The old Protestant religions continue to lose their hold in the West. The Catholic Church is not as far along in some ways, but also seems to be on the way out. The world order, with its mercantile, secular-humanistic values, rises to take its place.
As mainline Christian denominations decline in numbers, vitality, and influence, they also tend to become more liberal, more open to accepting any excluded group or latching on to any social justice cause that grants them relevance. Their theology either gets simpler, as in the case of evangelical preacher mills, or so abstract that it doesn't seem to be talking about the christian God anymore(i.e Paul Tillich).
Modern Christianity's remaining function focuses on meeting the emotional needs that the emerging secular capitalistic value system is not yet equipped to handle. However, they don't really come up with new competing values and methods, or reinforce the old ones necessary to continue the religious expression of Christianity. Rather, their values have been gradually redefined to the point that they are parroting the newly emerging neoliberal values(homosexual acceptance, capitalist-christian ethical syntheses, positive psychology, a hazy conception of God as oneness) using the techniques and strategies of the new order. (Reliance on presentation technology over substance, focusing on fun, sociality, and social justice causes over theology or ritual, and conducting raucous simplistic religious ceremonies in stadiums... )
Modern Christianity is also used as a cynical tool for ensuring the obedience and fervor of the masses of troops in the U.S military. It ties in their loyalty to Jesus with their loyalty to 'America', which by extension means fighting wars for the sake of propagating the values of the mercantile elite with a hazy religious conviction. I had a friend who openly stated that he was an atheist during his tour. According to him, a number of soldiers, including officers, would get in his face and rudely ask him things like 'have you found Christ yet?'. They also denied him training opportunities because of his atheism. After he got into arguments with some squad mates that confronted him about his lack of faith, he was afraid to go on hairy combat missions because he was genuinely afraid that he would be an 'accidental' victim of friendly fire.
While this is just relying on hearsay, and I don't have personal experience of the U.S military, I thought his story was worth including to flesh out my point because what I consider reliable sources indicate that his story is plausible.
On a broader political level, presidential candidates like Rick Perry, Mitt Romney, George Bush, and opinion makers like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck among others, tend to speak at political rallies of the Christian Right. The content of their speeches often works as a pragmatic bridging or a glossing over w/r to the differences between the Christianity of the mega churches and the secular-humanistic values neoliberalism works comfortably in. The new system is converting the remaining energies of older Christianity to pave the way for its own ascendence.
There is still some moral right wing resistance, usually coming from the Christian Right, to the leftward shift that is going on across most sociopolitical spectrums of the U.S. Yet, it is clear that over time that if things continue as they are the values of modern Christianity and the secular-humanist/neoliberal regime will become increasingly indistinguishable.
The writing is on the wall for older forms of Christianity.
It seems that the so-called conservatives in America are always only one step behind the liberals when it come the destruction of culture. It makes sense that they would be only one step behind the turn from religion to secular liberalism. Those far on the Christian Right may have some degree of comprehension of liberalism's destructiveness, but they are nihilist in that they're Christian, and they do actively promote reading the bible and highly regarding Jesus. Even if they largely ignore the teachings of Jesus as they're written in the new testament, they still read them and parrot them. As much as they may think that they have their religion as a solid basis against the infiltration of liberal ideas, they really don't have much of a defense when Jesus himself was basically teaching liberalism.
Hrafn
Gender : Posts : 24 Join date : 2014-12-02 Age : 33 Location : United States
[quote="Stuart"]It seems that the so-called conservatives in America are always only one step behind the liberals when it come the destruction of culture. It makes sense that they would be only one step behind the turn from religion to secular liberalism. Those far on the Christian Right may have some degree of comprehension of liberalism's destructiveness, but they are nihilist in that they're Christian, and they do actively promote reading the bible and highly regarding Jesus. Even if they largely ignore the teachings of Jesus as they're written in the new testament, they still read them and parrot them. As much as they may think that they have their religion as a solid basis against the infiltration of liberal ideas, they really don't have much of a defense when Jesus himself was basically teaching liberalism./quote]
I agree with your final sentence. The values of the previous Christian churches have always stood for, particularly those that emerged in reaction to cultural changes after 1968, paved the way for Christianity's demise now.
The thing with the Christian Right is, it has been so co-opted by the neoliberal/neoconservative economic value systems that the allegedly 'spiritually Christian' values are either slightly-reworded packagings of neoliberal values, or they are solipsistic, self-medicating slogans used to make one feel better able to serve the neoliberal system.
Stuart wrote:
It seems that the so-called conservatives in America are always only one step behind the liberals when it come the destruction of culture.
