Why Young Christians are Leaving the Church

Author: Stronn

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Theists often misunderstand why most atheists don't believe, saying it is because they hate God, or don't wish to obey Him, or don't want to follow religious morality. This article describes the real reason, which most atheists already knew.


"What, then, is the real reason young Christians (and other religious believers) leave the faith? The answer lies in a prior, 2016 Pew Research Center survey which allowed respondents to answer in their own words. In this study, most “nones” said they no longer identified with a religious group because they no longer believed it was true. When asked why they didn’t believe, many said their views about God had “evolved” and some reported having a “crisis of faith.” Their specific explanations included the following statements:"

“Learning about evolution when I went away to college”
“Religion is the opiate of the people”
“Rational thought makes religion go out the window”
“Lack of any sort of scientific or specific evidence of a creator”
“I just realized somewhere along the line that I didn’t really believe it”
“I’m doing a lot more learning, studying and kind of making decisions myself rather than listening to someone else.”







#2
Mopac
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It's bad education. That's the real reason. I used to be right there too. 


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@Mopac
What you call bad education is actually teaching critical thinking skills. The more people exercise critical thinking, the less religious they tend to be.

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@Stronn
I'm pretty sure that Loving The Truth will lead to critical thinking skills, and loving The Truth is my religion.

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One definition of religion from merriam webster...


"a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith"

So how is a scientist not practicing a religion when they are following the scientific method?


I think that the real issue people have with God is superstition, which is...



"1 a : a belief or practice resulting from ignorance, fear of the unknown, trust in magic or chance, or a false conception of causation
b : an irrational abject attitude of mind toward the supernatural, nature, or God resulting from superstition"

Because anyone who says that God is not real likely takes God as being something other than....

"1 capitalized : the supreme or ultimate reality"


Yeah, atheism is a position of ignorance, superstition, and sometimes outright denial of reality and the embrace of delusion.




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Castin
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@Mopac
While people can have faith in science (I do), science is not faith based. It is evidence based. It doesn't require ardor or faith. It requires empirical proof.
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@Castin
A definition of faith....

"something that is believed especially with strong conviction"

Evidence leads to strong conviction.
No, the faith is in the scientific method as far as being a way of aquiring knowledge.

Or in the case of most people, faith in what people say or write in textbooks is science.





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Outplayz
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@Stronn
I'm glad. It shows society as a whole is becoming wiser. It is harder to indoctrinate through fear. It is harder to lie about facts when one search will tell the truth. Plus, the more you get educated your critical thinking abilities improve and that make a difference when being lied to... you can tell lies from truth or at the very least, what doesn't logically make sense. Religion's history doesn't help either. A history of violence and blind obedience. I'm sure there is a lot more to it, but it all comes down to religion simply being false is catching up to it. 

With all that said, i am quite spiritual. The "none' category also is too. It is composed of atheist, agnostic and other... most of the other being spiritual. This is a good thing, but can also be a bad thing. People might just jump to fringe beliefs to supplement not being able to think too spiritually. For instance, torats, wicca, astrology, etc. There is something within humanity that just knows somehow there is a spiritual reality. Everyone...even atheists at some point have had this feeling. I personally think there is something to that. That all the religion and philosophy we do is an attempt in defining what it can be. I think it is an attempt that will never truly be discovered, for my belief has taken me to the truth actually being something infinite. Therefore, we as finite beings will never truly be able to define the infinite. Who knows though, humanity is pretty amazing and the progress we make is mind blowing. There is no telling what we will discover. All i know is, looking at this life as my afterlife has made me appreciate it more. I believe we have an immortal self or "soul" however i do not think that is where we prefer to be. We prefer to be experiencing as finite beings... as evident by us being here now.  
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@Outplayz
The Ultimate Reality is God, and there is no other God.

Every atheistic argument is contingent on making God something other than what God Is.

It's easy to argue against outward manifestations of religion, culture, and created things. There is no argument against The Truth. The way things ACTUALLY are.

