Post: #1

When did practicing Christians become such a minority group in Western Europe? I know there were obviously a combination of factors that lead to Christianity's undoing in Europe, but when did these countries become so secularized? France, Holland, Denmark and Sweden are hardcore agnostic/atheist. Even traditionally religious/conservative countries like Spain and Ireland are trending towards "Christian-in-name-only". Especially those of you who are European, or lived extendedly in Europe, I'd be curious to hear personal observations of when this drastic decline in religiosity happened? What Happened???

Post: #2

Is there a link to this?

It is normally accepted that WW1 and WW2 destroyed the older order columns of Europe - Christianity being one of them.

Post: #3

The Reformation was the beginning of Christianity's undoing, as it paved the way for each man to judge what is true. Then came the Enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution, which put paid to Christianity in intellectual terms, and the wars of the 20th century destroyed the old social order. Nothing but nostalgia remains.

However, secular left-liberalism has inherited Christianity's zeal and moralizing, so be of good cheer if that is your thing!

Post: #4

(04-12-2015 02:08 AM)RawGod Wrote:  However, secular left-liberalism has inherited Christianity's zeal and moralizing, so be of good cheer if that is your thing!

I think to make any intelligent assessment of Christianity, one has to separate the cosmological elements which are grossly outdated, or must be interpreted as allegory ( Earth created in seven days, Christ arising from the dead), and the sociological elements: which include that each person has some value-- as an impetus for humanity to progress in the social steps beyond slavery and brutality-- as it was a religion that arose among slaves when I believe 80% of the population of Rome were slaves.

This is ironically why Nietzsche seemed to disparage Christianity as a religion of slaves.

The most important fundamental secular message of Christianity, which is compassion to all others, is still alive and well and has in sum been furthered despite horrible retrogressions in the Churches over the centuries.

I'm an atheist, and the Catholic church became not only zealous hypocritical and moralistic, but murderous as they tried to hold onto their linguistic monopoly with the Latin bible a few hundreds years ago, but now the top guy is talking what Christ basically said-- be compassionate to everyone. (Galatians " There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.)

Any decent examination of the positive aspects of Christianity makes it clear this was a revolution in accepting the value of the individual, what some might call a "liberal" idea, but which also could be called a libertarian one.

It was a religion that arose in the face of slavery, which I think is a little hard to argue for with a straight face.

The positive social aspects of Christianity are still deeply embedded into many institutions and the psyche of modern First World nations, and also poor countries like the Philippines.

All you have to do is look at the basic teachings of the bible++, and the respect given to each human in many places now is largely due to the type of consciousness Christianity eventually brought forth ( or one could argue the progression in consciousness that allowed Christian thought to flourish.)

The cosmology sucks, so--they didn't have modern physics and astronomy.

But we wouldn't have prisons-- we would just slaughter those we are angry at

We wouldn't have hospitals in America where they will care for you in an emergency even if you don't have money-- we'd step over the rotting corpses as people did in ancient cities.

We wouldn't have Social Security for the old, we'd let them rot in their feces as they declined. ( *SS reduced poverty among the elderly Congressional Budget Office)

Christianity is dead where and when there is cynicism and brutality, but its important ideas flourish whereever there is kindness.It's hard to argue that human compassion is dead, except in the most scarred individuals. To paraphrase Shakespeare, maybe "The fault lies not in our societies, but in ourselves."

Or as Jesus said -- something like-- "Look for the plank in your own eye before you look for the dust speck in someone else's"

++

1 Corinthians 13:1-13 (New International Version)
Love


=============================================
++
1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.
2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.
3 If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames,but have not love, I gain nothing.
4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
5 It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

* Congressional Research Service that analyzed ways to improve the future financing of Social Security. The report starts: "Social Security has significantly reduced elderly poverty. The elderly poverty rate has fallen from 35% in 1959 to an all-time low of 9% in 2006, in large part because of Social Security. If Social Security benefits did not exist, an estimated 44% of the elderly would be poor today assuming no changes in behavior."