In the context of the U.S leastways, seeing liberals as the Step 1 in the general cultural decline, and then conservatives reacting and adapting and adjusting leftward as Step 2 would certainly be an accurate way of thinking about the liberal and conservative relation to the general cultural decline of the West.
A way of describing it that would expand on the picture is establishing a framework for why, in the first place, conservatives are merely reacting to changes liberals incite.The direction of the Left-Right tension is only one set of relationships in society, deeper forces (neoliberalism) are directing it's course. The Right is cast as the 'reactionary' branch because it is operating from a dispriviledged position in relation to the current of Modernity. Liberal values are preferred for many reasons.
They effect each other in the sense you describe now because both are configured as handmaidens of neoconservatism/neoliberalism/Modernity to the masses. Liberalism and Conservatism as they are defined in this context are basically ideologies,which explain how material resources will get distributed on a mass level.Many aspects of ideology have taken a back seat to economic models and theories when it comes to how the majority of people nowadays approach something like a deliberate 'serious political opinion' on an issue. Most think that if you take care of things at an material economic level, then ideology will basically lose its teeth, but not the other way around.
Most 'conservative' ideologies are of the Fox News variety, which are basically the party of the buisness class exploiting the masses as much as they can, and ultimately have little to do with the CR, except when it can use it for its own ends. (You can see this now, as the two are starting to fragment).
[quote="Stuart"] Those far on the Christian Right may have some degree of comprehension of liberalism's destructiveness, but they are nihilist in that they're Christian,/quote]
I agree that Christianity is fundamentally a left wing, marxist type religion, and so it wont be able to escape the self destruction inherent in all systems based on emotive ninnydom thinking.
Perhaps you are giving the Christian Right too much credit, though, with regard to the the peoples' understanding of liberalism. Other than talking about how Obama Alone is responsible for destroying the economy, and repeating the need for a Gigantic Fence to keep the immigrants out, they mostly see liberalism through the image of folk devils, or as isolated social problems, not an integrated part of a larger system. In the U.S mainstream media lately, let alone what is getting fed to the youth nowadays in universities, those sorts of 'reactionary' CR positions are increasingly getting subjected to simplistic, emotionally driven ridicule critique, even in Christian schools. This means that CR positions are getting re-positioned as morally-other views in relation to the real System that tells the masses what the right range of opinions are.
[quote="Stuart"]It makes sense that they would be only one step behind the turn from religion to secular liberalism.
Even within the Christian Right, those 'interior' virtues of Christian religion that gave people some character are getting re-coded into psychological terms centered around achieving happiness and success. They make the change in such a way that ones inner identity and convictions are removed and replaced with externally oriented qualities that signal peoples particular commitment to a process of consumption/ lifestyle etc. Thats the shift from religion to secular humanism/capitalism under the dominant meme.
I should've said that the moral Christian Right resistance doesn't primarily stem from the existence of or belief in the current Christian denominations themselves. I think that is secondary. Rather, it is the rallying acceptable political engine of opposition through which basic forms of nationalism and white racial consciousness express themselves.
The Christian Right comprises mostly older whites raised in an older overall American culture, and is based in dynamics that go along with life in rural America, particularly the Midwest and South. I think that this resistance to the more cosmopolitan, atomized, anti-spiritual, liberalism has more to do with the wider spaces between people, and the slightly more small town community ethos that lends itself to those environments, rather than as a result of the christian church teachings themselves. And I think that through the growing influence of the internet and larger culture industry propagating modern values, and as modern conveniences and education make more and more incursions into these spaces... Tragically, the youth will not continue with those residual values on a large scale.
To be more clear about the nihilistic moral resistance of the Christian Right, I also meant that the less modern segments of it still carry the cultural inertia necessary to support things like the traditional family, marriage, patriotism, anti-abortion beliefs, etc. I don't think that reading the Bible, and even memorizing it and teaching it as Scripture to kids, changes the relationship to decline in much more than a superficial sense. It also will not save Christianity, in the end. Degenerate behavior and cultural decline still manage to find all sorts of ways to work there way into the underbelly of the Bible Belt, even if the stated values there are more traditional. The stated beliefs and even the observance of the formal traditions of a culture by its people is not the final word as to its essence. For example, while many people on the Christian Right may believe in God in their hearts, maintain a family and have 'controversial' political beliefs like being anti-abortion or anti gay marriage (positions subtly permitted them by the overarching neoliberal context) they often only go through the motions of having a family, and the sorts of values that they practice and support in their everyday life are rather bourgeoise. They think about making money and living for short-sighted, hedonistic ends as what God wants for them (they tell themselves), they dream of fame and admiration the abstraction of professional reputation, they raise their kids to do well in school and institutions rather than being educated or wise, they pursue to exhaustion that hazy 'happiness' idea the culture industry propagates. While calling themselves Christian, and stating beliefs and voting along lines that most think modern Christians should, what in their actions separates them from someone adhering to the overarching values of neoliberalism/modernity?
