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Baylor ISR - Rodney Stark- End of Religion? (May 5, 2015) — Transcript

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  1. 0:09so I'm going to introduce the first
  2. 0:10person who is the co-director of ISR
  3. 0:13Rodney Stark he and I came to Baylor
  4. 0:15about the same time almost 11 years ago
  5. 0:18and uh Rodney really needs no
  6. 0:21introduction uh but he's become a dear
  7. 0:23friend and colleague you can see a
  8. 0:25number of his books outside on display
  9. 0:27as well as other uh books by is our
  10. 0:30faculty um so Rod uh come give us the
  11. 0:34first talk of our
  12. 0:48conference oh my I've been sitting here
  13. 0:51with my back to you and I didn't notice
  14. 0:53how many of you came
  15. 0:57in you're all aware that at least once a
  16. 1:00month sometimes more often there'll be a
  17. 1:03big story in the national press always
  18. 1:07the same story usually by the same
  19. 1:11suspects having to do with the fact that
  20. 1:14religion is
  21. 1:16doomed last week Daniel Dennett the sage
  22. 1:21of tuft
  23. 1:23University was uh quoted at Great length
  24. 1:26in the Wall Street Journal about the
  25. 1:28fact that it's all over we finally won
  26. 1:31according to
  27. 1:32dennet religion is dead and if it looks
  28. 1:35like it's still healthy that's because
  29. 1:38that's a dying
  30. 1:42spasm well whatever else that may be
  31. 1:45it's not news people have been
  32. 1:47predicting the end of religion for more
  33. 1:50than three
  34. 1:51centuries and true to form the very
  35. 1:55first person who did it was an Anglican
  36. 1:58clergyman writing in
  37. 2:021710 Thomas Wilston predicted that all
  38. 2:05traces of religion would be
  39. 2:08gone by
  40. 2:111900 voler thought he was pessimistic
  41. 2:15and in a letter to Frederick the great
  42. 2:17voler said now it'll all be gone and
  43. 2:22over by
  44. 2:271810 subsequently
  45. 2:30these sorts of people got a little
  46. 2:33circumspect and now they will only say
  47. 2:37soon they won't say
  48. 2:42when that's all
  49. 2:45right
  50. 2:47because somehow they still get all the
  51. 2:50Press
  52. 2:52um Peter Burger the sage of Boston
  53. 2:56University and once a visitor to bayor
  54. 3:01told the New York Times in
  55. 3:031968 that the 21st cent in the 21st
  56. 3:08century religious Believers are likely
  57. 3:10to be found only in small sects huddled
  58. 3:15together to resist the worldwide secular
  59. 3:19culture the predicament of the believer
  60. 3:22is increasingly like that of a Tibetan
  61. 3:26astrologer on a prolonged visit to an
  62. 3:29American
  63. 3:30University now the subsequent
  64. 3:32lionization of the do llama on American
  65. 3:36campuses suggests that there's another
  66. 3:38interpretation possible here but the
  67. 3:41fact
  68. 3:44is that it's the 21st
  69. 3:48century and it still hasn't
  70. 3:52happened
  71. 3:55moreover the facts are that the world is
  72. 3:58probably much more religious than it was
  73. 4:01a century ago it may in fact be more
  74. 4:04religious than it ever
  75. 4:07was never before has organized religion
  76. 4:12enrolled such a huge proportion of the
  77. 4:15world's
  78. 4:17population worldwide
  79. 4:2081% of the people belong to one of the
  80. 4:24major organized
  81. 4:28faiths
  82. 4:31all of the great world religions are
  83. 4:34growing with the possible exception of
  84. 4:38Buddhism and contrary to uninformed
  85. 4:41accounts Christianity is growing far
  86. 4:45faster than either Islam or
  87. 4:49Hinduism and regardless of their
  88. 4:52religion 74% of the world's people say
  89. 4:57religion is an important part of their
  90. 4:58daily lives
  91. 5:0150% say they have attended a worship
  92. 5:04service in the past 7
  93. 5:08Days in very few Nations do more than
  94. 5:135% claim to be
  95. 5:15atheists and only in China Vietnam and
  96. 5:18South Korea do they exceed
  97. 5:2220% furthermore in every nook and
  98. 5:26cranny left by organized religions
  99. 5:30all manner
  100. 5:32of unchurched
  101. 5:35spirituality and
  102. 5:37mysticisms are
