I’m reminded of the Yes, Prime Minister bit :
Does it have anything to do with the fact that the US is politically far to the right of most European nations, with no national left-of-centre party at all?
At the same time, is the US more religious than Europe? I think that assertion could be open to debate. Both blocs seem happy worshipping the God that is money and profit and sidelining the poor.
I haven’t responded anything to anything about Spanish citizenships because this post is the first time I’ve noticed anything about such a question.
AFAIK the granting or not of Spanish nationality to the children of foreign residents is governed by bilateral treaties; I’d be all, not merely for the granting of local nationality to anybody born in a country, but for the complete elimination of nationality as an administrative element. You’re wherever you happen to be, you’re subject to the laws of wherever you happen to be, and who the fuck gives a shit where you or your parents were from when it comes to applying such laws. That good enough for you?
Were you adressing such a question to me personally, to any Spaniards, or confusing me with sailor?
A search has led me to information on a poll published by El País including such completely stupid questions as, indeed, “do you think Spanish Jews are more loyal to Israel than to Spain”, which took place among high school students in the kind of areas where a child with an evidently-Hispanic name has about a 45% probability of having a Latin American parent and another 5% of having a Guinean parent. From what I can tell, the poll was
- translated from American ones, a methodology which is for some reason very popular among our poll-makers,
- slightly adapted to Spain (but only slightly, as evidenced by that question above)
- and generally displays a level of intelligence which would have led my own HS class to throw pencils to the floor in disgust about the time we reached question #3 and, when told we had to answer, to go on with the most stupid answers we could think of.
The poll-takers did something akin to going to East LA and asking students “would you be willing to have a Hispanic classmate?” I’m trying to decide what’s more stupid, the poll or the local comentators who are taking it as an accurate representation of national attitudes despite having the information to realize how stupid the poll is.
Lack of independent thought.
Poor education.
Sheeple mentality passed down generation to generation.
EVANGELICISM - serious bible thumping. I personally have had crusaders visit my doorstep over 20 times. And I live in one of the most independent thinking, well educated cities in the country, and the crusaders (Mars Hill, The City Church, etc.) have practically taken over our city.
Cult mentality.
Low self esteem - a need to “belong” to something to validate your existence.
Shall I continue… ?
I’d completely forgotten about this being busy at work and since the thread had gone completely off-topic was no longer all that interested in it.
Frankly, I’d have been more interested in discussions of why Arab and Japanese immigrants in Latin America seemed to have a much easier time in getting accepted into the local culture than Arab and other non-white immigrants seem to be in much of Europe and arguably the United States.
You’ll notice I immediately apologized for the question after I posted it as you can see from the following post. I’ll apologize for posting it again because it was obnoxious and confrontational. FTR, I’d confused you with Sailor.
Once again, apologies to the both of you.
Anyway, here’s the poll in question which was of a number of different European countries, not just Spain, by the ADL.
http://www.adl.org/assets/pdf/israel-international/Public-ADL-Anti-Semitism-Presentation-February-2009-3.pdf(warning PDF).
Since the poll wasn’t taken of high school students it wasn’t the one you’re referring to and the ADL has always been known for being extremely reliable in it’s studies and is regularly cited by academics of all different stripes.
Once again, sorry for the confusion and I wasn’t trying to cast asperions on either Spain or Europe, just note that the idea that somehow xenophobia is vastly worse in the US than Europe is patently false as plenty of minorities within Europe can testify to.
I think however it’s really a subject for a different thread since I don’t think xenophobia is why so many, for example, African-Americans are far more church-going than Western Europeans.
Sailor is the one with more body hair 
Apologies myself for the snark in my own answer, I’m having “nationality issues” at the time but it’s definitely not your fault (my Catalan clients and boss apparently don’t believe it’s possible to celebrate “Navarre’s day” without going to Navarre - it’s 400 km away and they were expecting me to go there and back in the day! I would have needed Smaug Cab Service!).
That poll’s still asking the wrong questions, sorry. I’m sure they prepared it in good faith but they prepared it wrong.
I don’t think your history is relevant. American religious fervor was at a pretty low level back in the 50s. People were going to church, but they weren’t spouting the “Lord willing” or getting religiously political. Growing up in a religious Dutch immigrant family in Canada back to the fifties, I can recall the general perception of America in my Dutch Reformed community as generally hedonistic.
