The Apalling Spectacle of American Christianity

[Saint Marcus]

Ahead or behind...You have to be kidding? Or are you one of those Americans who think Scandinavia isn't part of Europe?

Aparantly he is.

In Scandinavia or Holland churches are way ahead of those in other countries. That's also the reason the pope is concerned about Holland, because it's too progressive in accepting (for instance) homosexuals.

There still are a few protestant groups here though that are as conservative as your average American bible belt church, but they are few and far in between.

Churches in America in particular, and also in France and Britain, are decades behind churches in Holland or Scandinavia.

[JohnT]

this isn't a threadjack, just a digression...

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
BTW, the reason why there are so many religious nut jobs here in America is because they all moved here.... All sorts of religious groups came here: Baptists, Quakers, Shakers, Mennonites, etc., etc. to esacpe perscution back in Europe. And then came the Great Awakening (which also happened in Great Britain). When Evangalism swept the nation, circa 1800. We still feel the effects of that today.

And given that we were formed because of European persecution, does it not follow that we would naturally look with distrust at other European social views, be they religious, political, or legal?

Interesting thing about us: up to recently we could've considered England to be the "mother country," but we never thought of Europe as the "mother continent." While the US has been pretty open to all things British, like our island cousins we have never really trusted the Continent all that much. I mean, as far as social issues are concerned you guys gave us Hitler, Napoleon, Marxism, Communism, Jewish genocide, slavery, and colonialism. You might be the ****s when it comes to the sciences, but why in hell would y'all even think that the US would want to follow your example politically?

Roland, "intellectually stagnant" is too harsh a phrase to use for a country that committed the apparently unforgivable sin of not following your favored political and economic biases and is, frankly, beneath someone of your apparent intellectual gifts. I do hope that you don't use this unfortunate turn of words when you discuss China, Japan, and other countries not fortunate enough to produce leaders ranging in quality from Joseph II to Hitler.

I will say that it has been a while since I've been surprised into awareness of just how different the US is from your conceptions. I knew y'all got some things wrong consistantly, but this thread has really hammered it home. Thanks!

[Locutus]

Originally posted by Saint Marcus
but they are few and far in between.

Actually, they live quite close to each other... it's called 'incest'

j/k

[Saint Marcus]

Interesting thing about us: up to recently we could've considered England to be the "mother country," but we never thought of Europe as the "mother continent." While the US has been pretty open to all things British, like our island cousins we have never really trusted the Continent all that much. I mean, as far as social issues are concerned you guys gave us Hitler, Napoleon, Marxism, Communism, Jewish genocide, slavery, and colonialism. You might be the ****s when it comes to the sciences, but why in hell would y'all even think that the US would want to follow your example politically?

A. Most settlers going to the US were non-English.
B. Slavery was abolished in almost all European countries long before it was abolished in the USA
C. you talk about the bad social and political systems Europe has produced, but why not talk about what the US did to minorities in the past? Mainly the native americans and the african americans. sure Europe has had it's share of helping to screw up the world, but the Americans aren't saints either.
D. "you guys gave us Napoleon". hmmm. As I recall the French under Napoleon had very good relationships with the Americans.

etc
etc
etc

[Imran Siddiqui]

Spray, you guys allow abortions, but there's still an enormous controversy over it.

Unlike, say... Ireland, where there really isn't that much controversy that it should be banned .

Some states (Kansas, for one) don't allow evolutionary biology, a perfectly valid branch of science, to be taught in schools due to its supposed conflict with the way the Bible tells us the world works.

You misinterpreted that whole event, didn't you? Seems like most did. They didn't eliminate evolutionary biology as something to be taught, they simply said that creationism ALSO had to be taught. That might not be the best of things, but it isn't throwing out evolution.

And St. Mar... in a certain way, John is right. During the era of WW1, people looked on disdain at Europe, not wanting to follow that lead and glad that the US was isolationist. So, in certain ways it does work. And remember, we never really had extreme communism or facism gain much clout here.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Alexander's Horse
The televangelist is the direct descendent of the 17th century travelling preacher.