  103. 5:41booming there are more occult
  104. 5:44practitioners in Russia than there are
  105. 5:46medical
  106. 5:47doctors 38% of the French believe in
  107. 5:51astrology 35% of the Swiss agree some
  108. 5:56fortune tellers really can foresee the
  109. 5:59future
  110. 6:00future and nearly everyone in
  111. 6:03Japan takes a careful action to have
  112. 6:07their new car blessed by a Shinto
  113. 6:12priest probably can't get insurance if
  114. 6:15you
  115. 6:16don't
  116. 6:19true now where do these numbers come
  117. 6:22from I mean you're sitting out to say
  118. 6:24how does he know this because of a
  119. 6:27wonderful thing called the gallop world
  120. 6:29World
  121. 6:31polls they started in
  122. 6:352005 and by now they're doing an annual
  123. 6:38National survey in every one of 163
  124. 6:44Nations which add up to 98% of the
  125. 6:47world's
  126. 6:48population and by collapsing years you
  127. 6:52can get huge case bases 10 15,000 in
  128. 6:57various countries which means that the
  129. 6:59statistics are extremely stable and
  130. 7:02probably very
  131. 7:05accurate now I have a book coming
  132. 7:09out uh in the fall in which I use these
  133. 7:14data to cover the world here I'm going
  134. 7:16to only talk about a few places um I'm
  135. 7:20certainly not going to talk about Europe
  136. 7:22because my colleague Philip Jenkins is
  137. 7:24going to do that I'm going to leave
  138. 7:25America alone because Byron is going to
  139. 7:28end the program with the United
  140. 7:31States but let's begin with Latin
  141. 7:34America for centuries Latin America was
  142. 7:38alleged to be a Roman Catholic
  143. 7:42continent the Catholic Almanac of
  144. 7:461949 reported that the percent
  145. 7:50Catholic in Argentina was
  146. 7:5599.2% that it was 98% in Bolivia
  147. 8:00that it was
  148. 8:0299.8% in
  149. 8:04Chile and it made similar claims for the
  150. 8:07other Latin Nations the truth is that no
  151. 8:10more than 20 and usually closer to 10%
  152. 8:13of the people in any Latin American
  153. 8:15Nation ever went to
  154. 8:17church so few men entered the
  155. 8:21seminaries that all across the
  156. 8:24continent most of the priests had always
  157. 8:28been imported
  158. 8:30from elsewhere in the
  159. 8:32world then came Protestant
  160. 8:35competition during the second half of
  161. 8:38the 20th
  162. 8:39century it finally became legal for
  163. 8:42Protestants to exist in Latin America
  164. 8:45and they started converting tens of
  165. 8:47millions of
  166. 8:50people now the Catholic Church of course
  167. 8:53had to respond and their first
  168. 8:57response was something call Liberation
  169. 9:00theology and the Assumption was that
  170. 9:03people were becoming Protestants because
  171. 9:05they were poor and deprived and
  172. 9:07Powerless so let's put some Marxism
  173. 9:10together with some Catholicism and let's
  174. 9:12go out and get them all to join base
  175. 9:14communities and we'll get rid of these
  176. 9:17Protestants and despite the fact that
  177. 9:19the current pope seems to think that's
  178. 9:21the way to go and that's the way he went
  179. 9:24in Argentina it was a thunderous
  180. 9:27flop nobody
  181. 9:32joined but then came some wiser
  182. 9:37heads something
  183. 9:41called the Catholic Charismatic renewal
  184. 9:48mement it meant the P met the
  185. 9:51Pentecostals head on with the same kind
  186. 9:54of intense religion because people were
  187. 9:55not converting because they were poor
  188. 9:57they were converting for religion the
  189. 9:59rich were as likely as the poor to
  190. 10:01become Protestants and you know what the
  191. 10:04Catholic Charismatic religious movement
  192. 10:07has greatly
  193. 10:09slowed the progress of protestantism in
  194. 10:12Latin
  195. 10:14America how did it do it it did it by
  196. 10:16filling the
  197. 10:18churches it's amazing but in seven of
  198. 10:21the 18 major Latin American nations
  199. 10:25weekly Mass attendance today is above
  200. 10:2960% a
  201. 10:32week in six others it's above 50% a week
  202. 10:37keep in mind that it's 31% in Spain and
  203. 10:4029 in Canada and we're talking about
