like it? Did you have fun? What did you enjoy the most? What did you learn?...

Stop believing in me; believing is assuming, guessing, imagining. I don't want you to believe in me, I want you to believe in you. I want you to feel me in you when you kiss your beloved, when you tuck in your little girl, when you caress your dog, when you bathe in the sea.

Stop praising me, what kind of egomaniac God do you think I am?

I'm bored being praised. I'm tired of being thanked. Feeling grateful? Prove it by taking care of yourself, your health, your relationships, the world. Express your joy! That's the way to praise me.

Stop complicating things and repeating as a parakeet what you've been taught about me.

What do you need more miracles for? So many explanations?

The only thing for sure is that you are here, that you are alive, that this world is full of wonders.

- Spinoza