Race

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Do Christian 'conservatives' have different beliefs than secular 'conservatives'?

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Do Christian 'conservatives' have different beliefs than secular 'conservatives'?

I very much enjoy when other people share my work, especially when they have an audience as large as Rod Dreher’s over at the American Conservative.

Dreher recently picked up on a piece that I wrote laying out the most recent data that we have on the religiosity of Generation Z. In short, about 45% of them do not identify with a religious tradition. But, where a lot of that growth is coming from is through young people who identify as politically conservative.

Dreher writes:

“I would like to know what separates conservative Nones from political conservatives who are religious. That is, on what political points they differ. Are the Nones pro-choice, for example? I’m guessing they are probably fine with gay rights, though I don’t know what they think about trans; maybe they’re for it. What, exactly, makes them conservative?”

Well, I can make an attempt at documenting whether politically conservative Christians look like politically conservative nones using the same data sources that were included in my post.

Let’s start very broadly, by assessing just what percentage of Christians (regardless of age) identify as conservatives compared to those who are atheists, agnostics, or nothing in particular.

Just a bit less than 50% of Christians (of all races) identify as politically conservative. That’s been basically true dating back to 2008. The share has never dropped below 45% and vacillates very little from year to year. It’s fair to say that 47-48% of Christians are conservatives. The share of nothing in particulars who are conservative is much lower. In 2008, it was just 21% but that slowly crept up to 27% by 2011, but has stuck around 25% in the last few years.

Political conservatives represent a very small portion of atheists and agnostics. In 2008, just one in 10 atheists and agnostics were conservative. By 2014, that had increased to 15% for agnostics, and maybe had jumped a single point for atheists. By 2020, 11% of agnostics were conservative and 9% of atheists.

But looked at holistically, it’s important to note that about three quarters of all conservatives identify as Christians, 17% are secular and the remainder come from smaller religious groups like Jews, Hindus, Muslims, etc.


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Plug-In: From life issues to gov't mandates, religious reactions to vaccines have been complex

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Plug-In: From life issues to gov't mandates, religious reactions to vaccines have been complex

Want to be smart?

Then avoid simple narratives in news coverage. That’s especially true on the still-timely subject of religion and debates about the COVID-19 vaccines.

For evidence, check out these recent stories:

• “As vaccine mandates become a reality, politicians, pastors and even the pope are speaking out against faith-based exemptions,” the Deseret News’ Kelsey Dallas reports.

But here’s the twist: “In many cases, those who claim a religious exemption are part of a denomination that doesn’t share their concerns, although many faith leaders do support making exemptions available.”

• “Does respect for human life mean vaccine mandates?” asks a story by the Washington Post’s Michelle Boorstein.

The answer? It’s complicated.

“In recent days, with a handful of organizations from Facebook and Google to the University of Virginia announcing vaccine mandates, religious leaders and organizations have considered their own teachings and values on the question of how to show respect for life,” Boorstein writes. “And their conclusions vary widely.”

• This news, via USA Today, jumps out at you: “Florida church vaccinates hundreds after 6 members die from COVID-19 in 10 days.”

"It's just been ripping our hearts apart,” the senior pastor says in the story by Marina Pitofsky.

It’s probably no surprise that social media pounced on the church for waiting until members died to promote vaccinations.

Except, as anyone reading the entire report learns, it didn’t: “The church vaccinated about 800 people in March at a similar event as COVID-19 vaccines became widely available in the U.S.”

While not religion related per se, Peggy Noonan’s Wall Street Journal column this week makes some excellent points.


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New podcast: Yes, religious issues are part of the great divide in media and, thus, America

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New podcast: Yes, religious issues are part of the great divide in media and, thus, America

When journalism profs talk about “old-school journalism,” we are actually discussing a rather modern phenomenon which is often called the American Model of the Press. It was born when printing presses started speeding up in the mid-to-late 19th century and, as it evolved, it stressed accuracy, fairness and balance when dealing with controversial issues.

What does that mean? At the very least, it meant showing respect for competing points of view — in part to allow newspapers (and advertisers) to reach a broad, diverse audience of readers.

