Conversations of Faith at Common Ground

As the political races shape up in the run for President, the conversations concerning who Christians will/should back are heating up as well. On both the Republican and Democratic sides, which candidate is most in line with an “evangelical” worldview? How should/could a Christian weigh a candidate’s stance on abortion, homosexuality, poverty, race, war, business and/or taxes?

If you are a Christian, what do you consider to be critical issues as you think about who you would consider voting for? Which political party do you think represents a “Christian” worldview better than the other? If there is, why?

Either way, what defines or makes a “Christian” political position?

If you’re not a Christian, what do you think of the kerfuffle Christians are having over the political candidates and issues?

We thought it might be helpful to provide a page that tells you about what type of reading material we’ve got on our nightstand. Check out our “What we’re reading” page.

Drawing boundaries for our kids can be hard, especially if we know our kids will cross them and we lack the resolve to enforce the lines we’ve drawn.

This mom doesn’t have that problem. Upset that her son had alcohol in a car she bought for him, she placed an ad in the paper that read, “OLDS 1999 Intrigue. Totally uncool parents who obviously don’t love teenage son, selling his car. Only driven for three weeks before snoopy mom who needs to get a life found booze under front seat. $3,700/offer. Call meanest mom on the planet.”

Here’s an interesting observation about this and coming generations of adults — http://www.christianitytoday.com/bc/2007/006/2.10.html

John Piper offers a summary of the article and helpful suggestions for the church — http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/TasteAndSee/ByDate/2007/2487_A_ChurchBased_Hope_for_Adultolescents

As good as Piper’s suggestions/solutions are, the problem that still needs to be identified is how and why this is happening. Possible roots of the problem raised in the CT article are society and the Church’s attitudes toward consumerism and adulthood.

For instance, Smith writes:

“Jeffrey Arnett explored the religious beliefs and practices of the more than one hundred emerging adults he interviewed in various locations around the country. Here is what he concluded:

The most interesting and surprising feature of emerging adults’ religious beliefs is how little relationship there is between the religious training they received throughout childhood and the religious beliefs they hold at the time they reach emerging adulthood … . In statistical analyses [of interview subjects' answers], there was no relationship between exposure to religious training in childhood and any aspect of their religious beliefs as emerging adults … . This is a different pattern than is found in adolescence [which reflects greater continuity] … . Evidently something changes between adolescence and emerging adulthood that dissolves the link between the religious beliefs of parents and the beliefs of their children.

Although the transmission of religious faith is not a central concern of Arnett’s, he still finds this observation startling. He writes, “How could it be that childhood religious training makes no difference in the kinds of religious beliefs and practices people have by the time they reach emerging adulthood? It doesn’t seem to make sense … . It all comes to naught in emerging adulthood? Yet that seems to be the truth of it, surprising as that may be.” Need I say that these findings raise serious questions? To be sure, Arnett is not working with nationally representative data, and so his findings must be viewed with some skepticism. Even so, the very possibility should make Christians sit up and notice.”

YIKES!

Smith adds,

“Jean Twenge’s Generation Me helps us along in that regard. The story of her book, which among those discussed here is the most pitched for a popular audience, is ironic. Young adult Americans are free, confident, tolerant, open-minded, and self-asserting—but they are also cynical, depressed, lonely, and anxious. How did they get into such a state? According to Twenge, multiple mainstream institutions in our culture have taught them their entire lives “to put their own needs first and to focus on feeling good about themselves,” encouraging them to believe that they can be whatever they want to be, that self-esteem is everything, conformity to rules is ridiculous, easy sexual fulfillment is waiting to be had, and life is all about consumption and gratification. These messages come, says Twenge, not only from mass-consumer advertising but from the best-intentioned school success programs. Having actually believed such confident messages, young adults then find it hard to cope when real life often turns out differently. Stagnant careers, failed romances, personal insecurities, financial difficulties, and other disappointments and problems often lead to sarcasm, depression, apprehension, loneliness, and self-defeating gambits to force life to turn out the way it was promised to have worked (e.g., quick “rebound” romances, spending sprees, ill-considered job changes). Twenge suggests that we as a culture stop promising so much, “ditch the self-esteem movement,” and develop more realistic educational programs that teach empathetic connection with others and real-life accomplishments. If she is correct, we will in the end turn out happier young people.”

Are you finding this the case in your experience — the attitude of youth and “adultoscents” AND how the church perpetuates the culture at-large? Any thoughts on how you’d tackle the problem or is this be an overblown issue?