  204. 10:43really full
  205. 10:45churches uh something hadn't been seen
  206. 10:49before in 1960 there were 4,000 men in
  207. 10:53Catholic seminaries in Latin America
  208. 10:55today there are well over
  209. 10:5820,000 uh religion worked the more the
  210. 11:02more important point is that what wasn't
  211. 11:04a Catholic continent is now very much a
  212. 11:08Christian
  213. 11:10continent but it's nothing compared to
  214. 11:12South subsaharan
  215. 11:14Africa there
  216. 11:16are more Christians in subsaharan Africa
  217. 11:21than there are anywhere else in the
  218. 11:24world a third of the world's more than
  219. 11:28two billion Christians are there and
  220. 11:30across my
  221. 11:32colleague has written about this a great
  222. 11:35length about Christianity in the global
  223. 11:37South and it's
  224. 11:41true church
  225. 11:43attendance is extraordinary in
  226. 11:45subsaharan Africa uh the Latin American
  227. 11:49attendance looks bad if you start
  228. 11:51looking at subsaharan Africa where
  229. 11:52people tend to go at levels of 80 and
  230. 11:5690% a week to to Long church
  231. 12:05services many of these people belong to
  232. 12:09African denominations I mean one started
  233. 12:12by Africans but many also are Roman
  234. 12:15Catholics and the Gallup WHL pole
  235. 12:17statistics on the number of Catholics in
  236. 12:19the various African nations is way way
  237. 12:22above what the Catholic Almanac
  238. 12:25claims so I got a hold of some people in
  239. 12:28the Vatican and then asked them about it
  240. 12:30they were delighted to hear the news but
  241. 12:32they didn't know why and they finally
  242. 12:34concluded that the priests are so busy
  243. 12:37with baptisms and confessions that they
  244. 12:39don't bother to count and therefore the
  245. 12:42numbers are 20 years old and I guess
  246. 12:44that's probably what's going
  247. 12:47on we could of
  248. 12:51course me it's it's just it's just
  249. 12:55amazing what's going on
  250. 12:58there
  251. 13:07the fact now I'd like to switch
  252. 13:11slightly and talk
  253. 13:14about the great Muslim
  254. 13:18rival as recently as the
  255. 13:221960s Western experts including the
  256. 13:26CIA assumed Muslims were rapidly
  257. 13:29becoming secularized and they began
  258. 13:31teaching and Reporting all of this at a
  259. 13:34very time in which a great renewal was
  260. 13:36going on in Islam that they didn't
  261. 13:39bother to look
  262. 13:42at during the 1950s about 100,000
  263. 13:45pilgrims a year went to
  264. 13:48Mecca by the mid 1970s that number had
  265. 13:52risen to a million a year in
  266. 13:552012 it topped 3 million it could
  267. 13:59probably be as high as 10 or 15 million
  268. 14:02but the Saudis won't give them more
  269. 14:03visas than that because it's so
  270. 14:06difficult to provide food and water and
  271. 14:08shelter in the middle of the desert so 3
  272. 14:11million is all they're letting come
  273. 14:14in even
  274. 14:21so there are very few longitudinal data
  275. 14:25available on belief in Islam but there
  276. 14:27are for turkey
  277. 14:29but only for the last 20 years even so
  278. 14:33you find enormous increases in things
  279. 14:35like mosque
  280. 14:37attendants um the proportion who believe
  281. 14:40in Hell went from 83 to
  282. 14:4499 83 is awfully high but 99 means
  283. 14:47everybody 99 means something else it
  284. 14:50means that this isn't all about a bunch
  285. 14:52of impoverished folks running around in
  286. 14:55the Arab streets
  287. 14:57socalled the educated ated are in fact
  288. 15:00slightly more religious in the Muslim
  289. 15:03nations than the least educated it turns
  290. 15:06out that by the way we'll find that's
  291. 15:08true in many other parts of the world
  292. 15:10contrary to most
  293. 15:14sociologists the CIA of course has now
  294. 15:17been recently was I it was yesterday the
  295. 15:21former deputy director of the CIA
  296. 15:23confessed that made a terrible mistake
  297. 15:25about the Arab
  298. 15:27Spring that they when the governments of
  299. 15:30Egypt and Libya and Yen and what not