The United States has an amazingly high population of Baptists. Cromwell considered Baptists to be a plague of vandals far worse than catholics. He used them for his political purposes but it was the fear of Baptists and their fundamentalist ilk ever coming to power again in Britain that averted civil war time and again in 18th century Britain. The Brits were very glad when the bulk of them decamped to the Americas where their influence has been felt ever since.

40 million out of 280 million is less than 15% of the total population! Furthermore I don't think that Baptists (the American type) weren't even around during Cromwell's life. You may be thinking of the European Anabaptists.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Lars-E


Ahead or behind...You have to be kidding? Or are you one of those Americans who think Scandinavia isn't part of Europe?

Sorry! Scandinavia is a small part of Europe, having a total of less than 20 million out of a population of 350 to 400 million in just western Europe.

[Dr Strangelove]

Yes, Jefferson, Franklin and Payne were confirmed deists at the time of the revolution, though Jefferson eventually came back to the Episcopal church as he grew older. Most of the other founding fathers professed some form of Christian faith. Adams and Hancock were Congregationalists; Washington, Mason, Henry and Madison were Anglicans. Washington and Mason in fact sat on the committees that drafted the charter of the Episcopal church. Patrick Henry tried to make the Episcopal church the state church of Virginia.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

Spray, you guys allow abortions, but there's still an enormous controversy over it.

Unlike, say... Ireland, where there really isn't that much controversy that it should be banned

Or Portugal...

They're hardly representative of what I consider "Europe".

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
Or Portugal...

They're hardly representative of what I consider "Europe".

What? You mean Portugal and Ireland aren't the main players in Europe?!

[Hoek]

There are countries with higher percentages of "christian" loonies: Lebanon, for instance.

The abortion question is not applicable to this debate. There is nothing in the bible about abortion or anything approaching it. The debate is therefore outside the realm of a religious question (though religious arguments are used regarding respect for human life...the question essentially is a philosophical one: what is a human life?)

Your question is also non-specific. You do not define what you mean by "nutjobs." You cite Al Gore saying that he asks "what would jesus do" as being a nutjob. You seem to mix together two questions: one about extremism, the other about the general level of religious conviction.

If you are asking why is there more Christian extremism in America than other countries, I think you should actually look at the percentages. How many people are actually involved in this extremism? What reach do they have? If you actually examined the evidence, I think you would find that there are just as many in America as everywhere else.

[KrazyHorse]

Read my post/see my link.

The percentage of Biblical literalists in the population is ~5 times higher in the US than in Britain. I'm certain the British figures are similar to those for the rest of Western Europe.

[Hoek]

1) Most of the original settlers in what is now America were in fact English. Hence English is the language most widely used in the U.S. and so many English traditions are present in the U.S. (English common law is used, etc., etc.)

2) While I don't agree that "Europe gave us slavery," your characterization of the situation is far from accurate. European countries never really had much use for slaves on the continent because of the nature of European agriculture. They had no problem using slavery for their economic benefit. Let's not forget their legacies in places like Africa and Asia.

3) In terms of social and political institutions, I don't think any country has it "right." My ideal political scheme would be a hybrid: U.S.'s checks and balances and seperation of powers, Germany's federalism and SMD/PR representation scheme, a unicameral legislature, and England's party system.

4) No, Napoleon did not have very good relations with the U.S. Jefferson didn't like him, but wasn't too concerned about Europe in any case. The "good" relations were mere balance of power politics on the North American continent: the French would rather America have Louisiana than England or Spain. You should also realize the inherent differences in the French and American revolutions. France's revolution was a true revolution---which makes it inherently liberal. America's "revolution" was actually very conservative in nature. It's purpose was to preserve the power of the institutions (the state legislatures) already in place.

[Hoek]

Well, my guess would be that it is a product of the superiority of European educations systems (though I must say that the way educations systems is ranked is very poor indeed...they examine the wrong data. Good indicators of an education system's success are things like dropout rates, graduation rates, average class size, etc.

[Grrr]

I don't want to be anti-american here

AMERICA CREATES NUT-JOBS!!!

If america didn't exist we wouldn't see these Christian Nut Jobs, or those Al Qaeda Muslim nut jobs either.

Christianity is a thing of the past

I agree, it happened 2 millenia ago, can't those Americans forget anything.

I think the reason America has so many Christian Nut Jobs is because it has not enough SUNDAY TRADING.