Post: #5

I would say the late 1960's as far as France is concerned. My parents/uncles/aunts used to go to church every sunday when they were kids.

Post: #6

(04-12-2015 02:41 AM)Tresor Wrote:  I would say the late 1960's as far as France is concerned. My parents/uncles/aunts used to go to church every sunday when they were kids.

La France la fille aînée d'Eglise is the key to this.

Despite being over-run by the international forces of Le Grand Orient in 1789, its population retained its medieval religious and social conservatism up until the late 1960s.

It were Frenchmen at the turn of the last century who first concluded that Marxism as a materialist creed benefited international capital rather than the working classes.

What happened in the late 60s?

1.General de Gaulle wanted France's Force de Frappe to be independent from the USA;

2. General de Gaulle wanted France's gold to be returned from the New York Federal Reserve;

3. The Soviet Union had mostly recanted the 'rootless bourgeois cosmopolitanism' of Trotsky and Lenin by the 60s in favour of a Mother Russia National Bolshevism;

3.1 French Conservative and old school Communists saw a future alliance with Moscow as a means to guard France from the culture corroding influence of the USA;

3.2 Anglo-American doctrine from the Congress of Vienna after the defeat of Napoléon demands that the fragmented German states and France are kept at similar power levels. This means that both Germany and France are forbidden from making an alliance with Russia unless either France or Germany has become the greatest continental power;

4. TO combat De Gaulle's pretensions, the USA used May '68 New Left Social Justice Warriors to destroy both French conservatism and French old school socialism. The French Establishment is now Le Grand Orient empowered by the New Left - its journal is Charlie Hebdo...

This is why I think France is again the key to Western Europe now that Germany has again been dismembered in an attempt to weaken what Bismark put together in 1878.

It will be interesting to see if Le Front National (which now combines Gaullism , pre-Vatican II Catholism, Royalism, disgruntled Communists, Pétainism) seeks better relations with Putin's Russia (which is experiencing US SJWs such as Soros' Pussy Riot etc) and who has made Russian politics more Christian and Petrine ('St Petersburg') and less Asiatic Moscovite.

Post: #7

(04-12-2015 01:34 AM)blacknwhitespade Wrote:  I'd be curious to hear personal observations of when this drastic decline in religiosity happened? What Happened???

Intellectual, social and philosophical progress. Basically 'a freeing of the mind', with an increased adoption of 'objective reality' metaphysics.

Ultimately religion has just been a channel by which human beings control each other (especially the highly-structured monotheist religions versus older polytheist ones), and it has largely been superseded in that arena by Leftism.

On a personal level, every school I went to when I was a kid was a Christian school, and I came from a semi-religious family. As I vaguely recall, as a child I used to believe in god and pray etc. Eventually all it took was me actually realizing that I could question the religion, and that I ultimately didn't have to subscribe to it, for me to come to the conclusion that 'these people are talking complete and utter shit', and cast it aside.

To that end, I think the core of its descent is simply the fact that people stopped being punished if they questioned or disregarded the religion. Its old foe is still going strong, simply because of the fact that, like Christianity once did, it hurts people who don't accept it.

Post: #8

(04-12-2015 02:36 AM)iknowexactly Wrote:  I believe 80% of the population of Rome were slaves.

This is ironically why Nietzsche seemed to disparage Christianity as a religion of slaves.

Nietzsche's idea of "slave morality" was broader than that. He was contemptuous of Christianity (and its mother, Judaism) as he saw them as inverting the natural scheme of things by gaining power through claiming that weakness and meekness gave "moral authority". He saw Judeao-Christianity as a kind of virus which had infected the host (Greco-Roman civilisation) and inverted its values, exalting the weak, the poor, the widows, etc. instead of the strong and the noble. However, in his view this is only a cynical lie to be exploited by the priestly class for their own benefit. That is why we say that modern progressivism is the direct descendant and heir of Christianity, a secular, post-Enlightenment version stripped of the outdated mythic elements. In the name of the weak, women, down-trodden foreign peoples, a new priestly class comes to power.

