Actually, the above post may sound somewhat snippy - I just realised that those are the opinions of the people whom you’ve read, not you necessarily.
Sorry.
I’m still not comfortable with the idea of traveling to a counrty specifically to convert people, though. Just my personal opinion.
Re your first paragraph, that’s why I asked.
Apology accepted.
Re your last paragraph, well, from the earliest documents we have, it seems to have been JC’s idea.
At least here, I think the charitable work done by local church is way more limited than in the USA (that’s just a guess based on frequent references on this board to what is done in the USA by local churches, compared to it being very rarely mentionned in France). The bulk of the christian charitable work, I suspect, is done by nation-wide christian charities receiving donations directly, not by local churches. Also, these charities don’t stress the fact they’re christian. I sometimes receive letters from some of them, and you’d have a hard time finding any rreference to religion in their mails.
Also, and this time it’s not a guess but based on figures I read, european people give significantly less money to charities, christian or not, than american people.
Why? Because they think the public welfare state is enough?
Taking it as a given that Europe (and the BI) are irreligious its really not too hard to see why that would be…nor why the US isn’t (quite) there yet. I’d say that religion has left a pretty bad taste in the collective mouths of our European brethren and sisteren over the years. How many millions have died in their various religious squabbles? I’m surprised (especially after that eye opening tax post about Germany) that ANYONE still clings to a religious affiliation in Europe these days.
The US on the other hand was founded by religious folks fleeing the various persecutions and the odd pogroms in Europe. Couple that with the fact that we haven’t had many 30 years wars, many Spanish Inquisition, many Protestant vs Catholic all out slugfests to the death, many anti-Jewish riots, many Crusades, etc its not that hard to understand why there is a difference between our respective outlooks.
-XT
clairobscur writes:
> Also, and this time it’s not a guess but based on figures I read, european
> people give significantly less money to charities, christian or not, than american
> people.
Really? Do you have some figures on this? I’ve read that the average American donates less than 2% of his/her income to charity.
xtisme writes:
> The US on the other hand was founded by religious folks fleeing the various
> persecutions and the odd pogroms in Europe.
Well, no, actually. The overwhelming majority of immigrants to the U.S. (even if you were to specify the immigrants before 1800, or before 1700, or whatever) did not come to America for religious reasons. The fact that some famous cases of coming to America for religious reasons always get played up in American history textbooks doesn’t mean that they are typical examples.
Really? Do you have a census as to why they did want to come here? Did they all (or some percentage of them) list their reasons? If so, do you have a cite?
Also…did the Europeans not kill each other for centuries in job lots over religion or was that part true?
-XT
Some timely statistics on religion and belief from UK:
And after looking for a few days, I finally found those statistics on Norwegians’ beliefs that I knew I’d seen somewhere. (PDF, in Norwegian, from 1998.) The following questions only asked about “God” (capital G), without specifying religion:
[ul][li]Don’t believe in God 11.6%[/li][li]Don’t know, don’t think it’s possible to know 12%[/li][li]Don’t believe in a person-like God, but believe in some kind of higher power 24.9%[/li][li]Believe in God sometimes, don’t believe sometimes 8.4%[/li][li]Doubt, but feel that I believe in God 23.9%[/li][li]Know that God exists, don’t doubt 18.3%[/li][li]No answer to this question 0.9%[/ul][/li]Some other answers (I omit some “don’t know” and no answer here, and do some summary and rounding of fractions in my head, so the numbers don’t all add up to 100%):[ul][li]Believe in life after death: Yes 44%, no 40%[/li][li]Believe in Heaven Yes 32%, no 46%[/li][li]Believe in Hell Yes 15%, no 63%[/li][li]Opinion on the Bible:[list]God’s word, should be taken literally 9%[/li][li]Inspired by God 31%[/li][li]Collection of old fables, legends and moral teachings made by human beings 44%[/li][li]Not relevant to me 4%[/ul][/li][li]“Jesus is my saviour and died for my sins”: Agree 22%, partially agree 12%, don’t agree 27%, don’t know 17%, no answer 23%[/li][/list] There are loads of other questions on morals, opinions, and life stance, but none that reasonably cover new age-beliefs (there’s something on astrology, meditation, and alternative medicine, but those can exist alongside with all kinds of religions or lack thereof, so they don’t really fit).
So, there it is: At least one European country where less than a fourth of the population agree with a core statement (perhaps The core statement) of Christianity. And where 85% of the population belong to the state church.
Another question is whether missionaries from US would be at all effective in converting anyone here. I have strong doubts on that account. But that is, I guess, another Great Debate.
Oh, and xtisme, I’ve no cites on this, but I’ve always heard that the emigration to US was mostly economically motivated. Huge numbers going during/after the potato plague in Ireland. The mythology of US as the promised land of milk and honey, younger sons and daughters leaving an overpopulated, poor Norway to go to a land where, rumour said, fertile land was free for the taking. “Uncle from America” is a Norwegian cliche for someone who’s immensely wealthy and visits to shover gifts on everybody.
