Marginal Christianity

          We are currently knee-deep in a debate about why “Millennials” are apparently streaming out of our churches.   Rachel Held Evans initiated this discussion with her piece on CNN Belief blog.   Many have responded pro or con from many different perspectives.   Today Diana Butler Bass weighed in on Facebook by claiming that it’s not theology but demographics that accounts for the Millennial exodus: “OK, here's the only thing I'm going to say about the viral millennials piece. Millennials are not ‘leaving’ for theological reasons. It is about exponential demographics. Throughout the last 100 years, there has been a steady increase in the number of people who dis-affiliate in each generations. With each increase, it is like multiplication, not addition. The millennials' parents and grandparents ‘left’ at a rate of about 15%. Those people married other people who also left religion. They had unaffiliated children. Thos...

Peter Steinfels July 25, 2013 - 11:58am http://www.commonwealmagazine.org/blog/religious-progressives   Are religious progressives the wave of the future?   That is the conclusion that a number of people have drawn from Do Americans Believe Capitalism & Government Are Working? , the study that has already been discussed here following posts by Paul Moses and myself.  Besides surveying Americans on economic conditions, inequality, capitalism, government economic policy, and religious values, the study paid special attention to what it considered the understudied counter to the religious right, namely “religious progressives.” By combining scales measuring Americans’ views on theological, social, and economic issues, the study concludes that 28% of the population are religious conservatives, 38% are religious moderates, and 19% are religious progressives.   The latter, however, may have prospects that those numbers belie.   F...

http://www.cardus.ca/comment/article/3995/capitalism-religion-and-the-economics-of-the-biblical-jubilee/ Capitalism offers unrestricted capital mobility and unrestrained debt creation. Is there an alternative? Perhaps we should investigate the biblical vision of Jubilee. July 12, 2013 - By Paul Williams Capitalism as Ideology Much of mainstream economics presents capitalism as a morally neutral economic system. It does so with two arguments. The first focuses on the individual consumer (or firm or worker). Capitalism is morally neutral, it is argued, because it is designed to enable individuals to make their own choices based on whatever values they happen to have. The second focuses on overall systemic outcomes: capitalism generates the largest possible economic pie and we can then choose what to do with the proceeds. But are these arguments compatible? Capitalism is not, in fact, morally neutral. The apparent neutrality of individual choice masks ...