Delegates at the denomination’s convention voted overwhelmingly to finalize the ousters of one of its largest churches, Saddleback, and a small church in Kentucky, despite impassioned appeals from their leaders.
Yikes. There is quite a pattern developing in the religious right, in the US at least. We are turning back the clock folks.
This is not surprising as SBC membership has been steadily declining and this, alongside the overall decline of Christianity in America, is leaving only the most conservative and extreme views behind. This act will only serve to ensure the decline continues as they are really just digging their own grave.
This is such a great observation that it seems obvious as soon as I read it, but it didn’t occur to me at all, especially in the sense you have framed:
The decline of Christianity isn’t a dissipation, it’s a contraction towards the hard core.
Gaming that out leads to some pretty alarming scenarios, and that’s relative to the alarming scenario we are currently living through!
This is not surprising as SBC membership has been steadily declining and this, alongside the overall decline of Christianity in America, is leaving only the most conservative and extreme views behind. This act will only serve to ensure the decline continues as they are really just digging their own grave.
This is such a great observation that it seems obvious as soon as I read it, but it didn’t occur to me at all, especially in the sense you have framed:
The decline of Christianity isn’t a dissipation, it’s a contraction towards the hard core.
Gaming that out leads to some pretty alarming scenarios, and that’s relative to the alarming scenario we are currently living through!
The hard core was always there, the more moderate ones were just cloaking it