This model replaced, at least in newspapers and wire services, what is often called the European Model of the Press. In this model, accuracy is still emphasized, but newsroom coverage is clearly and honestly based on specific editorial points of view — liberal, conservative, labor, business, etc. It is openly biased.

I offer this journalism history flashback because these terms played a major role in this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (click here to tune that in). The key question this week: How are readers supposed to relate to journalists and newsrooms when they claim to use the American Model, but their news coverage (especially online) is, on most issues (especially topics mixing politics and religion), clearly being crafted to fit a particular cultural or political template? Yes, we are talking about “Kellerism,” a term long used here at GetReligion (click here and then here for background).

In part, host Todd Wilken and I focused on a viral tweetstorm by the Russian-British comedian Konstantin Kisin, instead of dissecting the contents of one or more mainstream news reports.

It’s crucial to note that Brexit — as opposed to Donald Trump-era America — was the first hook for Kisin’s long, long commentary. Also, the ultimate goal here is to understand why so many people are skeptical when it comes to the COVID-19 vaccines (whether one agrees with that point of view or not).

(Reminder to readers: As a 67-year-old grandfather with asthma, I got my COVID shots as soon as possible. I also wear a mask when visiting institutions that ask me to do so. As for church, I follow the instructions of my bishop and our priests. It also helps to know that, after decades as a pro-life Democrat, I am now a third-party voter.)

Here is the opening of the Kisin thread. Whether he knew it or not, it is a litany mourning the loss of the American Model of the Press.


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Here we go again: White House reaches out to Latino 'faith leaders'? Why not quote a few?

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Here we go again: White House reaches out to Latino 'faith leaders'? Why not quote a few?

First, my apologies. Once again, I need to write about an issue that I have covered over and over here at GetReligion.

I mean, like this: “Why are Latinos veering into GOP? It's all about money, money, money (and zero faith).”

Then there was: “Concerning Hispanic evangelicals, secret Trump voters and white evangelical women in Georgia.”

And also this: “New York Times listens to Latino evangelicals: 'Politically homeless' voters pushed toward Trump.”

Now, that third post did get to point readers to a passage in a New York Times story in which it appears that the reporter did pay attention to what a circle of Latino evangelicals had to say. For a brief moment, a window opened into a world that is larger than mere partisan politics:

When Pastor [Jose] Rivera looks at his congregation of 200 families he sees a microcosm of the Latino vote in the United States: how complex it is, and how each party’s attempt to solidify crucial support can fall short. There are not clear ideological lines here between liberals and conservatives. People care about immigration, but are equally concerned about religious liberty and abortion. …

To explain his own partisan affiliation, Mr. Rivera says he is “politically homeless.”

In that post, I noted that this sounded like words I have heard before, spoken by many frustrated Democrats in pews. To go further, I added:

That sounds just like the laments I have heard from all kinds of reluctant Trump voters — Catholic, Orthodox, evangelicals, etc. — who define themselves in terms of their religious convictions, more than loyalty to a political party. They feel stuck, but shoved toward the GOP because of an overwhelming sense of fear caused by Democrats (and mass media professionals) who now put “religious liberty” inside scare quotes.

So this brings me to a new headline at The New York Times: “Latino Voters Moved Toward Republicans. Now Biden Wants Them Back.” Yes, here we go again.


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Devil is in the details, when covering battles inside the powerful McLean Bible Church

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Devil is in the details, when covering battles inside the powerful McLean Bible Church

When I hear of a hostile takeover in a church, I think back to around 2006 when conservative Episcopalians were breaking free of their denomination, reclaiming the name “Anglican” and trying to take their church properties with them.

Usually they failed with conservative and liberal sides accusing each other of malfeasance. The lawyers got paid, of course.

This time around, the headlines are about conflict inside the largest evangelical church in the Washington, D.C., area and because it’s in northern Virginia, where so many inside-the-Beltway workers live, its problems have gotten a lot of press interest. It didn’t hurt that then-President Donald Trump visited the place on June 2, 2019, which stirred up lots of people.