A clearer way of putting it would be that the cultural rot is working on the Christian Right in a different way, not only in reactionary or concomitant way, and the antagonism/prodding from the Left is almost a byproduct. The superficial media screeds about abortion, gay rights, the open pedophilia accusations of the Catholic Church, and how often Christianity is criticized in the media today, are an indication of how much older cultural Christianity has lost out to the new values.
Thanks of your response Stuart. I've never interacted with anyone in this capacity w/r to these topics, its invigorating. Things are very different when you're only reading things and thinking to yourself, and listening to easily-angered, afraid, or indifferent retards IRL. There is a demand for clarity in this forum, and room for intellectual growth because you can refine your ideas through others.
Lyssa Har Har Harr
Gender : Posts : 8965 Join date : 2012-03-01 Location : The Cockpit
"Don't judge a book by its cover." Says the Christian.
So far religion hasn't been much of a large topic in my experience, I once dared to question selflessness however and was ostracized by the soldiers present in the room.
It's so tempting to expose my fur.
Those same soldiers also began to point out how my smile was creepy to them even when I laughed and smiled in earnest.
Maybe I have a bad sense of humor.
_________________ Once more, with knowing.
The meek shall inherit the Earth, but the Noble shall take it.
Hrafn
Gender : Posts : 24 Join date : 2014-12-02 Age : 33 Location : United States
Something that immediately jumped out was the following quote from the post.
Gates Of Vienna wrote:
Ask how many federal crimes are in the United States Code and you’ll get as many answers as answerers — but the number is close to 5,000. All of which means that anyone may be found in violation of some law or regulation, at any time. How convenient, for the “management” of dissent and as punishment for deviation from NeoMarxist orthodoxy.
I thought of this as a mutation of the older Christian idea of original sin. The idea that one cannot act on anything without always already violating the 'right' laws or regulations, given from on high by the State, whose interest is allegedly for the Good. Instead of a sin against God, to be dealt with on personal terms or smaller scale terms…it changes to breaking the Contract with some overlapping and stacking Syndicate/Institutional systems of regulation. The difference is that the latter is abstracted to a larger scaled, thinner, materialist level.
The ever increasing system of constant surveillance, on all fronts could be seen as God always watching over everyone.
Large scale regulation leads to the need for standardization, to make everyone free from sin so to speak.
As much as they may think that they have their religion as a solid basis against the infiltration of liberal ideas, they really don't have much of a defense when Jesus himself was basically teaching liberalism.
I agree with your final sentence. The values of the previous Christian churches have always stood for, particularly those that emerged in reaction to cultural changes after 1968, paved the way for Christianity's demise now.
The thing with the Christian Right is, it has been so co-opted by the neoliberal/neoconservative economic value systems that the allegedly 'spiritually Christian' values are either slightly-reworded packagings of neoliberal values, or they are solipsistic, self-medicating slogans used to make one feel better able to serve the neoliberal system.
In that sentence I was just referring to the very text that supposedly defines Christians. There's nothing alleged or emergent about the values within; even the new testament translation that most CRs use hasn't even changed in 400 years.
Quote :
They effect each other in the sense you describe now because both are configured as handmaidens of neoconservatism/neoliberalism/Modernity to the masses. Liberalism and Conservatism as they are defined in this context are basically ideologies,which explain how material resources will get distributed on a mass level.Many aspects of ideology have taken a back seat to economic models and theories when it comes to how the majority of people nowadays approach something like a deliberate 'serious political opinion' on an issue. Most think that if you take care of things at an material economic level, then ideology will basically lose its teeth, but not the other way around.
Most 'conservative' ideologies are of the Fox News variety, which are basically the party of the buisness class exploiting the masses as much as they can, and ultimately have little to do with the CR, except when it can use it for its own ends. (You can see this now, as the two are starting to fragment).
Right, but there must be a source to the fact that CRs have become so cowardly that, whether they would admit it or not, they put money above all else. Was there ever a time in America's history where there was a people proud enough to put values over money?
