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Yesterday the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life released their findings from a study on religious knowledge in the United States. The test is a smattering of questions about the various major worldwide religions. Surprisingly, to me at least, self-described “Atheists and Agnostics” ended up scoring highest on the test while Christians were at the bottom. No group aced the test. Even the Atheists and Agnostics crowd only skated through with a solid D average.

Additionally, it seems that the Christians in the US have some educational gaps when it comes to their own religion. Only 55% of Americans knew that the Golden Rule isn’t part of the Ten Commandments; however, that number only went up to 67% when it came to White Protestants, and it was around 45% for Hispanic Catholics.

ABC News did a short video on the report in which they asked people on the streets some of the questions from the survey. It’s a lighthearted report, but some of the responses are a bit shocking to me:

Pew has a version of the Religious Knowledge test that you can take. They also let you compare yourself against the different segments of the population.

So, what do the results mean? I think it shows that the United States isn’t nearly as concerned with questions of faith and religion as it used to be. I’d also add that if there was any group that should have gotten 100% on this test it’s Christians. After all, we’re directly called to care for and love our neighbors. What better way to love our neighbor than to know the basic facts about what they believe?

What about you, how do you feel about the results of the survey? If you took the sample test on the Pew site, how did you do?

[HT: ThinkChristian.net]

Lillian Kwon writes in a recent Christian Post article about the ways that Claremont School of Theology is partnering with colleges from other faiths. Their goal is to create a multi-faith seminary.

Understandably, this has some Christian leaders taken aback. Here’s a portion of the article; you can read the whole thing to get a few dissenting opinions on Claremont’s plan:

Claremont’s president, the Rev. Jerry Campbell, announced Wednesday that the seminary will be partnering with Jewish and Islamic schools to offer clerical training to students of various faiths. Students will be trained in their own religious traditions as well as gain understanding of other faiths through shared classes with the Academy for Jewish Religion and the Islamic Center of Southern California. Eventually, the seminary plans to expand its training to include Hinduism and Buddhism, among others.

The new consortium of graduate schools, which is believed to be the first of its kind, is being launched to essentially better prepare students for the multi-religious world they are living in.

But a multi-religious environment isn’t anything new, said Mark Tooley, president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy, a conservative watchdog that monitors mainline denominations.

Christians have had to deal with such an environment for the past 2,000 years and Christianity has stuck to its truth claims amid the diversity, he noted during Mohler’s radio program.

“If they are to be faithful to the Gospel then they should be accepting the multi-religious environment as a challenge rather than trying to accommodate it or succumb to it,” Tooley commented.

While I think that Claremont’s reasoning for partnering with other schools is a little theologically shaky, the end result could be interesting. Keeping one’s faith intact in a setting like this would require a deep understanding of and commitment to one’s Christian faith. I have a hunch that Christian students at this school will find themselves articulating their faith to outsiders nearly every day.

Also, a World Religions class in this environment could be excellent; instead of one professor attempting to accurately describe many different religions, spiritual leaders from those religion could come in to teach. As a consequence, Christian students might leave with a much better understanding of the intricacies of preaching the Gospel to adherents of those religions.

What do you think? Assuming the Christian arm of the seminary is orthodox, do you think there’s value in a multi-faith seminary?

The Freakonomics blog posted a fascinating email from someone who finds social situations to be much easier when they fake Christianity. Here’s an excerpt from the post We Pretend We Are Christians:

We are agnostics living deep in the heart of Texas and our family fakes Christianity for social reasons. It’s not so much for the sake of my husband or myself but for our young children. We found by experience that if we were truthful about not being regular church attenders, the play dates suddenly ended. Thus started the faking of the religious funk.

It seemed silly but it’s all very serious business down here. We don’t go to church or teach or children one belief is “right” over another. We expose them to every kind of belief and trust that they will one day settle in to their very own spirituality. However, for the sake of friends and neighbors, we pretend we are Christians. We try not to lie but rather not to disclose unnecessary information. As the children are getting older, this isn’t so easy for them and an outing is probably eminent.

We are not the only ones. We have found a few other fakers out there.

Read the entire Freakonomics post. The comments after the post are filled with other people sharing their experiences faking religion or political leanings in order to smooth over social situations.

I’ve spent much of my life around Christians and in work environments steeped in Christianity. But recently I moved to a city with a very diverse religious landscape. It’s interesting to see how differently religion is discussed here. When religion is mentioned, it’s broached very carefully and tentatively so as to not offend anyone.

In some ways I miss the more direct openness of other places, but observing these extremely cautious conversations about religion has shown me how quickly Christians can create a situation in which it’s easier for other people to hide their convictions than to boldly state their opposing viewpoint.

Have you ever found yourself faking or omitting your own perspective when a touchy theological or cultural issue comes up in conversation? How do you make sure that people who don’t share your beliefs still feel comfortable around you?

[HT: Experimental Theology.]