Make of that what you will. But essentially "slave morality" is saying, "I am weak and oppressed, and that makes me righteous!"

Post: #9

What I find especially ironic is that a lot of these super secularized countries has had or still has national state churches that are funded by taxpayer's money. You see those crosses on all the flags of the secular Nordic countries? That is explicitly supposed to represent Christianity. Same with the crosses on the flag for the UK. Meanwhile in the US which is far more religious, the government is explicitly forbidden from starting a national church.

Post: #10

Churchgoing in England declined from the 1890's I believe, so I think that's a good starting date. The World Wars probably made the trend worse.

(04-12-2015 02:36 AM)iknowexactly Wrote:  I believe 80% of the population of Rome were slaves.

Slaves were at the Empire's height about a third of Italy's population, not sure about the other provinces but it seems unlikely they'd be more than there. No society is stable if 80% of it consists of slaves.

Post: #11

(04-13-2015 04:14 PM)Wutang Wrote:  What I find especially ironic is that a lot of these super secularized countries has had or still has national state churches that are funded by taxpayer's money. You see those crosses on all the flags of the secular Nordic countries? That is explicitly supposed to represent Christianity. Same with the crosses on the flag for the UK. Meanwhile in the US which is far more religious, the government is explicitly forbidden from starting a national church.

Niall Ferguson has talked/written about this. Basically, because the state and religion were intertwined, once faith in the old order collapsed in the ruins of WW1, so did religious faith.

Post: #12

World War I. As Peter Hitchens (the late Christopher's brother) said, the UK ceased being a Christian nation after the First World War.

Post: #13

(04-13-2015 04:14 PM)Wutang Wrote:  What I find especially ironic is that a lot of these super secularized countries has had or still has national state churches that are funded by taxpayer's money. You see those crosses on all the flags of the secular Nordic countries? That is explicitly supposed to represent Christianity. Same with the crosses on the flag for the UK. Meanwhile in the US which is far more religious, the government is explicitly forbidden from starting a national church.

We have the state funded church of England in UK.

I went to a UK government school in the 90s and we had Christian school prayer and hymn books. Nobody believed in any of it though, I can’t recall a single church going person from all of my schools in UK.

I’m not a Christian, but I have no problem with crosses since they represent the history a culture of western Europe. To many Europeans, Christianity is seen as a relic of the past which has no bearing on modern life. Believers are considered backwards.

Real Madrid soccer team did something particularly shameful about the cross in their logo.

Real Madrid remove Christian cross from official crest after UAE sponsorship deal

Quote:Real Madrid have dropped the Christian cross atop their official badge in a bid to appease new sponsors.

The Champions League holders have signed a lucrative deal with the National Bank of Abu Dhabi and as a result tinkered with their Los Blancos crest, according to Marca.

It is believed that the change is to pacify Muslim supporters in the UAE, although it hasn’t been altered outside the region.

Post: #14

¨^That says it all. You can't serve God and Mammon.

Post: #15

(04-13-2015 07:50 PM)WalterBlack Wrote:  

(04-13-2015 04:14 PM)Wutang Wrote:  What I find especially ironic is that a lot of these super secularized countries has had or still has national state churches that are funded by taxpayer's money. You see those crosses on all the flags of the secular Nordic countries? That is explicitly supposed to represent Christianity. Same with the crosses on the flag for the UK. Meanwhile in the US which is far more religious, the government is explicitly forbidden from starting a national church.

We have the state funded church of England in UK.

I went to a UK government school in the 90s and we had Christian school prayer and hymn books. Nobody believed in any of it though, I can’t recall a single church going person from all of my schools in UK.

I've noticed that England seems to be particularly anti-Christian even when compared to other secularized Western nations. It's not surprising that two of the Four Horsemen of the New Atheism are of British background and one of them, Dawkins was extensively educated in Anglican schools. I wonder if a lot of it is backlash is due to the religious education that you described which from what I heard is still going on even in a country as irreligious as England. Peter Hitchens who also went through similar religious education when he was in school talked about how liberating it was when he burned his Bible as a youth. What's your take on why England seems to produce so many of these sort of anti-religion atheists?

