Evangelical « Eclectic Christian

An Evangelical Revolution?

Sep 2, 2008

E. J. Dionne Jr. has an excellent article on The New Evangelical Politics. He writes:

Anyone who still doubts that the evangelical Christian world is going through a political revolution was not watching Pastor Rick Warren’s presidential forum this weekend. The era of reducing Christianity to a narrow set of ideological commitments is over.

Just a few years ago, who would have imagined that Barack Obama and John McCain would hold a discussion of this sort in a church? Who would have thought that the session would be moderated by an evangelical pastor who was emphatic in counting both the Democrat and the Republican as his “friends”? Who would have predicted that in such a setting, the issues of abortion and gay marriage would not dominate the pastor’s queries? …

In 2004, Warren took the view that Christians should vote on a short list of “nonnegotiable” issues, including abortion. But in 2006, on Fox News, of all places, Warren declared: “Jesus’s agenda is far bigger than just one or two issues. . . . We have to care about poverty, we have to care about disease, we have to care about illiteracy, we have to care about corruption in government, sex trafficking.” That is the new politics of evangelical Christianity.

Read the article then come back and let Eclectic Christian know what you think.

8 Comments | Evangelical, mega-church, Politics, poverty | Permalink
Posted by eclecticguest

Counting Canada’s Christians – Part 2 – Anecdotally

Sep 2, 2008

Recently I was asked by someone to comment on his statement that “Roman Catholics are not Christians.” I find that this is a blanket statement with which I do NOT agree. I wish to show evidence for my disagreement both statistically and anecdotally.

In the first part I looked at the question statistically, primarily using data from Statistics Canada, and from the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada.

In this second part I will focus on an anecdotal analysis.

2. Andecotal Analysis

I feel I need to offer a bit of a disclaimer, largely because of some comments that I got in part 1. I am not a Catholic, I am an Evangelical Protestant. I am not a Catholic because there are a number of Catholic doctrines that I do not believe in, and what I believe is very important to me. In my mind, some of these differences are significant, others are minor. I don’t feel it is important to list the differences here as I don’t really want to get into arguments about what should or shouldn’t be in the lists.

I would also like to reiterate from part 1, that salvation is found only through faith in Jesus Christ. What I like to look for in a person, is a definite commitment to faith in Christ, adherence to the early basic creeds of Christianity (I am sorry, but if you don’t affirm the divinity of Christ then you are not a Christian), and I look for the fruit of the Spirit. (Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, Self control) Of course, only God knows a person’s heart, and when the final judgment comes I am sure that I am going to find surprises on both sides of the ledger.

In that final judgment, one of my biggest surprises is going to be how many things I got wrong. Even in those areas where I am pretty sure I have my theology right there is likely to be a few shocks. So when I write what I write, I do it with a certain amount of humbleness knowing that just because I disagree with someone, doesn’t mean that I am right. The other person may be right, or we may both be wrong.

Much of my theology I find has been shaped by reaction against what I have seen in my own previous traditions. I have found that those who have left a particular tradition tend to be its strongest critics as they are so focused on what was bad in their old tradition that they cannot see the good. As anyone who has read my profile knows, I have appreciated much from the various traditions to which I have been exposed, but in some cases it took a long time to focus on the good that I experienced in a particular tradition, and focus less on the bad. This tendency to focus on the negative of a previous tradition was very well described by C. Michael Patton in his post Converting from Evangelicalism a few weeks ago. He wrote:

From what I have seen, converts are sometimes the most unable to see things with a balanced perspective. Because of their belief that their previous faith commitments betrayed them, they approach issues as “enlightened” warriors against those former allegiances. The problem is that they normally wear their bitterness on their sleeve and this further taints the glasses that they think they are not wearing.

He goes on to say that:

Misrepresentation, ironically, abounds in these circumstances. They feel as if being a convert gives them a pass to say anything they want. “Don’t tell me what they believe, I used to be one!”

So how does this relate to this post. I have known both Evangelicals who have become Catholics and Catholics who have become Evangelicals. I have been told by some former Roman Catholics what Roman Catholics believe. Are they accurate in their assessments? I really am not a good one to judge, as I have so little experience in this area, but my feeling is that generally their objectivity has been been clouded by their previous experiences.

Take the topic of Mary worship for example. Do Catholics worship Mary? Some former Roman Catholics say yes. Catholic doctrine says no, she is to be venerated but not worshipped. Maybe some do worship Mary, but my own experience has been that the Roman Catholics that I have come in contact with over the years have not done so.

Let me introduce you to two of them.

Read the rest of this entry »

4 Comments | catholic, church life, Eclectic Christian, Evangelical, faith | Permalink
Posted by Eclectic Christian

Counting Canada’s Christians – Part 1 – Statistically

Aug 28, 2008

1. Statistically

There are obviously many ways to enumerate the numbers of Christians. The first would be that of self identification, that is people who self-identify with denominations that self-identify as Christian. Statistics Canada conducts a census every five years. A question on religion is only asked every ten years. The last time this question was asked was in 2001. Here are the numbers from Statistics Canada.

Total population	29,639,035
Catholic	12,936,905	43.65%
Protestant	8,654,850	29.20%
Christian Orthodox	479,620	1.62%
Christian not included elsewhere	780,450	2.63%
Muslim	579,640	1.96%
Jewish	329,995	1.11%
Buddhist	300,345	1.01%
Hindu	297,200	1.00%
Sikh	278,410	0.94%
Eastern religions	37,550	0.13%
Other religions	63,975	0.22%
No religious affiliation	4,900,090	16.53%

According to the table above, the total number of people in Canada who would identify themselves as Christian is 77.1%, a little more that three quarters of the population.

However, we cannot stop there. In the words of Keith Green, “Going to church doesn’t make you into a Christian any more than going to McDonalds makes you into a hamburger.” And who is to say that those who self-identify even go to church?

It was for this reason that the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, along with the Ipsos-Reid polling firm, co-sponsored surveys in 1996, 2003 and 2007 to determine the percentage of Evangelical Christians in Canada. After consulting with a number of Evangelical leaders, they came up with the following criteria that they felt would determine if someone was an Evangelical Christian.

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6 Comments | catholic, church growth, Evangelical, faith, statistics | Permalink
Posted by Eclectic Christian

Does Evangelical = Republican Party?

Jun 20, 2008

Here are a couple of maps that I find very interesting. The top map represents the number of evangelicals per 1000 of population as of the year 2000 as found at a quite amazing site called The Association for Religion Data Archives. (I will blog more about it another day.) The darker the red, the more evangelical the state. The bottom map represents the vote for President in 2000. Each number on the second graph denotes the number of electoral college votes from the state. Red for Republicans, blue for Democrats.

Notice the high correlation between the two maps. Of the ten most Evangelical states (based on percent of population identified as Evangelical), all ten voted Republican. Of the next ten most Evangelical states, eight voted Republican.