God is Back (?)

God is Back: How the Global Rise of Faith is Changing the World
John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge

Religion Resurrected
DAMIAN THOMPSON
June 2009

This book, by the editor and the Washington correspondent of the Economist, tells us "how the revival of religion is changing the world". Its message is a great deal more nuanced than its title and subtitle imply. In some parts of the world, God is back with a vengeance. In others, He never went away. There are undoubtedly places where He appears to be on his way out (Britain being one of them). Nevertheless, there is no arguing with Micklethwait and Wooldridge's central contention that the revival of religious ideology in the late 20th century has changed the world in ways that would have stunned and embarrassed the political scientists of 30 years ago. And it has also made the task of containing future international conflict infinitely more challenging: as the book points out, "three out of the four most likely flashpoints for nuclear conflict — Pakistan-India, Iran and Israel-Palestine — have a strong religious element. The only exception is North Korea."

Much of God is Back carries the authoritative stamp of the Economist, not just the world's best researched political magazine but also arguably the best written. The problem facing the American Founding Fathers, say the authors, was political rather than theological: "How can you prevent tyranny?" But this produced a paradox. "If the Founders were intent on grappling with a secular problem, their solution to that problem — the separation of church and state and the division of power — allowed the survival of religion in the modern world." That is splendidly concise, and spot on. The pluralism of American society is manifested as much in its religious culture as in its shopping malls. Only in the United States would the phrase "storefront evangelist" trip off the tongue so easily. It's true that American academics convinced themselves for many decades that modernity would smother religion. But now even they have recanted.

Micklethwait and Wooldridge are specialists in US politics (they are the authors of a study of American conservatives) and their tour d'horizon of the country's bustling religious landscape is full of well chosen details. One excellent point is that we tend to exaggerate the religiosity of Republican presidents while underestimating that of Democrats. George W. Bush has never lost his Ivy League mistrust of his Christian fundamentalist allies — "those wackos", as he once described them. He is a devout Christian, but the idea that he believed in any sort of theocracy is nonsense, as is John Gray's idiotic suggestion that American foreign policy during the Iraq War was inspired by Biblical millenarianism. Meanwhile, it was Bill Clinton who did more than any president since Eisenhower to lower the wall of separation between church and state. In 1997 he signed "the most sweeping sanction for the expression of religious views in the federal workplace ever issued". And, Monica Lewinsky notwithstanding, he surrounded himself with born-again Christians and "maintained a degree of interest in religion that would have had him branded a dangerous Jesus freak in Europe". One telling detail: the Democrat campaign in 2008 was significantly more Christian than that of 2004, when Howard Dean located the Book of Job in the New Testament.

In the US, capitalism and religion, or religiosity, are almost indivisible. The churches that thrive are those with a business model, while the corporate sector exudes its own plastic spirituality — positively cult-like in the case of Apple. One consequence of this fusion is that the globalisation of American culture carries with it American ways of "doing religion". The evangelical Christianity of Brazil and Nigeria is heavily Americanised (and much more successful than neocolonial experiments in liberation theology or "inculturation"). But the Americanisation of religion extends beyond the Christian world. Across the Middle East and Asia, we learn, "a younger generation of religious innovators are looking to America not just for signs of the devil's work but also for models of how to adapt a traditional religious message to modern audiences". In Bangalore, a Hindu "megatemple" creates the sounds and smells of eternal India. Yet it was founded by software titans as recently as 1997. Islam, too, has its "pastorpreneurs", who dress in blazers and whip up a mainly female audience with wireless mikes, a backing quartet and dry ice. But, like evangelical preachers, the trappings of showbusiness conceal a conservative message: these new Muslim preachers want women to wear the veil and favour sharia. Admittedly, this exuberant style of Islam has not spread to the Arab world. But then, as Micklethwait and Wooldridge remind us, only 20 per cent of Muslims worldwide are Arabs.

God is Back does not suggest that Islam is smoothly embarking on the road to modernisation. On the contrary, the religion's concept of equality — equal submission to Allah — is radically unsuited to a dynamic religious marketplace, just as modern Christianity's emphasis on the equal liberty of believers under God is suited to it. The revival of traditional Islam in the Middle East, Africa and south-east Asia is a ghastly omen, creating the way for unimaginable social collapse in countries whose rulers' reaction to modernity is to try to blow it up. Micklethwait and Wooldridge rightly conclude that neocon prophecies of "Eurabia" are based on dodgy forecasts. They also suggest that conflict between Muslims may ultimately prove more disastrous than terrorist threats against the West, which is why the US government's continuing ignorance of Islam is so alarming. But we are left with the strong impression that God's "return" to developing societies will ensure that they never become developed.

The book avoids broad-brush conclusions. Partly, I suspect, this is a function of its dual authorship: there's a definite sense of cut and paste about some chapters, and one of the pair (I don't know which) is a much better writer than the other. But there is no shame in acknowledging a degree of confusion, because religion morphs faster than secular ideology and we have no idea where we will be in ten years' time. There's a strong case to be made, for example, that the commodification of American spirituality, its heavy reliance on the techniques of the entertainment industry, is actually leading religion out of the public square and into the realm of fashion.

Yes, God is back, but then again, so are flared jeans.

http://www.standpointmag.com/node/1244/full

One thing I found interesting was the facts regarding Clinton v. Bush in regards to religous beliefs.

I think one thing history has shown us is nations of Faith suceed, nations without Faith are greatly diminshed or are replaced. The Old Testament point to the roller coaster ride of the Jewish people as they turned to God and turned away from God.

