Light...not Smoke!

“He will give light to those who live in the dark and in death’s shadow. He will guide us into the way of peace.” Luke 1:79

A Barna Research Group poll conducted in the summer of 2013 found that atheists commit fewer crimes, divorce less, and are better educated than Christians. According to the survey, fundamentalist Christians have the highest divorce rate, followed by Jews and Baptists. Those professing no faith were tied with Catholics and Lutherans for the lowest divorce rate.

Though not a part of the Barna poll, previous studies have showed that the more religious a state’s population, the higher the crime, STD and teen pregnancy rates. Though the report does say the religious are happier than the secular, that happiness may only be the euphoria of feeling they are the select few.

What are we Christians to do with such information? One common reaction is to simply deny it. “The poll was skewed”, we often say when we dislike the results. For my readers who may not know, Barna is an evangelical research organization. If anything, they would skew their results in favor of the religious. So, we cannot ignore this disturbing information by acting as if it is untrue.

Others might say that liberals Christians in the sample influenced the results. As observed, that won’t fly either, seeing how Lutherans are among those with the lowest divorce rates. We do not have the luxury of acting as if the numbers are untrue. In fact, one of the things that actually disturbs me, as a beliver, more than the high divorce rate, is our tendency as evangelicals to simply deny what we do not want to believe.

It happens all the time with so-called Creation Science. (Side-note: I believe God personally created the universe and that humans are a special creation made in His image.) When people want to try to prove the earth is a mere 6,000 years old, something the Bible never puts forward, they will come up with the zaniest reasons that stars cannot be billions of years old. The strangest theory is that God created the earth with the “image of age” upon it. So, 6,000 years ago, God created a universe that “looks like” it is several million years old. Anytime we decide what we want to believe first, then set out to prove that belief, we can actually prove anything we like.

It is unsurprising to me that Evangelicals and fundamentalists also are among the religious groups with the lowest education. The few that are willing to listen to the results of good science and keep their faith have a rough road; not from scientists, but from fellow conservative believers. My own take on Genesis 1, that it is a poetic account, and not a literal 6-day creation, has resulted in being called a heretic by some.

I will not attempt to speculate on the reasons for the high divorce rate among Evangelicals, although I have some suspicions. What I do want to ask is, “What do we do with this knowledge?” As has already been noted, we must not ignore or deny it. The verse I have quoted makes it clear that God intends to “give light to those who live in darkness.” We will only allow disturbing trends to continue if we ignore them.

For me, this news is one more reason to quiet our harsh rhetoric about the “godless world” out there that is taking us down an immoral path and destroying families. This Christian poll reflects exactly the opposite. Those with no faith are, for whatever reason, take their marriage vows more seriously than conservative Christians. This should be a call for humility…and now!

I am writing this just a few short days after Sarah Palin declared that if she were in charge “they would know that waterboarding is how we baptize terrorists.” Perhaps the fact that many Evangelicals have made her their darling reflects a real disconnect among conservative Christians and Jesus’ teachings. Perhaps she will change her tune after being confronted, but for now she is still belittling those who disagree with her. My own denomination hailed her as a leader!

When will we be known for our own repentance from sin? What has happened to the calls for humility? Why are we so ready to send the world to hell while our own household stinks? In most churches where I have pastored the loudest “amens” are when I talk about our “sinful world”. The responses sound more like “zzzzzs” if the call is to consider our own lives first.

Jesus did not come to divide up the world between the “good” and “bad”, the “true believers” and “sinners”. A group called the Pharisees had already done a good job at that. He came to tell the entire world that we all need forgiveness. And, He had handy way of dealing with those who disagreed with Him. He didn’t waterboard them, He died for them.

So, between the results of last year’s poll and this week’s pronouncement from Palin, maybe it is a good time for Evangelicals to follow some Quaker advice and learn the practice of silence. As Luke 1:79 says, Jesus came to “guide them into the way of peace.”