Along comes Billy Graham with the large revivals and non denominational approach somewhat defragmenting American Christianity just in time for Roe vs Wade sparking an intensive religious regeneration that allied Catholics and many Protestant groups.
Further to that, was the introduction of drums and guitars in religious service, swelling the ranks of practicing Christians .
I very much doubt that this is the case. Sailor and I have had this discussion in another thread: The granting or refusal of a country’s nationality is a matter for that country’s national law. I’d like to see a state leaving this fundamental issue to a system of bilateral treaties - and even if it did, it would not exonerate the country from the responsibility for granting or refusing nationality, since we would then have to ask: Why did the country conclude this or that treaty? So the question remains: Does Spain’s (or, for that matter, my country’s) refusal to grant citizenship to the child of a foreign resident indicate a level of xenophobia among the majority of the population that is not present in another country which does grant citizenship to these people? In my view, that’s a perfectly valid point.
I’d liken it more to a historical European top-down imposition of religion vs. the bottom-up nature of American religion.
In other words, a bunch of European countries were more or less mass converted to Christianity with the collusion and often the force of the ruling authorities. Everyone was Christian and there was little tolerance for anything else.
Contrast that with the US, where there’s always been a strict* separation of church and state, and you end up with a situation where the actual religious people are doing it out of inherent desire, rather than having it imposed on them. Self selecting for increased fervor and faith, as it were.
You see this in two ways- the religious types are becoming more religious as society in general is going the opposite way. The old “everyone goes to church” peer pressure that existed in previous decades and centuries is declining; a LOT of people are nominally Christian, but only go to church at Xmas and Easter, and a lot more are nominally Christian, but never actually outwardly worship.
There’s also the increasing political activism of the more conservative factions- Evangelicals, Baptists and other assorted wingnuts, who are almost by definition the ones who are self-selecting the most. This makes people assume that all Christians are part of that bunch, and that we all believe / politically agitate for same things they do.
Which isn’t true; I suspect that the Episcopalians, Lutherans, Methodists and Catholics far outnumber the wingnuts, but they only make 1/4 the noise, and that noise is much less strident and intolerant, so there’s not much press.
- The bush-league shit the religious right is doing these days doesn’t compare to say… 17th century England.
It’s a matter of acknowledging the country of origin as a party in the relationship, the same principle under which we do not perform weddings for people whose wedding would be illegal in their country. Before we grant jus solis nationality to someone, we want a paper from the government from which they get jus sanguinis saying that’s not going to be a problem. Why should we not recognize their jus sanguinis nationality?
The United States, as a whole, is a lot less religious than it was 50 years ago. Religious belief has eroded quite a bit in the United States, it just hasn’t completely collapsed the way it has in most of Europe.
Are you describing the U.S. or Europe?
Notably, it’s the mainstream, old-line Protestant churches that are aging and dwindling. The more energetically evangelical churches are doing much better.
Well, I wouldn’t say completely collapsed. If you’ve never been to Italy or Spain for example, the Jesus is still *kinda *big there :).
Kobal2:
Bigger than the Beatles?
They’re neck and neck but just you wait until Jesus’ big comeback tour, it’ll be nuts.
America worships money and celebrity.
Don’t fool yourself if you think otherwise.
Is there any reason why you include JW’s Muslims and Buddhists in a list of 'churches, Filbert? Why not Baptist, Brethren, Methodist, Pentecostalist, Presbyterian, etc? After all, there are probably more non-Catholic and Anglican Christian denominations in the UK than there are other, non-Christian religions.
Wrong, NB. The membership of the CofE is determined by who is on the electoral role of its various parishes. As for tithing being a particularly USA concept, it has been around for centuries, even before the time of Christ. If anything, its a Jewish concept which has been absorbed into Christian thinking. The USA bit about the concept is that it only applies to money. Most other parts of Christendom appreciate that it covers time and abilities, and not just money.
Regarding the governance of the CofE, it is tied up with government to a degree. Any major development within the church - such as the move from the Book of Common Prayer to something like the Alternative Service Book in the 80s, had to pass both the Synod and a Commons vote. The same has already happened in terms of disestablishment. There was an attempt to disestablish from within the churchback in the 60s, which had a lot of internal support, but it was beaten in a House of Commons vote.
I’m not sure, John. After all, its two main parties are still well right of centre in European terms. In fact, there is no left-of-centre party in the US.