Christianity in Today's America
1/19/09 at 08:27 PM 0 Comments

The New Millennium Christian

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Throughout American history it seems that cultures have changed their beliefs in the Bible, attending church, or in essence being a Christian. As a matter of fact, LifeWay Research which is an organization that develops surveys and other studies on religious topics showed that many non-believers don't have an understanding of God. Results on a survey conducted on 1,402 "unchurched" adults showed that 61% said the God of the Bible is "no different from the gods of spiritual beings depicted by world religions such as Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, etc". The survey also showed that 86% of adults said that they believed a relationship with God could be attained without belonging to a church.

At one time in our nation people didn't choose what beliefs they wanted to adopt as if they were going to a McDonald's drive thru. The bible was the source of guidance and overall direction for people's lives. Now it's obvious today that the word of God has become just an old history book with no significance for today in many non-Christians lives. So how did we come to this point in our nation?

In order to see how we came to this point we must look back in American History and the way our belief systems were impacted by past generations. Let's begin with the generation of who we called the "Baby Boomers". According to Wikipedia, this was the generation born after World War II between the years of (1945-1965). During this era peoples belief system changed significantly which impacted our nation in relation to Christianity. In an article by Time magazine, a sociologist Wade Roof did a study on baby boomers and their religious affiliations. Results showed that 42% of baby boomers were dropouts from formal religion, a third never stayed in church, and one-fourth of boomers were returning to religion. During this time many people decided to follow their own beliefs and left Christianity. We can see the results of how our nation's standards changed in the 60's and 70's when our society moved into the "free love and sex" movement. Our judicial system also made landmark decisions of legalizing abortion in (Roe. vs. Wade) and taking mandatory prayer out of schools. (Murray vs. Curlett)

The next generation called the "Baby Busters" or "Generation X" according to Wikipedia was born between the years of (1965-1979). The "baby busters" grew up in a time where computer technology and MTV was introduced to our society. Many people believed that those born during this time were raised on television. And music television or MTV opened the door to artists conveying messages that were not a representation of the kingdom of God but the very opposite. The producers of videos began to "push the button" and allowed more sexually explicit material on television.

The next generation that I'll briefly describe was called the iGeneration which are those born between the years of (1985-1990's). People born during this time were born in a nation that had really left the principals of Christianity and left nothing to the imagination. This was a time where the pornographic industry began making more money than Hollywood and various alternative styles of living were accepted and tolerated. I could go on but you can see how godly lifestyles went on a decline throughout the years.

Although we've seen from a brief historical view of how we got to the place where people's beliefs and standards have changed, we still need to look at two other reasons from a humanistic and religious point of view. Stay tuned.

 Jesse Duckworth has a new book called Against All Odds: Men pursuing purity in a pornographic society. The book is available at, Barnes and Noble and other online bookstores. He does speaking engagements for churches, high schools, and college campus organizations. You can reach Jesse at his website
