CLARK COLEMAN writes:

I’d like to make a couple of church-centered comments concerning all the discussion of “Asher’s dilemma.” First, I think that James Davison Hunter’s book,  To Change the World, about the failure of the church counterculture gets it backwards. The story is not that 40 percent of the population is conservative evangelical Christians, who outnumber the 10 percent of the population who are the institutional elite, but whose numbers do not equate to influence because the 40 percent  do not occupy the elite positions that the 10 percent do. The story of the failure of the “transform-the-culture” movement is that you cannot transform the other 60 percent if you are not transformed yourself. The churches are full of sell-outs to secular culture, liberalism, modernism, post-modernism, relativism, feminism, you name it. Sadly, they do not perceive themselves as they really are. How can they set an example for anyone on the outside when the church culture is rotten on the inside? The question is not what positions they occupy. It is what they believe and what lives they lead.

Early Christians did not occupy the elite positions in the Roman Empire and did not set the tone for the culture. But they did not sell out to that culture, nor did they whine about how helpless they were in the face of that pagan, warlike, baby-abandoning, sexually immoral culture. They could be different from the surrounding culture even while being greatly outnumbered. You pointed out that Amish, Hasidim, et al. do the same today.

Which brings me to the second point: Why are “conservative” churches so infiltrated by the pagan culture around us today? I think the answer is that “conservative” churches do not even attempt to be overtly countercultural. In David Wells’ book, No Place For Truth, he defines theology as a three-step process:

1) Learn the will of God and the nature of God via the Bible.

2) Study the surrounding culture.

3) Provide the Christian response to the culture by contrasting #1 with #2.

“Conservative” churches are stuck in step #1. That is how “conservative” evangelical/Protestant/fundamentalist churches define themselves. In contrast to all those liberal Protestant mainline churches who no longer believe in inerrancyof Scripture and no longer teach much of the Bible any more, we “conservative” Christians are “people of the Word.” We believe in Biblical inerrancy. We believe the Bible is our authority. We study the Bible. We can study the Bible over and over, read through the Bible in a year every year for ages, make sound Biblical teaching the center of our classes and sermons, etc. But we will never progress to steps 2 and 3.

Read the good conservative web sites, like yours and OzConservative and VFR and Jim Kalb’s Turnabout site, and you see steps 2 and 3 in action. Go to church, and you get none of it. Ask the typical “conservative” minister to speak about nihilism, radical individual autonomy, moral relativism, etc., and you will get a blank stare or a brief, canned response (in the case of moral relativism, which everyone has heard of). What is the effect on our culture of the psychiatric/therapeutic culture? What are the nihilistic elements of our culture? How does narcissism manifest itself in our culture? Forget any teaching on such esoteric topics.

As a result, many “conservative” Christians have very orthodox views on the Bible, and seemingly good knowledge of the Bible, and lead lives of radical individual autonomy, narcissism, etc. How exactly will that transform the culture? What difference does it make what positions such people hold?

To get back to Asher’s dilemma, several posters (including Asher) at your site and others (such as VFR) have related stories of how they cannot find suitable women even at “conservative” churches. I am not surprised. We need men of courage to speak up and teach in these churches. If Asher et al. do not think they are in a position to be accepted as authoritative teachers in the churches, they can at least write a letter to the church leaders pointing out that the younger generation in the church is growing up with secular, anti-Christian values, and challenge these leaders to address the issues. One caution: I would not tell them that you are a helpless victim who has been driven to porn, extramarital sex, etc. I don’t think that would help your credibility.

Those of us who are older, married men have nothing to lose by speaking up. We need to “man up” and open our mouths and teach and lead. The culture of the churches needs a big change from within.

                                                                             — Comments —

Laura writes:

Christianity is a unified answer to all the major questions. It addresses the whole man. The churches today do not succeed in making the entirety real. For one, they do not take seriously the intellectual side, as well as the importance of form and ritual, and they overstate the emotional. As Clark said, they do not address contemporary culture and the questions it poses.

All institutions in our society, religious, academic, corporate and governmental, are beholden to a predominately liberalculture. Our churches pander to a middle class audience that places the emphasis on correct feeling. They welcome the money that working women earn and do not want to challenge this important source of income. This is a very important reality, a major reason why many Protestant churches and the liberalized Catholic mainstream embrace feminism, failing to assert the authority of men, to insist on premarital chastity, to challenge the use of contraceptives, to attack popular culture and its effects on children, to criticize the departure of women from the home, and to vigorously fight divorce. They speak to a culture that values ease and affluence. The religious field is very competitive and they have much to lose if they do not cater to this audience.

I do not think change can come from these institutions themselves; it must come from Christians acting within the culture at large, from those who insist on the unified answer and who are independent and unencumbered by organizational demands while at the same time being faithful members of the Church. I’m not disagreeing with Clark’s point that men must speak up, but I don’t think churches will respond until they feel it is safer to do so, that they have less to lose if they challenge the surrounding culture.

Alan Roebuck writes:

Excellent points by Clark. I would only add that most of the churches that go to step 2 (study the surrounding culture) eventually capitulate to that culture. See the “seeker sensitive” and “emergent” churches. These churches are not biblically faithful (although they generally pretend they are), so one result is that most biblically faithful Protestant churches reject the kind of engagement with the culture that is necessary and that I argued for in my “Manhattan Declaration” essay linked here before. 

Kevin R. writes:

I am a lifetime member of an emerging church that has never been Christianity Lite. We believe we have the actual Church of Jesus Christ re-established.

I send our family proclamation to you in case you have never seen it. Thank you for your brilliant and courageous writings.

Laura writes:

Kevin sends the Family Proclamation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, otherwise known as the Mormon Church. Here are some key sentences:

By divine design, fathers are to preside over their families in love and righteousness and are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families. Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children. In these sacred responsibilities, fathers and mothers are obligated to help one another as equal partners. Disability, death, or other circumstances may necessitate individual adaptation. Extended families should lend support when needed.

We warn that individuals who violate covenants of chastity, who abuse spouse or offspring, or who fail to fulfill family responsibilities will one day stand accountable before God. Further, we warn that the disintegration of the family will bring upon individuals, communities, and nations the calamities foretold by ancient and modern prophets.

People say that we cannot embrace traditional sex roles in the modern world.  Mormons, the Amish, and the Hasidic Jews prove that communities determined to live traditionally survive and flourish. These sects do not leave individuals to invent masculinity and femininity for themselves. Masculinity and femininity, they believe, are foreordained and, by accepting traditional roles, human beings conform to what is.

Brendan writes:

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