The Lausanne Movement is holding their once-per-decade meeting in Cape Town this year. As part of the run-up for the conference, they’ve partnered with Christianity Today to create a series of videos to go along with The Global Conversation initiative. Previous videos have explored global partnerships and the idea of following Jesus while still being a Muslim. This month they’re talking about truth and common ground.

In the following video, they ask people on the streets of Madison, WI a simple question: what in life are you completely sure of?

Common Ground from The Global Conversation on Vimeo.

How would you answer that question? What in life are you completely sure of?

[HT: Out of Ur.]

Share your thoughts!

Most Christians have a passing familiarity with the major holidays and notable dates in other religions’ calendars—Jewish holidays like Hanukkah are well-known, as is the Islamic observance of Ramadan. Similarly, most Christians have at least a basic knowledge of those religions’ basic beliefs.

But how much do you know about what Buddhists believe? Do you know how the claims of Buddhism compare and contrast with Christianity’s?

February is a fitting time to learn more about Buddhist beliefs, since it’s when many Buddhists celebrate Parinirvana Day, the day that, they believe, Buddha died and achieved complete Nirvana. A good place to start is an article on the basic beliefs of Buddhism from Campus Life, which also identifies points of similarity and difference between Buddhism and Christianity. A short article at Answers to Tough Questions explains how Buddhist beliefs differ from Christianity.

If you’re interested in further reading, J. Isamu Yamamoto has written a more in-depth article on how Christians should understand and respond to Buddhism in North America (and the article points out that there are different branches within the umbrella of Buddhism, so Christians who’ve studied up on one branch shouldn’t assume they know everything there is to know). Christianity Today has a short discussion of theological issues within Tibetan Buddhism, and an accompanying collection of articles for additional reading. And of course, you can’t beat Wikipedia for sheer volume of information about Buddhist history and beliefs.

So this month, as Buddhists around the world commemorate Buddha’s life and death, take some time to read up on Buddhist beliefs, and consider how you might share your faith with a Buddhist friend or neighbor.

I don’t think that anyone would argue that Christians should be familiar with the basic beliefs of Islam. But what about investing a serious amount of time reading the Muslim scriptures?

For anyone engaged in day-to-day interactions with Muslims, it makes sense to be familiar with what they believe. But what about those of us who spend most of our time around Christians—is there value in studying non-Christian scriptures, or is doing so a potential distraction from the faith?

Should Christians read the Qur’an?

Share your thoughts!

How important is it for Christian parents to keep their children involved in church activities and education? It’s difficult to get a handle on a question so broad, but the issue has seen some debate recently. You may recall a much-discussed study commissioned by Answers in Genesis that found that childhood Sunday school attendance did little to keep people from drifting away from the Christian faith later in life.

However, there’s a new wrinkle in the debate, in the form of a Barna survey also examining the links between church involvement as a child and faith later in life. It’s an interesting read; here are some of the conclusions:

How do childhood and teen engagement connect to adult spirituality? The research examined four elements of adult religious commitment: attending church, having an active faith (defined as reading the Bible, praying, and attending church in the last week), being unchurched, and switching from childhood faith.

When it comes to church engagement, those who attended Sunday school or other religious programs as children or as teens were much more likely than those without such experiences to attend church and to have an active faith as adults…. In comparison, less frequent participation as a teenager correlated with less frequent adult participation.

Measures of disassociation – being unchurched and changing from childhood faith – were also correlated with activity before age 18. The highest proportion of unchurched adults was found among those who had never attended as children or teenagers. Weekly activity as a child and weekly or monthly activity as a teen were connected with the lowest levels of disconnection from church attendance. 

The study also found that people who were “heavily churched” in their youth are less likely to switch to a different religion as an adult.

All very interesting, although the question is so big, and the nuances of “religious” and “active faith” so varied from person to person, that it’s hard to know how to interpret it all. But at the very least, if you were worrying that forcing little Johnny to attend Sunday school every week was going to damage his faith in the long term, you can breathe a sigh of relief. (The jury is still out about whether or not youth group games of dodgeball inflict permanent psychological and spiritual damage on the participants.)

How do these findings resonate with you? Were you heavily involved in church activities and education, and if so, do you see that experience as one that strengthened your faith over the long term? If you came to the faith without the benefit of childhood religious education, do you think your faith was stronger or weaker as a result?

This is one of the more vexing questions that Christians encounter (or ask themselves): if Jesus is the only way through which we’re made right with God, what does that mean for people who never hear about him? It’s one thing to hear the Gospel and choose to reject it; but what about somebody who never had a chance to hear, let alone reject, the message of Jesus?

Christians have taken many different approaches to this question. I’ll highlight responses from two different online ministries below. Do you agree with either (or both) of them?

Uplook Ministries answers the question by arguing that God works in people’s hearts in many more ways than just through overt preaching of the Gospel. They conclude:

God has promised us that, if we seek Him with all our hearts, we will find Him (Jeremiah 29:13). He is not eager for anyone to perish (2 Peter 3:9). “For there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile, for the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. For whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:12-13). We do not know how God is dealing with people in lands yet unreached by the gospel, but from Scripture we can see that He will never condemn anyone unjustly, but will be faithful to reveal Himself to anyone who looks for His salvation.

