Oct 14 2008
Growing Religion is those claiming no religious affiliation
Alan Canon grew up in a fundamentalist household and was a Bible-camp prize winner. But his family also valued science, and he ultimately couldn’t reconcile the two and became an atheist.
“For people openly to say they’re atheist is similar to gay people coming out,” said Canon, of Louisville, who often wears a pin with a scarlet-letter “A” to prompt conversations about atheism. “It’s not popular at all for people to say they’re atheist, especially in these parts.”
He is part of an increasingly vocal minority of atheists and other Americans who claim no religious affiliation. The percentage of religiously unaffiliated Americans has doubled since 1990, rising to 16 percent. That growth represents one of the largest trends in American religion today, according to a poll published this year by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.
Some of the religiously unaffiliated say they want to combat conservative Christians’ political activities in areas such as embryonic stem-cell research, creationism and courthouse postings of the Ten Commandments.
Religious groups, meanwhile, are responding by trying to make churches more culturally relevant or by finding common ground with atheists.
Among the religiously unaffiliated, about 2 percent describe themselves as “atheist” or “agnostic,” according to the Pew survey. Most of the rest say they’re nothing in particular - and half of that group actually has religious beliefs or practices.
Members of a Louisville group, Louisville Atheists and Freethinkers, reflect the complexities presented in the Pew survey. Some meditate or practice Wiccan spiritual rituals, tied to the rhythms of nature. Several belong to Unitarian Universalist churches, which have no theological creed but proclaim values of love, justice and truth-seeking.
“We do believe in spirituality,” said David Cooper, 59, who belongs to Thomas Jefferson Unitarian Church in Louisville. “It may not necessarily be a type of theistic spirituality.”
The Kentucky Baptist Convention, alarmed by a 2004 report showing that one-third of Kentucky adults had little or no church connection, has seen many churches work to be more culturally relevant, said Larry Baker, director of new work and associational missions.
“We have to meet people exactly where they are, respect them as individuals and then share boldly and with clarity about what we believe about our relationship with Jesus Christ,” Baker said.
Read more here.
[From me]
It does seem like atheism is becoming more vogue. I am meeting more and more people who have no religious leanings than I ever have in my life.I like what Mr. Baker says. We need to respect everyone but explain what we believe and leave the rest to the Holy Spirit. It isn’t followers of Jesus job to convert people. That is the job of the Holy Spirit. Our job is to share Jesus with others and leave the rest to God.
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3 responses so far
I agree with you Kevin and also want to add that no matter what a person’s religious or non-religious leanings they need to be treated with respect. It also needs to be visa versa. I have never met A3 personally but he seems like a man who is willing to respect other peoples’ opinions even though he may not agree. You try to be the same way and as a result have this forum. We can treat someone with respect without agreeing with them. This post also tells me that we have lots of work to do as Christ-followers.
Bill(cycleguy)’s last blog post..An Old Dog and New Tricks
I don’t know if I can even express what I’m thinking, but that never stopped me before, so here goes.
We have one the one hand, people who seem forthright in their beliefs, wearing external evidences of their beliefs and opinions, who occasionally get together in a group. We hear a lot from them, an a big bunch of the hearing comes from individuals.
Then we have big groups of people who lobby, protest, get together now and then, but while they’re active as a group, don’t much identify with their cause individually.
The real tragedy is, it seems to me, this: it’s the atheists who are more individually vocal, whereas it’s the Christians who leave it to the groups to speak and act, keeping a low profile individually.
Bob Cleveland’s last blog post..SBC: Stay Out Of The Vinyl Siding Business!!
Bill,
Thanks for the kind words. I also feel that you, and most others who post on this blog are respectful of my opinions as well.
Bob,
That’s a very interesting observation and I think you are on to something. Atheists tend to be less influenced by pressures to conform and therefore tend to act more individualistically. And conversely, Christians tend to be more influenced by those pressures and therefore tend to act more collectively.
I came across an interesting article that shows that non-theism (which would include atheists and agnostics) is up even higher among younger poeple: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/14/AR2007091402199.html. That means that we should expect a significantly higher percent of non-theists in the US in a few decades.