  300. 15:32were overthrown they thought that this
  301. 15:34was going to be a great move towards
  302. 15:40secularization they didn't look at any
  303. 15:42of the
  304. 15:43polls I don't know why but they don't
  305. 15:46seem to look at polls but polls would
  306. 15:48have showed them that the people in
  307. 15:52Egypt were vastly vastly more
  308. 15:55Orthodox or extreme or whatever you want
  309. 15:58to call it than was the
  310. 16:00government and that in fact if you had
  311. 16:03an elect free election which they did
  312. 16:05have they'd elect a Muslim brother which
  313. 16:08they
  314. 16:09did it's it's it's amazing but uh um the
  315. 16:15one poll item that the government US
  316. 16:18Government made a lot of is after 911
  317. 16:21that the mass majority of people in the
  318. 16:23Muslim nations did not support
  319. 16:26it but what they failed to report report
  320. 16:30is the only people who supported it were
  321. 16:32those who thought Arabs had done it the
  322. 16:34rest of the people thought George Bush
  323. 16:36did it and of course they didn't support
  324. 16:38it so I mean you've got to be careful
  325. 16:41with what you're looking at in any event
  326. 16:45one thing I think before I move on I'd
  327. 16:47like to remind you is that whatever
  328. 16:50terrorism is involved it's mostly
  329. 16:52brother killing brother I have a book in
  330. 16:56which we we did a lot of calculations
  331. 16:58look about 70% of everyone who's killed
  332. 17:02by a Muslim terrorist is another Muslim
  333. 17:05perhaps a terrorist as well but uh it's
  334. 17:08at least somebody of a different form of
  335. 17:11Muslim faith now let's move to
  336. 17:16India when India became an independent
  337. 17:19country
  338. 17:221947 all of its political leaders have
  339. 17:25been educated in Great Britain and
  340. 17:27everybody thought consequently the
  341. 17:29secularization was coming with
  342. 17:31modernization and Neu the first
  343. 17:33president expected Hinduism to disappear
  344. 17:36within 40 or 50 years and of course
  345. 17:39that's not what happened U as India has
  346. 17:44modernized there's been a huge Muslim
  347. 17:48Revival uh India is much more religious
  348. 17:51now than it was 100 years ago you can
  349. 17:54measure it in all kinds of ways in terms
  350. 17:57of of pilgrims was going to the
  351. 17:59religious sites uh in 1986 1.3 people
  352. 18:05visited million people visited the Davi
  353. 18:09Shrine above cashmir last year a top 10
  354. 18:13million uh a
  355. 18:15cliche among Indian
  356. 18:18journalists is the gods are
  357. 18:21back a national survey in 2007 found
  358. 18:25that a third of Indians said they were
  359. 18:27more religious than they had been 5
  360. 18:28years years ago and only 3% said they
  361. 18:30were less
  362. 18:32religious 67% of Indians say they've
  363. 18:36attended a religious service in the past
  364. 18:38week 85% say religion is important in
  365. 18:41their daily lives and these numbers go
  366. 18:44up if you limit it only to Hindus in
  367. 18:48India and of course the more educated
  368. 18:52the more
  369. 18:55religious and then there's
  370. 18:57China
  371. 19:01uh odd little
  372. 19:04Story American and Western
  373. 19:08intellectuals Long believed that China
  374. 19:11was immune to religion 1934 Edgar snow
  375. 19:15equipped that in China opium is the
  376. 19:18religion of the people well American
  377. 19:22academics and all throughout Europe
  378. 19:26giggled
  379. 19:27agreed
  380. 19:29and decided that the several million
  381. 19:31Chinese who were attending Mission
  382. 19:33churches were rice Christians that they
  383. 19:36went there for the benefits and if the
  384. 19:38benefits stopped they'd go away and of
  385. 19:40course then came the Chinese Communist
  386. 19:44taking power in
  387. 19:461949 um
  388. 19:491966 came the cultural revolution and
  389. 19:53religion was declared
  390. 19:55illegal and the red guards
  391. 19:59burned or tore down or converted into
  392. 20:01warehouses all of the churches all of
  393. 20:04the pagodas all of the shrines anything
