U.S. Church Membership Falls Below Majority for First Time

[Absolut da poet ®]

Understand Jesus started the church so where He was, that's where the church was. Wherever He went He took the church with Him. The Apostles and a lot of other people followed Him. There is nobody living today that can say that. He is the focus of the church.

That's why everybody gathers in His name. You can do that wherever you want, and it can be 2-3, but there's more than 2-3 believers in the world so using that as an excuse to just gather in your little clique is really saying something else.

Based on your first line i believe we're talking about two different things

Christianity began after Christ's death.. I'm not talking about that.. as Modern day Christianity is not the same as what Christ was doing.. during his life
He was living by example

During his life he's considered a rebel by the establishment " The Church" of his time

He preached the gospel.. The new way to find salvation which was not necessarily tied to being in the church or following their laws but by doing the acts in faith , spreading the word and following the path he laid out etc

The Church was necessary but it needed to be changed.. And his focus wasnt on those four walls

But on the spirit inside of people .. The people are the church not the building or the doctrines .

In my opinion ..People do need to join forces to strengthen the spirit.. not all.. but many do

Church is the hospital for the weak in spirit

 

[Turk]

all religions except Christianity were founded by winners
Examples:
Islam -> Mohammed and his armies
Hinduism -> Aryans
Buddhism -> Buddha was an Indian prince

The early church was persecuted by Rome and all the apostles were penniless and died gruesome deaths

It's easy to understand how winners spread their ideology, but Christianity grew faster during persecution to the point where they were one of the largest religions in Rome before Constantine made Christianity the empire's official religion
There must be truth for those early Christians to keep believing

This argument is so stupid and not only that, but it's false af

Muhammad was a "nobody"in his society prior his alleged revelation

Who are the "Aryans"? Hinduism doesn't have a founder

The Buddha was a prince who gave up everything in his quest for enlightenment. What would make a man who had everything give it all up to wander around for years and years meditating and living off the kindness of others for years? Clearly, Buddhism must also be truth for Buddhists to believe in him

 

[Supa cat]

not to mention, theres a black awareness in the west that ...none of this is our shyt

What you mean "our" ? You're indian

 

[Wild self]

Imagine getting up early on a weekend morning just so I can dress up and get lectured to for 2-3 hours. Ya’ll can have that.

If church was like 1 to 3 pm, more people would attend.

Anything done on a weekend MORNING is bound for lack of attendance, if you don't thoroughly enjoy it.

 

[Wild self]

Most men are solution-oriented.

It’s not in our nature to sit and be lectured to about some feel-good shyt when the world is outside burning around us. That’s what Malcolm understood when he created two separate orgs after his spilt from the NOI. One of his orgs was more religious for those types and the other more secular for problem solving.

The Black Church needs to reimagine itself as a problem solver in the community, using scripture to guide.

Men will gravitate to the work being done.

But, asking men to show up so they can get their weekly dose of feel-good messaging is falling out of favor fast. Add the fact that we have to dress up for it and sit for hours. We’re good on that. Tradition has to evolve.

Yeah, rocking suit and ties in uncomfortable temperatures on a Sunday Morning is not the wave.

 

[KidJSoul]

I don't go to church for the same reason I don't take everything in the bible seriously. Bunch of hypocrisy all around.

I believe in God because of my faith, not because of man. Man tends to tell lies, is full of hypocrisy, and like to think they are 100% noble and perfect just because they are Christian.

 

[invincible1914]

yo, i rock with you, but stop crying

Come roll with team Secular Humanist

Less judging

More filling

Naw man.

The combination of humanist ideas (so I won’t be stupid out here) and Christian principles ( so I will have some morals and goto heaven) is the way to go.

 

[KidJSoul]

The church as an actual house of worship where people gather to listen to priest is not even endorsed in the bible.

Bible Gateway passage: Matthew 6:5-6 - New International Version

 

[Dr. Acula]

This is a false statement.....

Nah. But I won't pretend in more modern times as it relates to the black American experience, many of our leaders were driven to do good things in the name of God but the only reason black Americans follow Christianity the way we do is because of slavers making their slaves follow it. Most black folks in US follow a form of Protestantism and this is directly traced back to Europeans who used it as a form of soft power through propaganda and social control along with the states who used violence as the secondary form of control. Most of us come from West Africa and either they were practicing Muslims introduced by trade earlier or practiced ancestorial worship or animism, similar to Shintoism.

I don't know about that one breh.

Modern Christianity is mostly a European invention. You may be referencing ancient Christian cults in North and East Africa and also in places in southern Europe. I'm not using the word cult as a put-down but this is what they were called relative to the pagan and polytheistic religion of the Romans who claimed these areas as provinces before it became widely practiced religion. However, early Christian sects are very different than modern Christianity. They didn't even have close to the idea we had of Christ as we do now. They couldn't even agree on whether Christ was a prophet or if he was of the same "substance" as God-like most Christians believe now. It wasn't until Constantine in the 4th century basically made all these bishops get together and they all agreed to believe he was the same as god. They didn't even have a coherent story of where he was born (this was Constantine's mother who decided his birthplace) or when he was born (they also decided that December 25th would be this date which coincided with a festival that was popular in pagan circles at the time. Then you had the great schism between greek orthodoxy and Roman catholicism in the 11th century. Then you had the protestant reformation of the 16th century. Finally, you arrive at some derivatives that most Americans practice now.

Most Black American's ancestors had no relation to Christianity until it was forced on them by Colonial powers given most of us trace our lineage to West Africa where Christianity mainly wasn't being practiced.

 

[SleezyBigSlim]

Right wing "Christians" in media and in politics doing everything but what Jesus would do. It turns people off.

White Christians are turning other people off by making it seem like its their religion basically.

 

[Dr. Acula]

check em out at 27 seconds

Bruh, I've lived in the south most of my life and these super religious people are fukking nuts and nothing in this clip surprised me. Hell, the only reason they are saying this shyt is because their mama and pappy and their mama and pappy and so on and so on going all the way back to slavery were telling them all this shyt growing up. This is just the legacy passed on to them all the way back and resulted in what they are doing in this clip now. The same rhetoric was used as a way to control the "savages" whether its us, Native Americans or indigenous people across the globe.

 

[Mr Hate Coffee]

People would actually go to church if it was some serious shyt. Tbh what really zoned me out is all the musical transitions, all that fukking slow singing then random jams used to put me to sleep, only highlights are when the pastor be roasting people

Fam I’m the same way. But we’re in the minority. I used to ask my mom if I could just show up for the sermon. I don’t need all that pomp and circumstance. The other issue is that the message isn’t always relatable. What would I as a 13 year old boy be able to relate to a message for a middle aged single mom?

 

[invincible1914]

Go to church to pay another man to read you the Bible when you can do it yourself brehs.

Go to church to pay another man so he can take your money to buy a new Lexus while you still driving your old car brehs.

What about fellowship?

Every preacher isn’t a crook.

 

[Pull Up the Roots]

Q anon, LBGTQ, feminism, etc are the new religions. We see how that is working out.

You are starting to sound like Mike Cernovich, man. This is the same shyt idiots like that are saying.

 

[GoldenGlove]

I get the consensus in this thread being that people are over going to church, but wouldn't common sense say that the sharp decline in these numbers recently is due to COVID-19?