Quote :
Stuart wrote:
Those far on the Christian Right may have some degree of comprehension of liberalism's destructiveness, but they are nihilist in that they're Christian,
I agree that Christianity is fundamentally a left wing, marxist type religion, and so it wont be able to escape the self destruction inherent in all systems based on emotive ninnydom thinking.
Let's take one of the most extreme historical American CR people, the pilgrims or puritans. It seems to me that even for them, with their very strict code of conduct, generally ignoring or even antithetical to the teachings of Jesus, so long as they actually had copies of the new testament around, the destruction of their values was inevitable once the majority became literate. - This would seemingly be so with or without outside cultural forces.
Quote :
Perhaps you are giving the Christian Right too much credit, though, with regard to the the peoples' understanding of liberalism. Other than talking about how Obama Alone is responsible for destroying the economy, and repeating the need for a Gigantic Fence to keep the immigrants out, they mostly see liberalism through the image of folk devils, or as isolated social problems, not an integrated part of a larger system. In the U.S mainstream media lately, let alone what is getting fed to the youth nowadays in universities, those sorts of 'reactionary' CR positions are increasingly getting subjected to simplistic, emotionally driven ridicule critique, even in Christian schools. This means that CR positions are getting re-positioned as morally-other views in relation to the real System that tells the masses what the right range of opinions are.
Maybe, I'm giving them too much credit, but I don't see how you establish that above or elsewhere in your post. You instead seem to establish how incredibly difficult it would be for them to express their true values.
Quote :
I should've said that the moral Christian Right resistance doesn't primarily stem from the existence of or belief in the current Christian denominations themselves. I think that is secondary. Rather, it is the rallying acceptable political engine of opposition through which basic forms of nationalism and white racial consciousness express themselves.
The Christian Right comprises mostly older whites raised in an older overall American culture, and is based in dynamics that go along with life in rural America, particularly the Midwest and South. I think that this resistance to the more cosmopolitan, atomized, anti-spiritual, liberalism has more to do with the wider spaces between people, and the slightly more small town community ethos that lends itself to those environments, rather than as a result of the christian church teachings themselves. And I think that through the growing influence of the internet and larger culture industry propagating modern values, and as modern conveniences and education make more and more incursions into these spaces... Tragically, the youth will not continue with those residual values on a large scale.
So the various non-Christian related, decent, family oriented values that the CRs have or at least have traditionally had, aren't so much a product of an old sub-culture which came from Europe, but just the product of any peoples in rural environments for 100s of years?
Quote :
To be more clear about the nihilistic moral resistance of the Christian Right, I also meant that the less modern segments of it still carry the cultural inertia necessary to support things like the traditional family, marriage, patriotism, anti-abortion beliefs, etc. I don't think that reading the Bible, and even memorizing it and teaching it as Scripture to kids, changes the relationship to decline in much more than a superficial sense. It also will not save Christianity, in the end. Degenerate behavior and cultural decline still manage to find all sorts of ways to work there way into the underbelly of the Bible Belt, even if the stated values there are more traditional. The stated beliefs and even the observance of the formal traditions of a culture by its people is not the final word as to its essence. For example, while many people on the Christian Right may believe in God in their hearts, maintain a family and have 'controversial' political beliefs like being anti-abortion or anti gay marriage (positions subtly permitted them by the overarching neoliberal context) they often only go through the motions of having a family, and the sorts of values that they practice and support in their everyday life are rather bourgeoise. They think about making money and living for short-sighted, hedonistic ends as what God wants for them (they tell themselves), they dream of fame and admiration the abstraction of professional reputation, they raise their kids to do well in school and institutions rather than being educated or wise, they pursue to exhaustion that hazy 'happiness' idea the culture industry propagates. While calling themselves Christian, and stating beliefs and voting along lines that most think modern Christians should, what in their actions separates them from someone adhering to the overarching values of neoliberalism/modernity?
You say that the bible won't help them avoid this decline, and I agree. I don't know if any part of the bible helps establish the more decent values of the CR, but certainly not the early part of the new testament. For example, when it comes to the issue of homosexuals, the old testament does speak against it, but when one places what I believe are the relatively few passages there with the broader theme in the early part of the new testament, the bible as a whole may actually be more of a help to some homosexual causes then a hindrances. Jesus was inherently anti-family, and inherently tolerant of all people; that alone if kept in mind by the CRs would effectively slow down any enthusiasm in opposing the movements.
We must keep in mind that while the subject here is largely how liberalism is contributing to the destruction of older denominations of U.S Christians, the fact is that liberalism itself, too, is rooted in Christianity.