Edit: From reading a lot of Victorian era literature it seems like there was already a lot of anti-Christian sentiment boiling over during that time, at least among the upper classes. Bertrand Russell is a great example of this and there were many other Victorian era intellectuals that seemed to have the same sort of mentality he did when it came to religion. It makes me give more credence to the theory that a lot of the anti-religion sentiment you see in England is rebellion against the deeply embedded cultural Christianity that is still propped up by the state to this day. If something is in your face all the time you'll tend to be turned off in it - kinda like how you'll see people hate on say a band, singer, or actor that gets pushed constantly by the media just for the fact you can't escape hearing about them all the time.

Post: #16

(04-14-2015 10:01 PM)Wutang Wrote:  I've noticed that England seems to be particularly anti-Christian even when compared to other secularized Western nations. It's not surprising that two of the Four Horsemen of the New Atheism are of British background and one of them, Dawkins was extensively educated in Anglican schools. I wonder if a lot of it is backlash is due to the religious education that you described which from what I heard is still going on even in a country as irreligious as England. Peter Hitchens who also went through similar religious education when he was in school talked about how liberating it was when he burned his Bible as a youth. What's your take on why England seems to produce so many of these sort of anti-religion atheists?

Edit: From reading a lot of Victorian era literature it seems like there was already a lot of anti-Christian sentiment boiling over during that time, at least among the upper classes. Bertrand Russell is a great example of this and there were many other Victorian era intellectuals that seemed to have the same sort of mentality he did when it came to religion. It makes me give more credence to the theory that a lot of the anti-religion sentiment you see in England is rebellion against the deeply embedded cultural Christianity that is still propped up by the state to this day. If something is in your face all the time you'll tend to be turned off in it - kinda like how you'll see people hate on say a band, singer, or actor that gets pushed constantly by the media just for the fact you can't escape hearing about them all the time.

I wouldn’t say England is anti-Christian per se, it’s just that outward displays of religiosity are considered tasteless. There’s a saying in UK that there’s 3 things you shouldn’t talk about in polite company – sex, politics and religion.

A lot of school now in UK don’t have school prayer any more since so many of the students are from a non-Christian background. My family is Hindu and I went to school with a lot of Hindu, Sikh and Muslim students. The white kids didn’t follow any Christianity strongly as far I knew.

It’s been a few generations now since the average white British family went to church.

There’s an old joke about religion in UK:

Do you believe in God?
No.
Oh, you must be Church of England then!

For the average British person they go to churches for baptism, weddings and funerals and that’s about it.

This is what the future could look like:

Anglican school where 75% of the pupils are Muslim drops Christian hymns from assemblies

Quote:Hymns have been dropped from assemblies at a Church of England school which has also introduced separate prayer rooms for girls and boys to cater to its mostly Muslim students.

Daily assemblies at Slough and Eton Church of England Business and Enterprise College, where 75 per cent of pupils are Muslim, are not based specifically on the Bible, but may make reference to it alongside other religious texts.

All of the the meat served at the secondary school, which has over 1,000 pupils aged between 11 and 19, is halal.

Headmaster Paul McAteer said the approach was to be 'sensitive to the fact that we do have many different faiths in the school', but added that Christian values were 'more prevalent here than I have experienced in non-Church of England schools'.

Mr McAteer, who pointed out that the Church of England describes itself as 'a faith for all faiths', told the Sunday Times: 'The values we support are very much Christian values of honesty, integrity, justice.'

According to the school's prospectus its assemblies - which Mr McAteer said contain a 'moral message' - reflect humanitarian and spiritual issues 'that concern everyone'.

The headmaster explained that the gender-separated prayer rooms at Slough and Eton, which is a voluntary controlled Church of England school, were not specifically for Muslim pupils, but said that it tended to be Muslim children that use them.