  394. 20:07religious that they could
  395. 20:14find and again the intellectuals looked
  396. 20:17around and said there there is the
  397. 20:19post-religious world we can see it and
  398. 20:22that turned out to be the Opium of
  399. 20:24Western intellectuals because the second
  400. 20:26the heat came off religion came
  401. 20:29bringing back tens of thousands of
  402. 20:32temples have been
  403. 20:34rebuilt and as for the rice
  404. 20:37Christians they went underground and
  405. 20:40when the heat came off they not only
  406. 20:42were still
  407. 20:44Christians there were three times as
  408. 20:46many of them as there had been before in
  409. 20:49other words back in the days when
  410. 20:52Christians were being shot people were
  411. 20:54joining the church in large
  412. 20:57numbers and now with the ha off of
  413. 21:00course they've been joining in even
  414. 21:02larger
  415. 21:04numbers nobody has been really sure as
  416. 21:08to what those numbers are some people
  417. 21:10say 20 million some people say 200
  418. 21:14million both numbers are
  419. 21:18silly unfortunately Gallup doesn't
  420. 21:20provide any data on religion in China
  421. 21:22because no foreign firms can ask
  422. 21:26questions about politics or religion
  423. 21:29in China but a big Chinese firm did so
  424. 21:33in 2007 huge survey 7,000
  425. 21:37respondents and by hooker crook we
  426. 21:41managed to get our hands on it uh we've
  427. 21:44got it in English um the
  428. 21:47calculations uh have been corrected for
  429. 21:50the fact that people under I mean it's
  430. 21:53still a little bit tricky to be a
  431. 21:55Christian in China and uh and so some
  432. 21:58people who are Christians wouldn't tell
  433. 22:00a strange uh survey administrator that
  434. 22:04that they were Christians but we found
  435. 22:05ways to correct for that and it looks
  436. 22:09like that
  437. 22:13about one
  438. 22:17about 70 million there's a strange thing
  439. 22:21here twice as many Chinese say they
  440. 22:25believe in Jesus as say that they're
  441. 22:27Christians and that's because the
  442. 22:29Chinese are all confused about what it
  443. 22:31means to belong to organizations and all
  444. 22:34sorts of other things but the best the
  445. 22:37the best conclusion is that there about
  446. 22:3970 or about were about 73 million
  447. 22:41Christians in China in
  448. 22:462007 in various ways I managed to
  449. 22:48calculate that there were
  450. 22:51probably about uh 10 million Christians
  451. 22:54in China in
  452. 22:561980 and you do the calculation that's a
  453. 22:59rate of growth of about 7% a
  454. 23:04year if that rate were to hold for
  455. 23:07another 15
  456. 23:08years you'd have 295 million Chinese
  457. 23:13Christians making China the largest the
  458. 23:16nation with the largest Christian
  459. 23:17population by the way even in 2007 there
  460. 23:21were more Chinese Christians and they
  461. 23:22were members of the Communist
  462. 23:25Party not only that but while it's
  463. 23:27illegal for members of the Communist
  464. 23:30Party to have a religion there are
  465. 23:33plenty of Christians in the Communist
  466. 23:35Party how do we know well out in the
  467. 23:38Villages you can't keep secrets and the
  468. 23:41local communist leader in the village
  469. 23:44the people you know people know he's a
  470. 23:46Christian so consequently they don't
  471. 23:48make any secret of it and there are
  472. 23:49communist leaders in The Villages that
  473. 23:51have crosses on the wall of the living
  474. 23:53room and we take that as pretty firm
  475. 23:56evidence that they've converted
  476. 24:01um I think that that's
  477. 24:05enough but the idea is that the world is
  478. 24:09really a very very religious place um I
  479. 24:14think this might be a good time to take
  480. 24:15a few questions and we don't have quite
  481. 24:19as much time but uh five minutes is all
  482. 24:23we'll
  483. 24:24do
  484. 24:26anybody that's all right
  485. 24:29about the latest Pew report the latest
  486. 24:32Pew report that says that you know the
  487. 24:34next Whatever It Is 40 50 years Islam