And if you are spiritual in a truly healthy sense, I'm certain you would have no problem agreeing with this, even if we understand things differently, as everyone does.







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@Mopac
I define "the truth" differently however i can agree that atheism is a shortsighted conclusion to make about our reality and beyond. With that said, in part i blame it on organized religion. Atheist are so focused on proving what is clearly wrong wrong, that they fail to step back and think of a spiritual reality as something actually very logical. I think you are slightly religious, but don't think of it from your beliefs stand point. Think of how you feel towards a religion like wicca or maybe even Islam. You can clearly see that it is wrong. Atheist see that in every religion. And, from what i've noticed, they get stuck on the fact that if all this is wrong... then, everyone is wrong regarding anything having to do with spirituality. Bc you can clearly say Wicca is just man made mumbo jumbo... they have applied that thinking to every spiritual belief so i don't blame them for their position however shortsighted i think it is. Although, i, for the most part, have explained a belief such as mine and i get a concession of "maybe" a lot of the times. I find that to be interesting. Bc like i said above, we all know at some point this reality isn't it. It's the various ways of defining it that have muddied the water. I always say, there is only one picture that is true in a puzzle piece game. What we have done is open puzzle pieces from thousands of different pictures and are trying to put one picture together... it's a mess.      
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@Castin
Yeah but science is still in its infancy. Another point is that science defines our reality... not any additional realities that might be. Although, there is math for it all which i find interesting. You just can't test a lot of what we know. Plus, i think spirituality is infinite. I think we come from an infinite platform. Therefore, i don't think science will ever be able to define it for we are finite beings trying to define an infinite reality. Can we ever? Who knows, but there is a chance we will never be able to. Just like a dog has it's limits... humans probably do to. However, if humans do come from an infinite intelligence... then interestingly, we should be able to imagine it. Which amazingly we can. We just can't define it perfectly in our limited bodies and mind. 
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@Castin

Watch this video if you want and have time. This guy is really good at explaining what i can't. He has a similar belief to mine. I add a bit to it, but it's basically the same idea of a lot of people that find this infinite intelligence thing to be plausible. 

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Stronn
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@Mopac
I'm pretty sure that Loving The Truth will lead to critical thinking skills, and loving The Truth is my religion.
You have it backwards. Critical thinking leads one to truth, not the other way around.

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@Mopac
One definition of religion from merriam webster...
Yes, a definition that practically no one means when they debate religion. Just like your definition of God, which practically no one means when they debate God.

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@Stronn
That's not what you mean because you know it makes your position stupid.

So what do you do? You debate people who don't really understand theology and shrink away when someone who does tells you that you've been debating superstition of God rather than God.


Critical thinking alone will get you to truth about as well as tying a bunch of bottle rockets together to construct a space shuttle to the moon.

Critical thinking without a love of the truth will simply lead you to reject everything, which actually takes about as much intelligence and thought as believing eveything.

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@Outplayz

Watch this video if you want and have time. This guy is really good at explaining what i can't. He has a similar belief to mine. I add a bit to it, but it's basically the same idea of a lot of people that find this infinite intelligence thing to be plausible. 


Very good video

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Most people I know who lost their faith went along the lines of "I realized I didn't really believe it". However, most of them would consider themselves agnostic. They usually don't know how to go about faith, or don't feel anything when they try to be religious, or even just don't care that much. 
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@Mopac
That's not what you mean because you know it makes your position stupid.

So what do you do? You debate people who don't really understand theology and shrink away when someone who does tells you that you've been debating superstition of God rather than God.
You are committing the fallacy of appeal to motive. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_motive

Critical thinking alone will get you to truth about as well as tying a bunch of bottle rockets together to construct a space shuttle to the moon.

