It is a commonplace in many of the most influential public policy precincts in the nation’s capitol these days — including among congressional aides working for senators, representatives and committees — that Christianity is in steep decline in America, that the country is fast becoming more secularized with every passing day.It occurred to me in one of those moments of realization and clarity that in comic books is usually signaled with the sound effect "Cazart!", that those who have been telling me the most about the decline of Christianity and the incipient doom and gloom have been the bishops under whom I serve. It may be that they are anxious for retirement and/or are feeling the, mostly self-imposed, stresses of their jobs, but in ordinary circumstances I would expect the opposite from them.
That certainly appears to be the case, judging by many aspects of the elite culture and the intellectual, social media and political rhetoric it sanctions, but a totally opposite picture is easily seen once you get outside of Amtrak’s Acela Corridor and the LA-San Francisco-Seattle axis to examine the data that reveals the real America.
There we find a nation whose people are becoming more, not less, involved in their churches, small groups, Bible studies and caring ministries reaching out in their communities. Perhaps even more surprising is the fact that the same thing is true in their own ways of most of the rest of the people with whom we share this Earth.
But, their job is mostly these days to represent the weight of cultural guilt, so who knows? The thing is, as a small-parish nobody, I see a reality that is better reflected in the current, secular literature and studies than in the puzzle-witted pronouncements of my betters.