  488. 24:37will outpace Christianity and its growth
  489. 24:39around the
  490. 24:41world I'm sorry I really couldn't I I
  491. 24:44couldn't hear it right I said the the
  492. 24:46latest Pew report the pew pew
  493. 24:51um no I won't say that I won't say Pew
  494. 24:56but Pew is very
  495. 24:58money they uh they've got a lot of money
  496. 25:01they do some very good
  497. 25:03research they don't seem to know what it
  498. 25:07means to
  499. 25:09say I have no
  500. 25:12religion in the United States when
  501. 25:15people say that it means that they've
  502. 25:17got no denominational pres preference
  503. 25:21because almost all the people who say
  504. 25:22they I mean there about 4% of the
  505. 25:24American public who says they're they're
  506. 25:27atheist the rest these people who say
  507. 25:29they have no religion
  508. 25:32pray believe in angels all sorts of
  509. 25:35things like this and you say well these
  510. 25:37aren't irreligious people what are they
  511. 25:38telling us and what it appears to be is
  512. 25:41that their parents would have said if
  513. 25:44you asked them the denomination they'd
  514. 25:46have said I'm a
  515. 25:48Lutheran but I don't
  516. 25:50go and what these people are saying well
  517. 25:53we're not really lutherans or we don't
  518. 25:55really have a preference if you ask them
  519. 25:57if they were Christians most of them
  520. 25:59would say yes so it's a very confused
  521. 26:01thing in China when people say they have
  522. 26:04no
  523. 26:05religion um it's hard to know what they
  524. 26:08mean because most of the people who have
  525. 26:09been a Buddhist temple in the last week
  526. 26:12say they have no religion uh 76% of the
  527. 26:16Chinese say they have no religion and of
  528. 26:19them 80% of that
  529. 26:2276% have been uh in a folk temple in the
  530. 26:25last two
  531. 26:26weeks uh but they don't regard that they
  532. 26:29have a very special definition of the
  533. 26:32word
  534. 26:33religion uh that most things don't I
  535. 26:35mean most Buddhists in China will say
  536. 26:38they have no religion they'll tell you
  537. 26:39they're a Buddhist but they have no
  538. 26:40religion uh it's very complicated stuff
  539. 26:43and I seen none of that subtly in the
  540. 26:46Pew
  541. 26:51report Islam
  542. 26:54will oh no I'm sorry
  543. 27:00no they're making the Assumption you
  544. 27:03know that people in the non-western
  545. 27:04world have got high fertility rates
  546. 27:06without going and looking at their
  547. 27:08fertility rates uh Iran's fertility rate
  548. 27:12is way below replacement level for
  549. 27:14example uh many many Arab countries
  550. 27:18their fertility is falling like very
  551. 27:21rapidly um I I I could name I think I
  552. 27:25recently saw a list of five that were
  553. 27:27below replacement and the rest streaking
  554. 27:30there no I don't see that at all um as a
  555. 27:34matter of fact
  556. 27:36fertility uh is so tricky that it may in
  557. 27:38fact rech christianize Europe because
  558. 27:42the Philip will probably bring this up
  559. 27:44but the Christians in Europe are the
  560. 27:46ones who are having the kids um you know
  561. 27:49there's
  562. 27:51a same American Judaism is is turning
  563. 27:55outra Orthodox because one kid per
  564. 27:59family doesn't equal 10 kids per family
  565. 28:02um it's all very
  566. 28:04tricky yes so actually somewhat related
  567. 28:07to that question uh when you start
  568. 28:09talking about statistics or quoting
  569. 28:11statistics it's to me any way it can get
  570. 28:13pretty confusing to understand so the
  571. 28:16question is how much of the growth is
  572. 28:19really seen as or can be accounted for
  573. 28:22just a growth in population so if the if
  574. 28:24the percentage stays the same and the
  575. 28:26population grows then the number grow
  576. 28:29sure sure sure the I've made tried to be
  577. 28:33very careful not to talk uh in terms of
  578. 28:37numbers except in the case of china
  579. 28:39because that's such shortterm kind of
  580. 28:41growth so going from say 60 million to
  581. 28:44290 million in 20 years uh you don't