We also know that John saw in heaven “…a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands and crying out with a loud voice, saying, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!’” (Revelation 7:9-10). Not only every nation but every tribe will be represented in heaven.

Notice that they all sing the same song. We are not saying that sincere Muslims or Hindus, trusting in their religion, will make it to heaven. There is only one Saviour, and everyone in heaven will be there through the salvation provided by God’s Lamb, the Lord Jesus.

Read the full answer at Uplook Ministries.

The Faith Facts ministry answers the question:

…the Bible also teaches that Jesus died for the sins of the whole world (1 John 2:2)! And it implies that whoever seeks after God earnestly will find him (Deuteronomy 4:29; Psalm 86:5; Proverbs 8:17; Jeremiah 29:13; Matthew 7:7-8). God is fair as well as just. We are confident, for example, that the Old Testament patriarchs who lived by faith before Jesus’ earthly ministry, are in heaven. So certainly some people have gotten to heaven without knowing Jesus in the personal way that the New Testament speaks of. Ultimately only God can judge as only He knows the individual’s heart. We hold out hope that for those who have not heard but have not rejected God, those have been misinformed, or those who are unable to understand (children, mentally ill, etc) may be pardoned by a just God.

Certainly, the Bible does not teach “universalism.” Universalism is the idea that everyone gets to heaven.

The Bible clearly teaches that the only certain way to heaven is through Jesus (John 14:6; Acts 4:12). We are confident that God will not hold anyone accountable for any knowledge he did not receive. At the same time, the Bible emphatically states that Christ is the only sure way to salvation. Anyone who has heard of the saving grace of Jesus, and rejects it, would be thumbing his nose at God (John 3:36).

Read the full answer at Faith Facts website.

Do these answers satisfy you?

Share your thoughts!

Can compassion be considered a universally accepted ethical and religious standard?

Karen Armstrong recently developed the Charter for Compassion as a way of extrapolating the Golden Rule—a rule that the Charter argues is reflected in every major world religion—into a statement of compassionate thinking and action.

At the moment, about 17000 people have called themselves affirmers of the Charter, and the list includes such celebrity signatories as the Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Paul Simon and Meg Ryan.

Here’s the first paragraph from the Charter for Compassion. Although, it’s worth reading the entire thing:

“The principle of compassion lies at the heart of all religious, ethical and spiritual traditions, calling us always to treat all others as we wish to be treated ourselves. Compassion impels us to work tirelessly to alleviate the suffering of our fellow creatures, to dethrone ourselves from the centre of our world and put another there, and to honour the inviolable sanctity of every single human being, treating everybody, without exception, with absolute justice, equity and respect.”

The Charter has garnered quite a bit of global religious support. Do you think it’s compatible with Christianity? Is this truly a document that we can all agree on? Should Christians sign it?

Today is Friday the 13th. Does that make you nervous? Did you glance anxiously over your shoulder on your way in to work this morning? Carefully avoid stepping on sidewalk cracks or walking under ladders?

Probably not. I’ve never met anyone who took Friday the 13th, or any of those thousands of other little superstitions, seriously (although it’s interesting how long they’ve stuck around, given that few people give them any credence). Americans, and Christians in particular, aren’t a superstitious lot… or are they?

This morning, I took stock of my life to see if anything I did could be called “superstitious.” And I was surprised to realize that in fact, I often act on what you might call “Christian superstitions.”

By “Christian superstitions,” I mean spiritual activities performed not because they contribute to my life as a Christian, but out of fear, routine, or a sense of obligation. When I do “Christian activities” mindlessly, out of guilt, or “just because I’m supposed to,” those activities become little more than dumb superstitions. Here are a few examples from my life:

How often have I mumbled the same old prayer before meals without giving any thought to what I was saying? Surely, a prayer in which I am not even paying attention to the words has no value at all.

How often have I gone to church on Sunday morning out of a sense of “Christian obligation” rather than a desire to worship? If I’ve just spent an hour sitting in the church pew daydreaming about the latest Batman movie or worrying about work, I’ve just wasted an hour of my life on a pointless activity.

How often have I dropped money in the offering plate at church because I’m expected to, and not because I want to gratefully give back to God? I may be helping the Kingdom of God financially, but the activity is robbed of any of the spiritual import it’s meant to have. If I give of my time or money for no other reason than “that’s what Christians are supposed to do” or out of a vague sense of guilt, that’s just empty superstition.

As you can see, I can be quite good at taking praiseworthy spiritual activities and turning them into meaningless religious routine. I don’t think that’s much more useful than avoiding black cats on Friday the 13th.

What about you? Every Christian must struggle at some point with the challenge of keeping our daily and weekly spiritual activities from becoming empty routine. How do you stay on guard against this tendency toward superstition?

[Photo by flickr user rachdian; used under a Creative Commons license.]

What do you think?