Critical thinking without a love of the truth will simply lead you to reject everything, which actually takes about as much intelligence and thought as believing eveything.
I think you are confusing critical thinking with skepticism. Critical thinking is a method for evaluating information in order to make rational, objective judgements about what to believe.
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@Vaarka
Right, most non-religious people are that way. They simply don't buy into religion.
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@Stronn
I feel like this is poor wording. It's not that they "don't buy into it", it's more that they just don't care
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@Stronn
No no, I apologize, I don't know your motive. I hope truth is your motive, and I will respect you as if it is.

But I am telling you no lie when I say that if God really does mean The Ultimate Reality, which it does, it makes atheism towards this God a very stupid and self defeating position.


If you don't love The Truth, critical thinking naturally leads to arbitrariness. If you love The Truth, your critical thinking in theory would perform the function you say it would.

What is the motivation for thinking critically?


If you love The Truth, this will naturally lead you to think more critically as you inevitably notice discrepancies between the way you think things are supposed to be and the way things actually are.

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Cool! Glad you liked it. The guy does get a lot of his experiences through using psychedelics, but i have no problem with that. He does explain how it isn't cheating in some of his other videos and i agree. Plus, i am very interested in how psychedelics or even most people with mental disorders come to this sort of belief. Infinite intelligence etc. I naturally came to this belief, but i feel like it is really rare, so finding someone like him talking about it is even more rare for me to hear. Check out some of his other videos. I would recommend the ones where he explains infinite intelligence / absolute infinity. They are also interesting. Oh p.s. how funny was his correlation of religious people and sex ;P they have faith that an orgasm is good lol. 
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@Mopac
A definition of faith....

"something that is believed especially with strong conviction"

Evidence leads to strong conviction.
No, the faith is in the scientific method as far as being a way of aquiring knowledge.

Or in the case of most people, faith in what people say or write in textbooks is science.
By that limited definition, science does produce faith, yes. Keeping in mind that just because science can produce faith does not mean it relies on faith. I don't believe "something that is believed especially with strong conviction" is a complete or accurate reflection of what science is.

I've heard theists try to draw a comparison between religion and science before, usually in an attempt to put religion and science on equal footing. But they're not the same, and that's okay. Science is not about what emotionally resonates within the personal human journey, and religious faith is not about gaining testable scientific data about the universe. While all religion I am aware of claims to be revealed truth, the methods, aims, and qualities of religion are sufficiently different from science to be considered apples and oranges imo.
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@Castin
Not all religions are the same.

My religion is Love of The Truth.

A scientists religion is love of knowledge.

My religion does not conflict with this, but is actually complimentary.

These atheistic arguments against religion are against certain types of religion, and really come from a fundamental misunderstanding of what religion is by associating these certain types of religion with religion itself.

When you say religion is bad, you are also saying diligence towards the scientific method is bad.
When you Say God is bad, you are saying The Truth is bad.

The vast majority of people are, and will always be theologically ignorant. That's not something to be helped. But taking the practices of the average superstious person as being representative of the whole is an obvious error.


And yes, it can be turned around. Atheism is a superstitious position.




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@Outplayz
Yeah but science is still in its infancy. Another point is that science defines our reality... not any additional realities that might be. Although, there is math for it all which i find interesting. You just can't test a lot of what we know. Plus, i think spirituality is infinite. I think we come from an infinite platform. Therefore, i don't think science will ever be able to define it for we are finite beings trying to define an infinite reality. Can we ever? Who knows, but there is a chance we will never be able to. Just like a dog has it's limits... humans probably do to. However, if humans do come from an infinite intelligence... then interestingly, we should be able to imagine it. Which amazingly we can. We just can't define it perfectly in our limited bodies and mind. 
True. The many worlds hypothesis is a legitimate theory in physics.

I'm actually not sure the human mind can truly imagine infinity.


Watch this video if you want and have time. This guy is really good at explaining what i can't. He has a similar belief to mine. I add a bit to it, but it's basically the same idea of a lot of people that find this infinite intelligence thing to be plausible. 
Long vid. May not watch the whole thing, but I'll give it a good half hour and get back to you.
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@Castin
True. The many worlds hypothesis is a legitimate theory in physics.

