The coming evangelical collapse

Maybe it would be best if American evangelicals could transform into being Orthodox instead of their Christianity having to decay. If an influx like the small one of Peter Gilquist (1,000 times over) should occur, one can wonder what the impact would be. "The kingdom of heaven must be taken by force." Dream on, I know.

dream on is probably correct, but I do see this a refocusing on the traditional gospel message, and I HOPE as a lessening of the willingness of people to allow political strategists to use a people's zeal for their God as a reason to jack up oil prices. (No offense intended, and my apologies for the strong personal opinion in that last sentence. I was trying to make a rather colorful point.)

I believe lots of what this author says is very true, and we see this happening already, not just within 10 years as he points out.

The coming evangelical collapse - CSMonitor.com

We are on the verge – within 10 years – of a major collapse of evangelical Christianity. This breakdown will follow the deterioration of the mainline Protestant world and it will fundamentally alter the religious and cultural environment in the West.

Within two generations, evangelicalism will be a house deserted of half its occupants. (Between 25 and 35 percent of Americans today are Evangelicals.) In the "Protestant" 20th century, Evangelicals flourished. But they will soon be living in a very secular and religiously antagonistic 21st century.

This collapse will herald the arrival of an anti-Christian chapter of the post-Christian West. Intolerance of Christianity will rise to levels many of us have not believed possible in our lifetimes, and public policy will become hostile toward evangelical Christianity, seeing it as the opponent of the common good.

Millions of Evangelicals will quit. Thousands of ministries will end. Christian media will be reduced, if not eliminated. Many Christian schools will go into rapid decline. I'm convinced the grace and mission of God will reach to the ends of the earth. But the end of evangelicalism as we know it is close.


further down, he says this:

Two of the beneficiaries will be the Roman Catholic and Orthodox communions. Evangelicals have been entering these churches in recent decades and that trend will continue, with more efforts aimed at the "conversion" of Evangelicals to the Catholic and Orthodox traditions.



We see this happening now. I really believe when you don't have the roots or foundation, it's hard to keep afloat or connected.

Originally Posted by Dorothea

The guy who wrote the article considers himself an evangelical. This wasn't written by an Orthodox. .

My career is in the policy/strategy side of politics. I work at the top level of a southern rural state. The evangelical hold over the conservatives in this country is starting to slip. The best evidence I can give you is the poll numbers for support of same sex marriage. Ten years ago in my state they held a referendum to modify the constitution to forbid same sex marriage and it passed 70-30. Today in my conservative state it's more like 50-50.

That may just be personal feelings and not religious zealotry, but there are other signs. Abortion and gambling have also dramatically changed. The truth is the old bible thumpers in my state are dying out. With that, the old evangelical protestantism is weakening. I know of one new Church being built in my area in the last year and it was Greek Orthodox. Catholic Churches have been on the decline ifor the past many years, but they are now on the increase with new demographics coming into play.

I may be wrong, but part of what causes a powerful movement to decline (and I'm just talking socio-political movements, not religion, necessarily) is an "all or nothing mentality. In the mind of the aggregate citizenry, people need a little cooperation. movements like the Tea Party here in the states are like bottle rockets, they go up, they flash, they fall back down.

I think that's the wisdom of the Orthodox and Catholic churches compared to eveangelical protestantism. They have seen the world develop for 2000 years, and they look to the future with the same long term vision. When I see churches going ballistic over minor secular issues in a community to the point of kicking members out who have disagreed ( for example, when a white Christian woman marries a black Christian man and gets thrown out of her church for it, as recently happened in my state,) they weaken themselves.

I think the author overstates it, too, but radical evangelical protestantism seems to be waning as far as I can see.

I could just imagine the impact of say an evangelical like Ravi Zacharias ( who bears respect even in some disagreements) becoming Orthodox, I wonder if much of the American EO status quo could handle it.

To be fair though, Evangelical churches have been on the rise for years as the mainline Protestant communions like Anglicans, Lutherans, and Methodists, etc. have been vacated in droves. Personally, I think evangelicalism is due to fair pretty well. The Catholic Church will have to continue to live with the hooooorrrrible PR of this pedophilia scandal for years to come and the whole credibility gap they've made for themselves. Orthodoxy is not very accessible. It's hard for it to grow and blossom and become a force when so much of Orthodoxy is insular, ethnically-focused, and not mission-oriented. Some Orthodox churches are gung-ho to mission, but many are content to just serve their ethnic communities.

