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    Barna:  Christianity is No Longer Americans’ Default Faith

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    Here are some of the results:

    Over 50% of people agree that Christianity is no longer the faith that Americans automatically accept as their personal faith.  64% of evangelical Christians and 60% of Hispanics embraced this position.

    By an overwhelming margin - 74% to 23% - adults agreed that their religious faith was becoming even more important to them than it used to be as a source of objective and reliable moral guidance.

    By a three to one margin (71% to 26%) adults noted that they are personally more likely to develop their own set of religious beliefs than to accept a comprehensive set of beliefs taught by a particular church.

    What are the implications?  Here’s what Barna says:

    Asked to describe what the research means for American society today, researcher George Barna offered several insights.

    1.  The Christian faith is less of a life perspective that challenges the supremacy of individualism as it is a faith being defined through individualism. Americans are increasingly comfortable picking and choosing what they deem to be helpful and accurate theological views and have become comfortable discarding the rest of the teachings in the Bible.

    2.  Growing numbers of people now serve as their own theologian-in-residence. One consequence is that Americans are embracing an unpredictable and contradictory body of beliefs. Barna pointed out, as examples, that millions of people who consider themselves to be Christian now believe that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the lessons it teaches at the same time that they believe Jesus Christ sinned. Millions also contend that they will experience eternal salvation because they confessed their sins and accepted Christ as their savior, but also believe that a person can do enough good works to earn eternal salvation.

    3.  In the past, when most people determined their theological and moral points of view, the alternatives from which they chose were exclusively of Christian options - e.g., the Methodist point of view, the Baptist perspective, Catholic teaching, and so forth. Today, Americans are more likely to pit a variety of non-Christian options against various Christian-based views. This has resulted in an abundance of unique worldviews based on personal combinations of theology drawn from a smattering of world religions such as Christianity, Buddhism, Judaism, Hinduism, and Islam as well as secularism.

    4.  Faith, of whatever variety, is increasingly viral rather than pedagogical. With people spending less time reading the Bible, and becoming less engaged in activities that deepen their biblical literacy, faith views are more often adopted on the basis of dialogue, self-reflection, and observation than teaching. Feelings and emotions now play a significant role in the development of people’s faith views - in many cases, much more significant than information-based exercises such as listening to preaching and participating in Bible study.

    You can read more at http://www.barna.org.


    For much of America’s history, the assumption was that if you were born in America, you would affiliate with the Christian faith. A new nationwide survey by The Barna Group, however, indicates that people’s views have changed. The study discovered that half of all adults now contend that Christianity is just one of many options that Americans choose from and that a huge majority of adults pick and choose what they believe rather than adopt a church or denomination’s slate of beliefs. Still, most people say their faith is becoming increasingly important as a source of personal moral guidance...

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    1. Eric Frisch on Mon, January 12, 2009

      “By an overwhelming margin - 74% to 23% - adults agreed that their religious faith was becoming even more important to them than it used to be as a source of objective and reliable moral guidance.” -


      That tells me that it’s very important for the church to pay attention to the rest of the number mentioned here.

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