God is Back--some good news

A few months ago I read an article in World magazine about an interesting new book called God Is Back by John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge. The overall point of the book is the explanation of how and why religion is booming around the world, contrary to what many secularists expected as the 21st-century began. I bought the book, read it, and would like to take you through certain portions of it.

In the authors' introduction they discuss the amazing growth of Christianity in China. Even a conservative estimate of the total number of Christians in that country exceed the total number of members in the Communist Party. Some believe Christians may well number over 100 million. They focus on a Chinese government economist, who wrote in a widely read essay about his travels around America. He argues in this essay that the key to America's commercial success is not its natural resources, its financial system, or its technology but in its churches -- "the very core that binds Americans together." The authors reveal that this economist later converted to Christianity.

This growth of Christianity has surprised many people who believe that the modern world would marginalize religion. Europeans have spent the last 200 years trying to free themselves of religious influences. America was a bit odd in their eyes since its people had always assumed religion and modernity could thrive together. Right now it looks like the American model is succeeding -- religion and modernity are going hand-in-hand all across the globe.

Secular intellectuals were looking forward to an atheistic world. Boy, have they been disappointed. You can see their exasperation in such books as The End of Faith, The God Delusion, and God Is Not Great. They are confronted with seeing the wrong sorts of religion worshiping -- not the mild, mainline Protestantism, but evangelicalism. In fact, the most remarkable religious success story of the past century has been the most emotional Christian religion of all -- Pentecostalism. Atheists are also frustrated by the kinds of people who are turning to religion. They expected it would be the weak, the ignorant, or the fearful. However, today it's actually the upwardly mobile, educated middle classes who are driving the explosion of faith. In America, the evangelicals are well educated and well off, much to the surprise of secular leaders and mass media pundits who have incorrect stereotyped images of religious people.

The authors give several reasons for the increase in religious beliefs. For one thing, the political classes in the West are waking up to the enduring power of religion. People over the last forty years have seen the overreach of elitist secularism. Politicians who have told us they can solve our problems have been shown to be failures. The authors believe competition and choice are driving the surge in religion just as they have in market capitalism. They say the American model of religion, one that is based on choice, is winning because it effectively blends God with modernity.

Christianity has spent longer grappling with modernity than other religions, so it's no wonder that it is doing so well on the world stage. The authors compare this attitude with Islam, where modernity does not sit well. It remains the world religion that has found pluralism hardest to cope with. Islam has not been through a Reformation, let alone an Enlightenment. The authors grant Islam is a power today, but they believe it will not be the direction we go in the future. Let's hope they are right.

This brief overview gives you an idea of the book's premise. In future blogs I would like to explore a few more specific points the authors bring up.