Why does a nation turn from God? Because, it get fat, dumb and lazy. Maybe what we are seeing a people realizing the limitations of this physical world and are becoming reaquainted with the Truth.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/23510.html

"As president, Barack Obama has mentioned Jesus Christ in a number of high-profile public speeches — something his predecessor George W. Bush rarely did in such settings, even though Bush’s Christian faith was at the core of his political identity."

"Obama’s invocation of the Christian Messiah is more overt than Americans heard in the public rhetoric of Bush in his time in the White House — even though Bush’s victories were powered in part by evangelical voters."

Obama talks about Jesus more than Bush ever did, but he gets a pass from the militant atheists, as did Clinton, who also talked about Jesus more frequently than did Bush. Every time Bush evoked Jesus, Bill Maher's head exploded. But (huge surprise) there's a double standard.

The double standard has become more and more interesting to me as a symptom of a movement that says "our motives are so pure and our objectives are so good that when we do things that we criticize in others, it's okay, because our virtue sanctifies whatever we do."

VicarJoe wrote:
The double standard has become more and more interesting to me as a symptom of a movement that says "our motives are so pure and our objectives are so good that when we do things that we criticize in others, it's okay, because our virtue sanctifies whatever we do."

That is to say, while I agree with you, I think that there are two "Jesuses" (I think I made up that word, it looks weird) out there in the political marketplace. There's the Republican, George Bush Jesus, who is bad--just like him. And then there's the Jesus of the left, the do-gooder hippie Jesus. My guess is there's a sense that Oabama worships a "better Jesus"--and while many feel this "jesus" is mythical, they're more comfortable with Obama's version.

I also think there's actually a hint of race ideology at work as well--people have a sense of the role of Christianity in African-American culture as operating something like Judaism; there's a sense, I think, that Obama is a "cultural Christian" by some, by virtue of his background.

And finally, I think some people figure Obama's lying half the time, and they're ok with that. It's like the double standard about gay marriage--gay marriage advocates think he doesn't really fell that way. They may be right, of course. I tend to make bets when I vote too--that certain andidates are lying about their pro-life or pro-choice stances, when all they're really going to do is step slightly to the right or to the left on the issue, in the endless dance of signing off of legislation that bypasses the real issue.

[quote="cradlerc"]

VicarJoe wrote:
That is to say, while I agree with you, I think that there are two "Jesuses" (I think I made up that word, it looks weird) out there in the political marketplace. There's the Republican, George Bush Jesus, who is bad--just like him. And then there's the Jesus of the left, the do-gooder hippie Jesus. My guess is there's a sense that Oabama worships a "better Jesus"--and while many feel this "jesus" is mythical, they're more comfortable with Obama's version.

My working theory is that the Progressive crowd (Bill Mahar) are threatened by the notion of any kind of diety, Christ included. Jesus is OK if you can "un-diefy" him and control Him. Jesus presented as the social philosopher and liberator of the opressed serves to accomplish this. This accomplishes two things, you can draw in people that know the name Jesus (but don't really know Him) and, after you have amassed enough folks to your world view, you can dispose of Jesus because, "He was just a nice guy".

In a way it is a similar tactic to how the Jews of old handled heresies. Draw them in by telling them you accept them and then, slowly, extinguish there point of view. Brilliant!

but I also encountered this concept in reading a book (The Long March, by Roger Kimball) that made several references to another book (The Pursuit of the Millenium, by Norman Cohn), which was essentially about the millenarian movements around the turn of the second millenium and how many heretics popped up who claimed that the "People of Light" were, by virtue of their virtue, allowed to do anything they liked. I've been harboring an idea about how perhaps some bit of the madness of the second half of the twentieth century was just millenial insanity that the West is destined to go through every thousand years. Obviously, someone like Hitler was a millenarian, with his claim that he could establish a thousand year reich. And a lot of heresies seem to be about establishing the kingdom of heaven on earth, here and now. Or as our current president said, "I am confident that we can create a Kingdom right here on Earth." Yipes! Typically, the obstacle to the kingdom, in the millenarian's eyes, are those bad people who aren't interested in unity (unity being that they drop their objections to our plans, and certainly not vice versa). Hence, I notice an almost intense longing in the media and among devout leftists to see not just one party triumphant but to see the other party destroyed, so that there really only is one party. And when people claim to be creating the Kingdom and bringing about the millenium, beware if they think you're in the way of progress.

So, is the theory that at the approach of each milenium there is triggered in part of the population a kind of millenium-phycosis?

You mentioned Hitler and the thousand year Reich, but was that timed up with a millenium or, was it something that was to last a thousand years?

A historical pattern that I have noted seems to be every 500 years (or close to it) something big happens. To wit:

500 BC: Moses
O BC: Christ is born, Rome becomes and Empire
500 AD Rome goes ca-put. (600 AD Islam est.)
1000 AD The Crusades
1500 AD Reformation, America discovered
2000 AD American decline?
2500 AD Obama's artifically alive head, runs for 123 term for office. and he went old school

or my tattered enjarred head would.

Yes, basically the idea is that people go nuts around the turn of millenias, and the whole twentieth century could just be the West in millenial panic mode. (As my wife points out, no one else is on our millenial calendar, so no one else cares.) The reason I like it as an idea is that it offers the possibility of hope, that somewhere around 2025 or so, we can all breathe out, realize that we're here for another thousand years of non-Kingdom on Earth, and return to normalcy. Because the other option is that civilization will simply continue to collapse until total barbarism returns. And that's a bit gloomy.

So the old Christian idea is that Jesus will return for a thousand year reign of perfect peace and justice, and for whatever reason, certain people wig out and think he's on our clock, so that 2000 would initiate the supernatural millenium (remember y2k panic? and Jack Van Impe predicting the end was nigh?). Hitler's third reich of a thousand years was a secular attempt to co-opt the Christian millenial kingdom.