I'm actually not sure the human mind can truly imagine infinity. 

My spiritual belief is basically in part a derivative of the many worlds hypothesis. The only thing i add to it is that intelligence/consciousness is also infinite. Two ways that could happen. It is either a manifestation of infinite reality and evolved from it... or, intelligence is everything. That everything came into existence when intelligence basically woke up. Either way leads to similar spiritual implications. 

The human mind can't per se, by definition it shouldn't be able to... but, i think you can scratch the surface. I've had a realization three times i am infinite. One time it was with weed, one time it was with a hallucinogen called Salvia, and one time it was sober. In all of these experiences i felt like god basically. I was everything and infinite. And in all of them 1) i understood what it feels like to be infinite and 2) all i wanted to do is forget and be finite again. I found that being everything and infinite is actually pretty scary. You basically are not living. This is bc i knew why i was here, why i chose to be here, what will happen to me, and the end of my story. I knew all that at once... and, all i wanted was to forget and thankfully i did. The deeper ones happened under the influence. The sober time i just understood what it feels like to be infinite. Even then, i understood that this world is actually the afterlife, for to stay infinite isn't living. 

So, there are ways to experience it or scratch the surface. People do it through meditation, deep spiritual thought/practice, and hallucinogens. I would recommend hallucinogens bc the other ways take a long time to get it, and sometimes you never can. Hallucinogens are a short cut. Either way it is pretty profound and life changing when you do experience it. Although it is scary being infinite, understanding that this life is your afterlife... makes this life more interesting imho.    

Long vid. 
Lol all his videos are long but he is an interesting character if you get into what he is saying. 
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@Mopac
Apology accepted.

But I am telling you no lie when I say that if God really does mean The Ultimate Reality, which it does, it makes atheism towards this God a very stupid and self defeating position.
It means what people intend it to mean, and most people don't intend it to mean simply The Ultimate Reality, but I think you know that.

If you don't love The Truth, critical thinking naturally leads to arbitrariness. If you love The Truth, your critical thinking in theory would perform the function you say it would.

What is the motivation for thinking critically?
The goal of critical thinking is to make better decisions. This includes decisions about what one believes.

Part of critical thinking is recognizing logical fallacies. One such fallacy is equivocation, which occurs when a key term in an argument is used in an ambiguous way, with one meaning in one part of the argument and another meaning in another part. You commit this fallacy when you equate God with Truth, when people don't simply mean Truth when using the word God.


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@Stronn
No see, you are actually making a fallacy when you make God to mean anything other than The Truth.

What is the fallacy for refering to a duck as a tree?

That's the fallacy you are making when you make God anything other than what God is.

What fallacy is it when the wrongful use of a word by a large group of people is taken as the proper meaning?

What fallacy is it to take the words of someone who is passingly informed about a subject to one who is a doctor of that subject?

As I said, saying The Truth doesn't exist is a stupid and self defeating position, and that is what atheism toward my God means.

#29
ethang5
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It isn't young Christians leaving the church (whatever church that is) it is young people leaving.

And Christians know why, first because we have seen the young people with the corrupt morality of pleasure. That is, "Whatever I personally find pleasurable is moral, and whatever I don't personally like is immoral.

They "leave" whatever they think blocks their pleasure. They are leaving marriage, school, childbirth, politics, and religion.

Second, Jesus told us 2,000 years ago that they would begin to leave, and He told us why they would begin to leave. For those people who interpret this as people getting "smarter", one look at the educational condition of young people leaving our schools today will show how wrong they are.

But the actual number of Christians in the world is growing, not declining.
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Hedonism and love of The Truth is incompatible. Hedonism gets in the way of Love of The Truth.


Pride, hedonism, and every other vice that subtracts from loving The Truth is what is glorified in contemporary American culture. 

Really it is nothing new, it has been something that will always be there. Rich and decadent cultures are particularly susceptible to being spoiled. 


Ethang5 is telling it right.