Evangelicals Fear the Loss of Their Teenagers

[cal04]

Despite their packed megachurches, their political clout and their increasing visibility on the national stage, evangelical Christian leaders are warning one another that their teenagers are abandoning the faith in droves.

At an unusual series of leadership meetings in 44 cities this fall, more than 6,000 pastors are hearing dire forecasts from some of the biggest names in the conservative evangelical movement.

Their alarm has been stoked by a highly suspect claim that if current trends continue, only 4 percent of teenagers will be “Bible-believing Christians” as adults. That would be a sharp decline compared with 35 percent of the current generation of baby boomers, and before that, 65 percent of the World War II generation.

While some critics say the statistics are greatly exaggerated (one evangelical magazine for youth ministers dubbed it “the 4 percent panic attack”), there is widespread consensus among evangelical leaders that they risk losing their teenagers.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/06/us/06evangelical.html?hp&ex=1160107200&en=4bc2ab121e996b11&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[eallen]

1. A learned stupidity is not that heritable.

[City of Mills]

2. Let's see them...

...deny evolution now :evilgrin:

[Webster Green]

3. Praise the Lord!

Great news!

[GAspnes]

4. Good (n/t)

[sutz12]

5. Perhaps there is hope for the future. nt

[Recursion]

6. But then who will they send racy IMs to? n/t

[Malikshah]

7. They should be concerned about losing them to endless war.

Too bad they don't really love their kids--otherwise, this increasingly powerful segment of society would have acted against the regime. Their silence is deafening. Their silence shows them to be less than they claim in terms of their capacity to believe in the message of their Savior and to follow in his footsteps.

Their silence is damning.

[physioex]

10. You would think...

That the fundy churches would be fertile ground for military recruiters......

[DianeG5385]

It's always been this way

The kids run screaming for the big city once they are of age!

[NOLADEM]

8. Drug treatment facilities and herion alleys everywhere are full of their

Children.

[wholetruth00]

9. The youth are usually the first to recognize hypocrisy and reject it.

they probably hate having to live among the Pharisees and Sadducees.

[MADem]

11. Of COURSE the kids are leaving. That Xtian rock SUCKS!!!!

And what putzes...like their parents, they run on fear and bribery (and this is stupid--making them toss away all their fun shit):

When Eric Soto, 18, transferred from a small charter school to a large public high school in Chicago, he said he was disappointed to find that an extracurricular Bible study attracted only five to eight students. “When we brought food, we thought we could get a better turnout,” he said. They got 12. ....The next morning, Mr. Luce led the crowd in an exercise in which they wrote on scraps of paper all the negative cultural influences, brand names, products and television shows that they planned to excise from their lives. Again they streamed down the aisles, this time to throw away the “cultural garbage.”

Trash cans filled with folded pieces of paper on which the teenagers had scribbled things like Ryan Seacrest, Louis Vuitton, “Gilmore Girls,” “Days of Our Lives,” Iron Maiden, Harry Potter, “need for a boyfriend” and “my perfect teeth obsession.” One had written in tiny letters: “fornication.”

[valerief]

12. Yeah, they'll all be shipped off to Iraq and shot at. nt

[Warren DeMontague]

13. Pffffffft.

Maybe they should have thought of that before they started beating the crap out of their kids with those special sticks they ordered online from James Dobson.

[EST]

14. Ah, wishful thinking...

[madmusic]

15. “the 4 percent panic attack”

That's sweet.

How come Christian music is exploding?

[MiniMandaRuth]

16. Che.

I go to youth group. That's enough. Bastids. Put some porno in the Bible's and that'll hook 'em.

[kineneb]

18. read the Song of Solomon (OldT.)

can be construed to be pretty racy... allegory or not. Guess they don't tell the kiddies about that one.

[Art_from_Ark]

23. Don't forget Lot and his daughters,

David lusting after Bathsheba, and Abraham knocking up his handmaidens.

[knitter4democracy]

17. Nothing new. They said that when I was in youth group.

And at our "Christian" college. And every Sunday since then. This is nothing new.

In reality, the turnover in those churches is higher than they want to admit, especially over the long term.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

20. Liberal Protestant denominations are full of people who

were brought up as fundamentalists.

[cynatnite]

21. Same thing when I was in church...

They would lament how the youth is being brainwashed by sex, drugs and rock & roll. We were being corrupted, blah, blah, blah. I swear the rhetoric never changes.

[ComerPerro]

19. Funny thing is, they have nothing to worry about

because NONE of them are Bible believing Christians anyway.

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

22. That's why they're sending the brats to kiddie guerrilla camp

Gotsta snag those souls while they're still young.

:shrug:

[stopbush]

24. As they say: The Truth Will Out.

It's a start.