Don't underestimate evangelicals. They have a lot of $$$$, a lot of influence in U.S. politics, and they are the beneficiaries of the collapse of mainline protestantism. The Catholic Church is the most relevent force for morality and political change in the world. The Evangelicals come in second. Orthodoxy has power in Slavic countries but here in the States, ninety-nine percent of politicians and the typical joe on the street don't even know what Orthodoxy is. If you mention any Orthodox patriarch, they won't have a clue who it is.

Most people hear "Orthodoxy" from me and think I'm looking into becoming a Jew!

Orthodoxy has a looooong way to go until it becomes a potent force in the U.S. for sure.

There seem to be many that've noted that perhaps there's a benefit to Orthodox not being as politically influential in the U.S as they are elsewhere...paticularly due to the fact that too much politics leaves you open to culture wars that can destory...and having an outsiders perspective gives more inclination in a way for others to want to hear.

There's a benefit for sure. I never thought there wasn't. But as far as recruitment, for many people social issues mixed with politics is what they're looking for.

While I don't like how the vast majority of hardcore online Catholics think the words Republican Party and Catholic are basically equivalent, I do appreciate that the Catholics have a LOUD voice against abortion and gay "rights" and other insidious, horrible issues like that. The Orthodox Church isn't loud enough or prominent enough in the public eye for my taste when it comes to this stuff.

That being said, I don't want a "either vote Republican or forget Orthodoxy, pal!" thing going on either.

Well, let me add this. My career is in the policy/strategy side of politics. I work at the top level of a southern rural state. The evangelical hold over the conservatives in this country is starting to slip. The best evidence I can give you is the poll numbers for support of same sex marriage. Ten years ago in my state they held a referendum to modify the constitution to forbid same sex marriage and it passed 70-30. Today in my conservative state it's more like 50-50.

That may just be personal feelings and not religious zealotry, but there are other signs. Abortion and gambling have also dramatically changed. The truth is the old bible thumpers in my state are dying out. With that, the old evangelical protestantism is weakening. I know of one new Church being built in my area in the last year and it was Greek Orthodox. Catholic Churches have been on the decline ifor the past many years, but they are now on the increase with new demographics coming into play.

I may be wrong, but part of what causes a powerful movement to decline (and I'm just talking socio-political movements, not religion, necessarily) is an "all or nothing mentality. In the mind of the aggregate citizenry, people need a little cooperation. movements like the Tea Party here in the states are like bottle rockets, they go up, they flash, they fall back down.

I think that's the wisdom of the Orthodox and Catholic churches compared to eveangelical protestantism. They have seen the world develop for 2000 years, and they look to the future with the same long term vision. When I see churches going ballistic over minor secular issues in a community to the point of kicking members out who have disagreed ( for example, when a white Christian woman marries a black Christian man and gets thrown out of her church for it, as recently happened in my state,) they weaken themselves.

I think the author overstates it, too, but radical evangelical protestantism seems to be waning as far as I can see.

If I may say..

The article you mentioned was, IMHO, a very good analysis of many factors impacting the Body of CHrist. I remember when it came out years ago (around 2009, I believe), as it was apart of a series from the ministry of "Internet Monk"--and for the entire one, one can go to The Original Coming Evangelical Collapse Posts | internetmonk.com.

I think what hit home for many was the entire dynamic of how there were struggles on all sides due to the issue of politicizing the Gospel...and people equating Christ with a political camp more so than the message of salvation....and what he noted about the ways others were either going to lose ground when not being able to unite on the central message of Christ (in light of agnostic/atheistic tendencies on the rise) or come together/thrive on the margins while Christianity spread elsewhere seemed intriguing. For me, when I saw his comments, part of me couldn't help but think that there has always been a bit of a battle within Evangelicism that is along the lines of culture....for whereas many feel that it was collapsing, others were of the mindset that it was actually thriving in communities that are minority based (i.e. Hispanic, Black, Asian, etc) and in urban centers because they had battles that many in other parts of the Evangelical world were NEVER concerned with ...and other have often noted how theological battles are often tied to cultural views and evangelicism has often been accussed of intentionally limiting the views of other theologians with a multicultural perspective.

The author of the "Coming Evangelical Collapse" also interviewed one of the main voices on how Evangelicism has flourished in other circles (seen here in The Next Evangelicalism by Soong-Chan Rah - Internetmonk), with Soong-Chan Rah noting how what others deemed "Evangelical" was often Euro-Centric/Caucasian /Upper views in dominance...and those views are not longer at the top as they were in previous eras. As he said:

For more on the man who was interviewed by Michael Spencer:

• Book Review: The Next Evangelicalism | onehandclapping