Here’s a Washington Post piece that tries to explain what’s going on:

The leaders of McLean Bible, one of the D.C. region’s largest and most high-profile evangelical churches, are facing attempts from its own members to spread disinformation to take control of the church, Pastor David Platt warned the congregation in a sermon earlier this month.

Last month, the church was supposed to vote in new elders who oversee the church, and a group tried to shore up enough votes to block the appointed leaders. In a sermon on July 4, Platt said the group told other church members as they were walking into the meeting that the new elders would try to persuade church leadership to sell the church’s building in Vienna, Va. to local Muslims who would build a mosque.

McLean Bible — which is seen as a conservative evangelical congregation and once had more than 16,000 attendees — has long been an important church in Washington with four locations near the city. But threatening McLean now is a group that has spread all kinds of rumors, Platt said.

OK, so a local megachurch is having a catfight. How does one make such a story interesting to the rest of the world?

Simple: Make it about a greater issue, such as the generational conflict or politics, which is what NPR did in calling the place “a hub for Republican senators and Bush aides.”


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Old Southern Baptist stereotypes? Journalists need to update some information

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Old Southern Baptist stereotypes? Journalists need to update some information

Anyone looking for Baptists should head to Greenville, S.C.

"People here say you can throw a rock in one direction and hit a Southern Baptist church and if you throw a rock in the other direction you'll hit an independent Baptist church," said Nathan A. Finn, provost of North Greenville University.

Finn's school -- with strong Southern Baptist ties -- isn't the only brand of "Baptist" life in town. There's the progressive Furman University, as well as the independent Bob Jones University, known for its rock-ribbed Baptist defense of fundamentalism.

The Baptist world is extremely complex and hard for many outsiders to navigate. Some of this confusion, said Finn, affects life inside the most prominent Baptist flock -- the Southern Baptist Convention -- and perceptions of SBC conflicts.

"Lots of people need to understand that Southern Baptists are far more diverse, ethnically and culturally, than they think we are," he said, in a telephone interview. "At the same time, we're more uniformly conservative that we often appear, especially since we spend so much time fighting with each other over some of the small points of theology on which we differ."

With some of these stereotypes in mind, Finn recently fired off a dozen Twitter messages describing different images of real "Southern Baptist" churches that are common today. The goal, he said, was to create "composites of what different kinds of SBC congregations look like" and he gave them "names that are common with certain types of real churches."

There is, of course, a "First Baptist Church" which Finn described as "a downtown church that runs 500 in worship. The church is affluent, which is reflected in their beautiful building. The worship service is traditional. There are lots of programs & committees" and the congregation is known for big donations to the SBC's shared "Cooperative Program" budget.

Then there is one of the megachurches that have dominated the American religious marketplace in recent decades. While the word "Baptist" is missing in its name, Finn noted: "CrossWay Church is a suburban church that runs 1400 in two services. The 'feel' of each service is laid back & contemporary. CrossWay has excellent recreational facilities" and its leaders are "considering launching a second campus."

These big churches frequently make headlines.


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Future scenarios emerge as the media debate the health of U.S. Mainline Protestantism 

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Future scenarios emerge as the media debate the health of U.S. Mainline Protestantism 

What has long been called “Mainline” Protestantism suffered inexorable shrinkage this past generation, eroding so much of its once-potent U.S. cultural impact that the news media tend to neglect these moderate-to-liberal churches. Yet a new Public Religion Research Institute poll reported what it argues is a sudden comeback and indicates Mainliners even outnumber the rival conservative "evangelicals" widely thought to dominate Protestantism.

True? The Religion Guy assembled devastating statistics that raise questions about that claim.

U.S. religion's hot number-cruncher Ryan Burge is even more doubtful and notes the Harvard-based Cooperative Election Study found a recent rise in Americans who self-identify as "evangelical."

As reporters ponder that debate, they should also play out longer-term Mainline scenarios, for instance for the Episcopal Church and United Methodist Church.

The hed on another Burge article proclaimed that "The Death of the Episcopal Church is Near."

"I don't think it's an exaggeration at all to believe that Episcopalians will no longer exist by 2040," he contended.

