{"id":7916,"date":"2023-10-05T14:33:39","date_gmt":"2023-10-05T18:33:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/?p=7916"},"modified":"2023-10-09T12:05:09","modified_gmt":"2023-10-09T16:05:09","slug":"christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html","title":{"rendered":"Christian Journalist Points to \u201cThe Chosen\u201d as Proof of Hunger for Christianity"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Lightstock | Inset: Angel Studios<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As 2023 nears a close, the statistics on faith in America remain dismal. A <\/span>projection<\/span><\/a>\u00a0by the Pew Research Center estimated that those in America who identify as Christian could shrink to 35 percent by 2070 based on current trends. An\u00a0<\/span>image<\/span><\/a>\u00a0of three large crosses displayed across the New York City skyline for Good Friday in 1956 went viral on social media as Christians lamented a post-Christian America. Even statistics that show a\u00a0<\/span>rising belief<\/span><\/a>\u00a0in Gen Z in a \u201chigher power\u201d point more to a rise of \u201cmoralistic therapeutic deism\u201d than a rising belief in the God of the Bible. Gen Z tends to believe in a version of a god or higher power that makes them feel good, rather than Jesus as a member of the Godhead.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Journalist Adrienne Bankert, however, recently pushed back against claims that Christianity in America is facing a death knell. Bankert recently hosted a special for NewsNation called \u201c\u2018<\/span>The Chosen\u2019 Phenomenon<\/span><\/a>\u201d and spoke with CBN\u2019s\u00a0<\/span>Billy Hallowell<\/span><\/a>\u00a0about the show\u2019s impact on society. She stated she feels the show\u2019s success shows a real hunger for a Christian \u201cresurgence.\u201d Bankert pointed at the massive reach of the show, which had been streamed more than the popular \u201cGame of Thrones\u201d at one point. \u201cIt\u2019s massive,\u201d she said. \u201cThey\u2019ve already translated this series into 62-plus languages. When you break [it] down by episode, it\u2019s been streamed 500 million times around the globe.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

She stated the story was \u201cold as time\u201d and could speak to many people. She noted that the impact of the show on the people she has spoken with makes her doubtful of the bleak picture polls are painting. \u201cTo think that in all these polls that people say, \u2018I don\u2019t believe in God,\u2019 and that most people are angry with God, bitter with God, change their mind about God \u2014 I just don\u2019t know who they\u2019re talking to. Because a lot of people found their faith during these past few years. They found their faith in a time of crisis,\u201d she said. She claimed that what she is seeing is a \u201cresurgence,\u201d not a decline. She noted a conversation she had with Rick Warren, who shared that people are coming to \u201can end of themselves.\u201d She recommended a \u201chigher level of scrutiny\u201d over polling and the types of questions being asked. \u201cThe curiosity and the appetite for God is much stronger than perhaps any of these polls suggest,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Hallowell agreed, noting the different polling numbers that can be drawn from an issue like abortion. \u201cIt really is so complicated,\u201d he said, referring to how polling is done. He pointed to a mass baptism of 4500 people at an event hosted by Greg Laurie, the subject of \u201cThe Jesus Revolution,\u201d which was a surprise hit this past year. He also noted that there may be a difference between those who are identifying more as \u201cculturally Christian\u201d versus those who are actually pursuing Christ. Bankert stated she believed many Christians don\u2019t like to respond to polling. She encouraged the need to tell more stories. She hopes the special will help people to see the story of Jesus as being \u201ccentered on hope.\u201d \u201cThat kind of recurring theme to me is something that so many of us can relate to.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As 2023 nears a close, the statistics on faith in America remain dismal. A projection\u00a0by the Pew Research Center estimated that those in America who identify as Christian could shrink to 35 percent by 2070 based on current trends. An\u00a0image\u00a0of three large crosses displayed across the New York City skyline for Good Friday in 1956…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":664,"featured_media":7952,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nChristian Journalist Points to \u201cThe Chosen\u201d as Proof of Hunger for Christianity<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A projection\u00a0by the Pew Research Center estimated that Americans who identify as Christian could shrink to 35 percent by 2070 based on current trends.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Christian Journalist Points to \u201cThe Chosen\u201d as Proof of Hunger for Christianity\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A projection\u00a0by the Pew Research Center estimated that Americans who identify as Christian could shrink to 35 percent by 2070 based on current trends.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Christ News Today\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-10-05T18:33:39+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-10-09T16:05:09+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2023\/10\/hunger-for-christianity-03_credit-lightstock-inset-Angel-studios-scaled.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"576\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Cecilia Buchanan\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Christian Journalist Points to \u201cThe Chosen\u201d as Proof of Hunger for Christianity","description":"A projection\u00a0by the Pew Research Center estimated that Americans who identify as Christian could shrink to 35 percent by 2070 based on current trends.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Christian Journalist Points to \u201cThe Chosen\u201d as Proof of Hunger for Christianity","og_description":"A projection\u00a0by the Pew Research Center estimated that Americans who identify as Christian could shrink to 35 percent by 2070 based on current trends.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html","og_site_name":"Christ News Today","article_published_time":"2023-10-05T18:33:39+00:00","article_modified_time":"2023-10-09T16:05:09+00:00","og_image":[{"width":768,"height":576,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2023\/10\/hunger-for-christianity-03_credit-lightstock-inset-Angel-studios-scaled.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Cecilia Buchanan","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html","name":"Christian Journalist Points to \u201cThe Chosen\u201d as Proof of Hunger for Christianity","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2023\/10\/hunger-for-christianity-03_credit-lightstock-inset-Angel-studios-scaled.jpg","datePublished":"2023-10-05T18:33:39+00:00","dateModified":"2023-10-09T16:05:09+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#\/schema\/person\/77cb6eeb5c74ee0eb8c77ea1ebc43c6a"},"description":"A projection\u00a0by the Pew Research Center estimated that Americans who identify as Christian could shrink to 35 percent by 2070 based on current trends.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2023\/10\/hunger-for-christianity-03_credit-lightstock-inset-Angel-studios-scaled.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2023\/10\/hunger-for-christianity-03_credit-lightstock-inset-Angel-studios-scaled.jpg","width":768,"height":576,"caption":"Lightstock | Inset: Angel Studios"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2023\/10\/christian-journalist-points-to-the-chosen-as-proof-of-hunger-for-christianity.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Christian Journalist Points to \u201cThe Chosen\u201d as Proof of Hunger for Christianity"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/","name":"Christ News Today","description":"Christian News From Around the Globe","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#\/schema\/person\/77cb6eeb5c74ee0eb8c77ea1ebc43c6a","name":"Leigh Pizzutilla","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/author\/lpizzutilla"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/664"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7916"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7916\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7958,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7916\/revisions\/7958"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}