  582. 28:47have to worry about uh about that but no
  583. 28:50that's the reason I've stuck with
  584. 28:52percentages increases because of course
  585. 28:55uh there's been population growth
  586. 28:57particularly in uh in subsaharan Africa
  587. 29:00uh but you know
  588. 29:03if population growth doesn't have any
  589. 29:06impact on the proportion of Christians
  590. 29:08if they're sitting there in excess of
  591. 29:1290% which they are and by the way of
  592. 29:14course the
  593. 29:16boundaries subsaharan Africa butts into
  594. 29:19North Africa you've got these terrible
  595. 29:22battles going on with bah Haram and
  596. 29:24Nigeria for example because uh uh of
  597. 29:28that
  598. 29:31conflict
  599. 29:35yes will result in a greater do you
  600. 29:40think those type of battles are having
  601. 29:41in nor Northern Africa will result in a
  602. 29:43a greater um depth of religion or more
  603. 29:48of a secularization of religion in that
  604. 29:50area to to get rid of the
  605. 29:54conflict I don't see anybody leaving
  606. 29:57either Islam or Christianity as a result
  607. 30:00of these
  608. 30:02fights
  609. 30:04um my impulse would say it might
  610. 30:06intensify the commitment on both sides
  611. 30:09uh it's it's it's hard to say but uh uh
  612. 30:14in general you know I mean you look
  613. 30:16around the United States and everybody
  614. 30:18says that religion is
  615. 30:22declining and as Byron will point out
  616. 30:26they've got everything on their side
  617. 30:27except the numbers you know you go to
  618. 30:30church on Sunday morning you don't find
  619. 30:32all those empty pews they're talking
  620. 30:34about or if you do you're going to the
  621. 30:36wrong
  622. 30:41Church you mentioned the brother the you
  623. 30:45mentioned the the increase of
  624. 30:49Islam assuming that there is a
  625. 30:51distinction between Islam and radical
  626. 30:54Islam is do any of the studies show an
  627. 30:57increase in in the rad radicalization of
  628. 31:00Islam that you see
  629. 31:05well that's a
  630. 31:07very difficult
  631. 31:10question if you look at pole data it's
  632. 31:15amazing
  633. 31:21how I don't know I'm grasping for a word
  634. 31:25extreme or whatever let's put it this
  635. 31:28way the
  636. 31:29overwhelming majorities in Nations like
  637. 31:33Egypt and
  638. 31:36Pakistan um
  639. 31:38Yemen overwhelmingly
  640. 31:41believe that
  641. 31:43anybody who Decon converts from Islam
  642. 31:46should be
  643. 31:48executed overwhelmingly they believe
  644. 31:51that anyone who blasphemes should be
  645. 31:55executed they overwhelmingly support
  646. 31:58killing your daughter if she winked at
  647. 32:00somebody so you know I don't know what
  648. 32:02you mean by extreme uh will they do
  649. 32:06anything he chances no uh and Leadership
  650. 32:09is is is a real issue as you notice uh
  651. 32:13when when when when the Arab Spring
  652. 32:16happened in Egypt we found out what muic
  653. 32:18had been sitting on successfully for 30
  654. 32:23years and now the Army took back and
  655. 32:26those guys are are Muslims too but
  656. 32:28they're they're they're not radical
  657. 32:29Muslims they're they're very uh uh
  658. 32:33peaceloving if you will I mean they
  659. 32:35really don't want attacks on Israel they
  660. 32:38really don't want
  661. 32:42uh to execute blasphemers and they don't
  662. 32:46but it's very this is very tricky stuff
  663. 32:49uh but we're not helped by people going
  664. 32:51around pretending that none of this has
  665. 32:53to do with Islam it be a little bit like
  666. 32:57pretending that that the people who who
  667. 32:59shot abortionists weren't Christians of
  668. 33:01course they were um you know it's it's
  669. 33:04it's
  670. 33:06it's it's very complicated and it's not
  671. 33:09helpful by being in
  672. 33:14denial thank you Professor for this
  673. 33:16wonderful talk this morning I'd like to
  674. 33:18ask the question though in the signs of
  675. 33:21religious revival are you equating
  676. 33:23religion then with superstitious re
  677. 33:26Revival as well and what would be your
  678. 33:30definition of the two