A voluntary controlled school refers to one which is state funded but the running of which a foundation - in this case the Church of England - has some influence over.

He said 20 male students would typically attend a lunchtime Islamic prayer session at the Berkshire school.

One of the school aims outlined on its mission statement is 'to promote tolerance and respect for all cultures represented in the school'.

The college was judged 'outstanding' by Ofsted in May 2011 and it was awarded the same rating after a Church of England inspection the following month.

Collective worship at the school is broadly Christian, and assemblies are based on Christian principles but are 'designed to value and not exclude any other faith', the prospectus states.

According to the Church of England, a substantial number of primary and secondary church schools - both voluntary controlled and voluntary aided - have over 80 per cent intake from the Muslim community.

Christianity declining 50pc faster than thought – as one in 10 under-25s is a Muslim

Quote:Christianity could be facing a catastrophic collapse in Britain according to official figures suggesting it is declining 50 per cent faster than previously thought.

A new analysis of the 2011 census shows that a decade of mass immigration helped mask the scale of decline in Christian affiliation among the British-born population – while driving a dramatic increase in Islam, particularly among the young.

It suggests that only a minority of people will describe themselves as Christians within the next decade, for first time.

Meanwhile almost one in 10 under 25s in Britain is now a Muslim.

The proportion of young people who describe themselves as even nominal Christians has dropped below half for the first time.

Initial results from the 2011 census published last year showed that the total number of people in England and Wales who described themselves as Christian fell by 4.1 million – a decline of 10 per cent.

But new analysis from the Office for National Statistics shows that that figure was bolstered by 1.2 million foreign-born Christians, including Polish Catholics and evangelicals from countries such as Nigeria.

They disclosed that there were in fact 5.3 million fewer British-born people describing themselves as Christians, a decline of 15 per cent in just a decade.

At the same time the number of Muslims in England and Wales surged by 75 per cent – boosted by almost 600,000 more foreign born followers of the Islamic faith.

While almost half of British Muslims are under the age of 25, almost a quarter of Christians are over 65.

The average age of a British Muslim is just 25, not far off half that of a
British Christian.

Younger people also drove a shift away from religion altogether, with 6.4 million more people describing themselves as having no faith than 10 years earlier.

Secular campaigners said the new figures showed that Christianity had now dropped below “critical mass” making the case for disestablishing the Church of England stronger.

But the Church insisted that while there had been a significant drop in “nominal” Christians, the core of the Church remained firm.
Prof David Coleman, Professor of demography at Oxford University, said: “This is a very substantial change – it is difficult to see whether any other change in the census could have been remotely as big.
“But I wonder how far it reflects an overarching change in society where it is more acceptable more normal to say that you are not religious or are not Christian.”

Dr Fraser Watts, a Cambridge theologian, said it was “entirely possible” the people identifying themselves as Christians could become a minority within the next decade on the basis of the figures.

“It is still pretty striking and it is a worrying trend and confirms what anyone can observe - that in many churches the majority of the congregation are over 60,” he said.

Keith Porteous Wood, executive director of the National Secular Society, said the long-term reduction of Christianity, particularly among young people, was now “unstoppable”.


“In another 20 years there are going to be more active Muslims than there are churchgoers,” he said.

“The time has now come that institutional Christianity is no longer justified, the number has dropped below critical mass for which there is no longer any justification for the established Church, for example, or the monarch going through a religious ceremony at coronation.

“The expressions of optimism by the church are just completely misplaced.”

But a spokesman for the Church of England said: “These figures highlight the diversity of Christianity in this country today, something which has been increasing for decades and shows the relevance of Christianity to people from all backgrounds.

“These figures once again confirm that this remains a faithful nation and that the fall in the numbers identifying themselves as Christians is a challenge but – as you can see from the stability of Church of England attendance figures – the committed worshipping centre of the church remains firm.

“The challenge to the Church is to reconnect with the nominal.”

