<\/p>\n
Over the weekend, I spoke to a large group of mainline churchgoers who posed their conference theme as a question: “Who Are You Christians Anyway?” <\/span><\/p>\n The question is a good one–and it is a question that people Younger Americans feel greater ambivalence toward the word Put simply, the word “Christian” has very high negatives right When many of us were children, the question of Christian identity At the conference, I answered the question by saying that Christians Who are you Christians anyway???<\/span><\/p>\n Over the weekend, I spoke to a large group of mainline churchgoers who posed their conference theme as a question: “Who Are You Christians Anyway?” The question is a good one–and it is a question that people ask me all the time, especially when I travel. Although the United States remains the country with the largest…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,1,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christian-living","category-christianity","category-religion-in-america"],"yoast_head":"\n
\nask me all the time, especially when I travel. <\/span>Although the
\nUnited States remains the country with the largest number of Christians in the
\nworld, even here Christianity is experiencing a decline in demographics. <\/span>The absolute number of Christians rose
\nfrom 1990 to 2008 as the overall population increased, but the actual
\npercentage of Christians dropped from 86.2% to 76%. <\/span>Many people feel increasingly anxious about identifying
\nthemselves as Christians, some obviously rejecting Christianity toward other
\nspiritual alternatives, while others reach toward different terms to identify
\nthemselves such as “Jesus-follower.” <\/span><\/p>\n
\n“Christian” than do older adults.
\n<\/span>In 2005, the Barna group polled 16-29 year olds asking the question,
\n“What do you think of when you hear the word ‘Christian’?” <\/span>91% of young adults outside the church
\nreplied, “anti-homosexual;” 87% responded “judgmental;” 85% said
\n“hypocritical;” 72% reported that Christians were out of touch with reality;
\nand 68% pegged Christians as “boring.” <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n
\nnow–especially with the generations that represent America’s religious
\nfuture. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n
\nwas moot. <\/span>Pretty much everybody
\nwas a Christian (except for a few Jewish friends) and we shared the assumption
\nthat “Christian” equaled “American.”
\n<\/span>If someone had pressed us further, we might have said that a Christian
\nbelieved in Jesus as God’s son, or was a baptized person, or who was saved by
\ngrace. <\/span>Typically, our responses
\ninvolved the family tradition we had inherited or what we believed about
\nGod. <\/span>Now, however, answers about
\nfamily identity and, increasingly, even about one’s beliefs about God are
\neroding in meaning and power. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n
\nare not people who inherit something or believe in something. <\/span>Rather, Christians are people who do<\/i> something: <\/span>They walk the Jesus way by practicing the love God and love
\nof neighbor. <\/span>Christians
\nparticipate in a way of life that reflects God’s dream of justice, beauty, and
\nlove for all creation. <\/span>We aren’t
\ntrying to convince anyone to believe in what we believe; we are trying to live authentically
\nas Jesus would have us live in today’s world. Christians don’t believe in Jesus; Christians experience the reality of Jesus in their lives. <\/span>This is a rather different definition than that which many
\nof us knew from generations past–but it also may be the understanding of faith
\nthat commends itself to a skeptical culture. <\/span>That is, of course, if we manage to practice what we
\npreach. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"