  679. 33:40terms I would say
  680. 33:44that
  681. 33:48mysticism or involves belief in the
  682. 33:52existence of Supernatural
  683. 33:55forces I think religion Takes One Step
  684. 33:58Beyond that and posits the existence of
  685. 34:02a conscious
  686. 34:04God that
  687. 34:06uh on the other hand if I'm sitting out
  688. 34:09here being being an aggressive atheist
  689. 34:14the fact that people have quit the
  690. 34:16Lutheran Church and are now
  691. 34:18spiritualists should not give me any
  692. 34:21comfort in the sense that it's still a
  693. 34:24supernatural world for these people uh
  694. 34:27the the very beliefs that they're
  695. 34:29against are still thriving in in
  696. 34:32spiritualism uh now that doesn't meet my
  697. 34:35religious taste and I'm very leery about
  698. 34:38the edge of of of what I would call
  699. 34:43supernaturalism that isn't religion but
  700. 34:45it is still supernaturalism and that's
  701. 34:48that's all no to me religion has to have
  702. 34:50a God and uh um I would even go so far
  703. 34:56as to say a conscious God because I
  704. 34:58don't know what you do with an
  705. 35:00unconscious God except it's it's a
  706. 35:03word
  707. 35:06um yes on that note uh maybe you could
  708. 35:10say something about the proportionate uh
  709. 35:13growth of minority religions or new
  710. 35:16religious movements in comparison to the
  711. 35:18mainstream world religions you've mostly
  712. 35:20been talking about or maybe also the uh
  713. 35:23growth in numbers of minority religions
  714. 35:26and new religious movements
  715. 35:28also well there are new religious
  716. 35:30movements constantly uh some of many of
  717. 35:34them
  718. 35:36u in subsaharan Africa it's it's
  719. 35:40estimated that there are
  720. 35:4310,000 christianities independent
  721. 35:46Christian movements that are uh locally
  722. 35:50uh
  723. 35:51formed
  724. 35:53um we certainly have all you know I mean
  725. 35:57we we got 1500 kinds of Protestants in
  726. 36:00the United States uh and then of course
  727. 36:03there are you know spiritualism is is is
  728. 36:06is a religion and and and it has a few
  729. 36:13churches the world is full of religious
  730. 36:16movements that's certainly
  731. 36:18true um Islam by the way we have a
  732. 36:22tendency to make Islam monolithic less
  733. 36:25so most recently but they have a
  734. 36:27tendency to make Christianity monolithic
  735. 36:30and in fact uh it's it's not so I years
  736. 36:33ago a a Muslim friend of
  737. 36:35mine educated me by saying I could take
  738. 36:39you to any Muslim village with four
  739. 36:42mosques and I could point out the
  740. 36:45Episcopalian mosque the Baptist mosque
  741. 36:48the Nazarene mosque and the Unitarian
  742. 36:52mosque uh and he said there's that much
  743. 36:55variety but you'd walk in there and say
  744. 36:58bunch of Muslims um and and he was quite
  745. 37:04right um on the reporting and statistics
  746. 37:08of Islam um on the reporting of
  747. 37:11statistics about Islam around the world
  748. 37:13do you think that's just oversight or do
  749. 37:15you think there's political motives um
  750. 37:18underlying racist motives anything like
  751. 37:20that to
  752. 37:22the what You' pointed out is false
  753. 37:24statistics coming out of various
  754. 37:31channels I don't hear as well as I did
  755. 37:35when I was your age and a bit of trouble
  756. 37:38yeah um so regarding the false stories
  757. 37:42about various sectors in Islam or the
  758. 37:46rise of Islam or things like that do you
  759. 37:48think that those are just oversights in
  760. 37:50media and statistics or do you think
  761. 37:53that there's some kind of motivation for
  762. 37:55that well there's obviously a lot of
  763. 37:58politics going on I mean the fact that
  764. 38:01what happened here at Fort Hood the
  765. 38:05government continues to call an instance
  766. 38:08of workplace
  767. 38:10violence having nothing to do with
  768. 38:13religion that's that's not
  769. 38:17ignorance it may be idiotic but it's not
  770. 38:21ignorance

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