The Break down of the “American Religious Tradition”
The Purpose of this paper is to discuss The Churching of America, Winners and Losers in Our Religious Economy, as well as the video lecture given by the instructor Chas Barfoot. These lectures discuss the past and current view of the American Religious economy, and the “winners” and “losers” of this economy.
In the 1960s, arguably, the most important events regarding (specifically) American religion took place. In particular, the single most important “reformation” type of event was the 1965 Immigration Act, a bill passed by President Lyndon B. Johnson’s democratic congress. This bill was paramount in the changing of the American religious landscape because, while America has always been a country of immigrants, those immigrants have been of a particular type. Before this bill the immigrants were predominantly European, this means that while there might be some difference in their practice, buy in large, they were all cut from the same cloth. After the bill passes the new wave of immigrants come from Latin American countries and Asia. According to the traditional views of a free market economy, it is the people and there patronage who drive growth and direction, with a new population mixing with the old, there should be little or no surprise that the economy changes accordingly.
The Churching of America, Winners and Losers in Our Religious Economy discusses how we ought to shift our thinking about religion into an economic framework. The central thesis of the paper is that the growth and success of the American religious traditions can (and should be seen) through the free market lens, and, that there will be “winners” and “losers” in the American religious economy. While it may seem irreverent to use such secular comparisons, if we just think about how a church could be successful in a country where there is no national religion, we are forced to see how “the invisible hand” becomes relevant, in fact, Smith calls nationalized religion “the most formidable combination that ever was formed against the authority and security of civil government, as well as against the liberty, reason, and happiness of mankind” (Smith, Adam. 1776). While this isn’t necessarily a testament to the viability of churching in a free market, it does illicit VERY the American sentiment of liberty above all else.
When discussing religion in the free market, it is paramount that we understand the free market itself as well as the different systems of the free market economy. In the English model (the one protested, understandably, by Smith in 1776) the people are purported to pay 1/10th of their gross income, usually crops to the local parish (Churching of America, Finke and Stark p.5) This is in stark opposition to the foundational view that Americans will build the things that they want and need and do not require a government mandate, nor will they follow one. The “winners”, then, would unquestionably be the churches who gain notoriety through growth in patronage or population, and a loser would be the inverse. Churching of America shows how Protestantism has risen to the top as winners and how the “mainline” institutions have fallen to the wayside (Churching of America, Finke and Stark p.282) .
It is these same sentiments, a longing for freedom from the rigidity of conformity, that cause the larger churches to begin to dwindle in later years (more modern times). Much like the growth of protestantism from 1776-1890 where the church grows from a negligible amount to an average of nearly 100 members per parish (Churching of America, Finke and Stark p. 28), these days we see similar growths in “churches” or systems of beliefs that didn’t even exist as seen evident in a study done by the Pew research center, ‘the category of people who see themselves as “spiritual, but not religious” has grown from 19 to 27 percent (Lipka, Gecewicz, 2017). The book asks Why are the “mainline” Denominations in decline? In the lecture we discuss how an “Ordinary religion” is a religion that is based on social norms and an “Extraordinary Religion” is based around a hero or heroine and shrouded in mysticism. During the lecture a book by Baird is referred to as one of the driving forces in the new religious understanding, the book is called “Religion in America, An account of the origin, progress relation to the state of the evangelicals with acknowledgment of the un-evangelicals” a statement in his conclusion perfectly describes the trajectory of the current religious market. -
“the Protestant or Catholic—the infidel, the Mohammedan, the Jew, the Deist, has not only all his rights as a citizen, but may havehisownformofworship,withoutthe possibility of any interference from any policeman or magistrate, provided he do not interrupt, in so doing, the peace and tranquillity of the surrounding neighbour- hood. Even the Atheist may have his meetings in which to preach his doctrines, if he can get anybody to hear them.*”
The lecture discusses the baseline understanding of the current breakdown of what are known (in Baird) as the Evangelicals, and the un-evangelicals. The Un-evangelical churches according to Baird would be (including but not limited to, not limited to): Roman Catholics, Unitarians, Universalists, swedenborgians, atheists, socialists, etc…. These might be thought of as “Top down” religions, where the clergy decimates all pertinent information down through the staff structure to the people where the word is to be followed rather than interpreted.
The Evangelical Churches are though of by Baird to be Episcopalians, Congregationalists, Baptists, Presbyterians, and the methodists. These are “Bottom up” religions, meaning that the people of the parish are the driving force of the doctrine, the people are the ones who make the directional decisions regarding how the church should function. Baird describes them as being shaped like a military force where they have an intent and a directive from high (in this case it would be the word of God) and then the lower levels act independently to fulfill the directive. Baird also references a Quaker case where the people themselves decide what a specific piece of doctrine means (Baird, 220).
To conclude, we look at what the American Church Economy currently looks like, who the winner would be and why that is the case, based on the information from the sources and the lectures, in conjunction with inference. The current state of the American religious economy is one of continuous trend away from the “status quo” or “mainline” churches. I believe that because the free market economy drives up the standard for a product (ability to discriminate information with ease, relatability, palatability) that the churches who are not in touch with the needs and wants of the people, I.e. the larger, “top down” churches, are likely to become stagnant and because the market ensures that a changing and growing product will be the successful one, these churches should be considered the “losers” of the religious economy.
A post script question. Is it possible for the congregationalist, once it reaches “church level” for them to regain the sect like characteristics of growth? Can the return to the “tension and innovation” stage?
I have no doubt that it is possible, however, it does seem highly unlikely that something with large inertial force (the force that got it to its current status) would so easily be able to change directions without severely damaging, or totally dismembering the framework. Excitement and stability, security and adventure, they are mutually exclusive qualities that have an inverse relationship with one another. In order to gain one, you must lose the other. So, a Congregationalist church could go back to something more akin to a sect, by it would unquestionably lose out on that which made it how it is today.
Works Cited
- Smith, Adam. 1776, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of The Wealth of Nations. Found at: https://www.ibiblio.org/ml/libri/s/SmithA_WealthNations_p.pdf
-MICHAEL LIPKA AND CLAIRE GECEWICZ,“More Americans now say they’re spiritual but not religious”, http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/09/06/more-americans-now-say-theyre-spiritual-but-not-religious/, September, 6, 2017
-Roger Finke and Rodney Stark, The Churching of America 1776-2005, 2014
-Robert Baird, Religion in America, or an account of the origin, progress, relation to the state, and present condition of the Evangelical churches in the united states. 1844, Harper & Brothers