Post: #17

I've been saying for a while now if all those New Atheist types from England really wanted to target religion, they should be focusing their attacks on Islam rather than Christianity since there was most likely more practicing Muslims then practicing Christians in England. Looks like I was right.

Post: #18

(04-15-2015 02:24 PM)Wutang Wrote:  I've been saying for a while now if all those New Atheist types from England really wanted to target religion, they should be focusing their attacks on Islam rather than Christianity since there was most likely more practicing Muslims then practicing Christians in England. Looks like I was right.

People are too scared to criticise Islam. There’s a lot of Muslims in UK. Christianity is considered a soft target.

Michael Palin of Monty Python said this:

You can't parody Islam, says Palin: Monty Python star believes religious sensitivities have increased so much it would be impossible to make Life of Brian today

Quote:During his Monty Python days he poked fun at everyone from the Establishment to Christianity.

But thanks to the threat of ‘heavily armed’ fanatics, Michael Palin has admitted there is one comedy taboo he is too scared to break- Islam.

The 70-year-old said religious sensitivities have increased so much since his comedy days it would now be impossible to make 1979 film Life of Brian - which satirised the life of Jesus - let alone laugh at Muslims.

He said: ‘Religion is more difficult to talk about. I don’t think we could do Life of Brian any more. A parody of Islam would be even harder.

‘We all saw what happened to Salman Rushdie and none of us want to get into all that. It’s a pity but that’s the way it is. There are people out there without a sense of humour and they’re heavily armed.’

In 1989, Mr Rushdie was forced into hiding after the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, issued a fatwa calling for him to be killed in revenge for his novel The Satanic Verses.

Post: #19

Yeah but that's just the point. Religions decline and rise in part to the extent that they hurt people who don't submit. If Christianity was still burning people at the stake, comedians wouldn't be parodying it either.

Post: #20

Christianity was, in effect, the state religion for the better part of fifteen hundred years. Of course comedians wouldn't parody it. Governments you can make fun of because they depend on popularity to stay in power, but churches do not.

Islam is different: it's not the state religion in the West, but it's treated and tiptoed around like it is.

Michael Palin's full of shit on this score. He could make Life of Brian today and nobody in the West would bat a fucking eyelid, just as nobody bats a fucking eyelid when "South Park" represents Jesus as a slightly dippy character on its show. Palin could make a Life of Goran ripping into Buddhism, and he'd just get a raised eyebrow from the Dalai Lama maybe.

But Palin could not make a Life of Abdul. Not then, not now. Even South Park understands that: when they parodied Muhammed, they got a threat from the group 'Revolution Muslim' that they'd probably end up like Theo Van Gogh. And the supposedly courageous Parker and Stone quietly removed the original Super Best Friends, which parodied Teh Profet, from South Park's website.

Post: #21

When did socialism become dominant in Europe? It seems to have replaced Christianity as the religion of choice.

Post: #22

(04-19-2015 03:49 AM)ElBorrachoInfamoso Wrote:  When did socialism become dominant in Europe? It seems to have replaced Christianity as the religion of choice.

When people believed they were entitled to free things others have worked for and envy of those who were well-off.

An example;

When it was common in the UK, you would have hundreds of young women figuring out you can get free things if you popped out a kid. The state saw it as a right to protect mother and child and took on the role as father.

What made it worse is then thousands upon thousands of young women "figured" they would do it too and it bred a class of people who were given free things without having to work for it.

The motto of scream the loudest and fuck as much as you can without birth control became a common occurrence. Nobody called them out on it until too late and when the government did do something about it too was too little too late.

Several generations of a family would always vote a socialist party if they gave them free things. Labour, SNP and Lib Dems are those free meal tickets.

Post: #23

People moved their faith from God to Governments; verily, they shall have their reward.

Post: #24

I think this thread could use a "revival" since the Buddhism thread has been derailed a bit.

Post: #25

I quite recently had a chat with my father where he literally said that the government has replaced the church. And that was not a good thing, at all. When faith declined, the state stepped in to fill the void. The disintegration of faith seems to have gone really fast in the Netherlands since the 1960s.