Do you have a cite ? I’ve always heard we’re at or near the bottom of the industrialized world, on a per capita or per dollar of income basis. We give a lot in absolute terms because we’re rich, that’s all.
Let’s rewind this…
Do you have a cite? Do you have a census as to why they did want to come here?
While it’s nice to talk up the supposed motivation of the country’s founders, the vast majority of immigrants to the US throughout its history have been economic migrants. They come to America because of the opportunities and the wealth This must surely play a larger part in the “American outlook” than a few thousand people at the outset of American history.
Of course not…I doubt such a beast even exists, as I seriously doubt anyone actually sat down and asked folks why they had left the old world for the new. While my own statement that the US was founded by folks seeking religious freedom may have been a bit overblow, by the same token so was Wendell Wagner’s categoric denial of it. Thus my request for a cite, seeing as he was speaking so authoratatively. Had s/he asked me I would have backed off my own assertion and said that the truth lies somewhere in the middle. SOME folks certainly came here for religious freedom, and it was certainly an important concern (not that it was addressed directly in the Constitution…not exactly a minor issue), while others came here for other economic reasons. Some of those economic reasons though also had (perhaps tangentially) to do with religion (like perhaps the Irish potato famine).
Really this wasn’t central to the point I was trying to make in any case…which is that Europe has historically had a lot of bad experience with religion so its no great shock that religion is at a low point there (taken as a whole, noting that there are exceptions)…while America hasn’t really had anything similar. To me this explains (in a simplistic way) the differences in religious outlook between Europe and the US. European history explains a LOT of differences between Europe today’s various attituded and attitudes in the US IMO.
-XT
Why is that a joke? Another thing that’s being said in this thread is that Germans don’t mind paying taxes to support their churches. You can’t assume that such taxation is going to drive religious belief underground.
Is that the same thing as a yarmulke?
I think that this was the whole point of the posts that you were responding to – that Blair might be just as religious as Bush, but if he pushed his religious beliefs as publicly as Bush does, he would be considered immoderate and would find it more difficult to win elections.
And I don’t think it is just a matter of rhetoric. Even if two people are religious to the same degree with regard to their sincere personal belief, it is to me a qualitative difference, not just one of rhetoric, that one of them will keep his religious beliefs largely to himself when discussing matters of public policy, whereas the other will take every opportunity to burden the public with his personal religious views while conducting matters of state.
From all the sources I can find, economic reasons seem to dominate immigration patterns in general:
And the majority of immigrants to the US seem to have been no exception to this rule. We tend to see a lot of historical emphasis on the Puritans fleeing religious persecution (or seeking a more congenial environment for their own religious monoculture, or whatever), but remember that they don’t represent a very high percentage of colonial immigrants, most of whom were shipped overseas as transported convicts, contracted settlers sponsored by business ventures, or displaced agricultural workers hoping to earn their own land.
Yes. Yarmulke is the Yiddish word for it, kippah is the Hebrew word.
Coming over to convert us, is he?
I’ll sharpen my spear and start building a wicker man.
Can anyone describe wha the situation is like in Italy and Poland?
I’m asking because my hometown has a very large population of Italian-Americans and Polish-Americans, and collectively they rend to be extremely Catholic. Most I know attend weekly and sometimes daily masses, there’s a couple of Catholic radio stations in the city, EWTN is usually on a very low channel on area cable systems, elaborate Mary on the Half Shell displays are common in yards, car interiors are often adorned with religious trinkets, every non-public college is Catholic, on Ash Wednesday it’s only the rare forehead that is clean, many pine for Latin mass … it’s quite hardcore.
And a thought: could one thing contributing to the religosity of the US be the sheer variety of religions out there? I keep reading in this thread that Ireland and France are predominantly Catholic, Scandanavian contries mostly Lutheran, THe UK (at least England) mostly Anglican/Episcopal, and so on. The majority of people in the US are Christians, but here’s really no denomination out there that is overwhelmingly dominant. With more options, it’s a bit easier to find a religion that fits your spiritual needs.
I’ll conceed the point then (especially as it wasn’t the main point I was raising). I have to admit I WAS thinking of the puritans and various other persecuted sects of Christianity, the immigration from Scotland after the Jacobite uprising and the Irish after the potato famine (both of which I think have religious connotations), the Jews at various points in history fleeing pogroms in Europe, etc. However I’m sure that more folks came here for the land and opportunity than for religious reasons. The main point though is we haven’t had nearly the religious problems here in the states as they have had in Europe historically, so religion doesn’t have the same effect on us as it does on our European kin…or does it leave the same bad taste in our mouth as it does them.
-XT