His gloomy forecast relied partly on a stark, candid piece from the blog of the Living Church magazine. It reasoned that annual marriages and baptisms foretell how the denomination will fare. If trends continue, the former would fall from 39,000 in 1980 to 750 as of 2050, and the latter from 56,000 to 2,500, over decades when average worship attendance would plummet from 857,000 to 150,000.

Similarly, in 2019 the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's research agency projected that this now-sizable denomination would dip below 67,000 members by 2050 and average Sunday attendance would hit 16,000 by 2041. Two years before that, Wheaton College's Ed Stetzer notably warned that Mainline Protestantism has "23 Easters left."


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Newsy question that won't go away: Should Southern Baptist Convention change its name?

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Newsy question that won't go away: Should Southern Baptist Convention change its name?

THE QUESTION:

After 176 years, does the Southern Baptist Convention need a new name?

THE RELIGION GUY'S ANSWER:

This question has simmered over the years within the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), which is by far America's largest Protestant body. How long? Check out the video at the top of this post (and note the name of the local pastor who was interviewed).

Discussions heated up a decade ago and are now more pertinent than ever, in part due to the growth of African-American churches in the SBC. Some Baptists hope this step toward a fresh new image might help overcome public relations disasters over SBC mishandling of sexual abuse cases, misogyny, racial insensitivity and partisan politicizing of the Gospel -- at a time when slow membership decline follows decades of impressive growth.

One reason to keep the old name is that the SBC has had what historian Bill Leonard calls "a powerful denominational self-consciousness" more than other Protestants. Its clear identity has long been associated with biblical conservatism in belief and energetic evangelistic effort at home and abroad. And yet the SBC faces the general move of U.S. Protestants away from loyalty and identity with a particular denomination. Some SBC congregations no longer emphasize their affiliation or even shun "Baptist" in their name.

Then again, is the Southern Baptist Convention even “southern” any longer? If not, the name is misleading even as it announces a narrowly sectional identity.

The answer to this is “yes” and “no.”

On the one hand, for a generation domestic missionaries and southern expatriates have extended the SBC's presence across the North and West to create a truly nationwide denomination. On the other, about four-fifths of members still live in the traditional turf extending southward from the arc of Virginia, Kentucky, Missouri and Oklahoma.


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New podcast: Spot any 'ghosts' in New York Times story about aid for (large) U.S. families?

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New podcast: Spot any 'ghosts' in New York Times story about aid for (large) U.S. families?

At first glance, it looks like another New York Times story about all those public policy debates between the entrenched Republicans and White House, along with the narrow Democratic majorities on Capitol Hill.

But if you look carefully, there is a reason that this Gray Lady update about the arrival of the expanded Child Tax Credit was, to use a turn of phrase from “Crossroads” host Todd Wilken, a “haunted house” of religion-news ghosts. He was riffing on a term your GetReligionistas have used since Day 1 at this blog. (Click here to tune in this week’s GetReligion podcast.)

OK, let’s play “spot the religion ghost.” First, here is the double-decker headline on this report:

Monthly Payments to Families With Children to Begin

The Biden administration will send up to $300 per child a month to most American families thanks to a temporary increase in the child tax credit that advocates hope to extend.

Nine out of 10 children in the United States will be eligible for these payments, which are linked to the COVID-19 crisis, but call back memories of policies from the old War on Poverty. The program will expire in a year, at which point the debates over its effectiveness will crank into a higher gear. Here’s the Times overture:

WASHINGTON — If all goes as planned, the Treasury Department will begin making a series of monthly payments in coming days to families with children, setting a milestone in social policy and intensifying a debate over whether to make the subsidies a permanent part of the American safety net.

With all but the most affluent families eligible to receive up to $300 a month per child, the United States will join many other rich countries that provide a guaranteed income for children, a goal that has long animated progressives. Experts estimate the payments will cut child poverty by nearly half, an achievement with no precedent. …

While the government has increased many aid programs during the coronavirus pandemic, supporters say the payments from an expanded Child Tax Credit, at a one-year cost of about $105 billion, are unique in their potential to stabilize both poor and middle-class families.

As you would expect, many Republicans oppose what they consider a return to old-style “welfare” payments of this kind.

That’s many Republicans, but not all.


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