don't mention it

Wednesday, July 3rd, 2024, two topics kicked off my morning, and then it expanded. Today in History 1863 the Battle of Gettysburg came to an end, General Lee's debacle left Gettysburg reeking with the stench of death that a witness wrote could be smelled twenty miles away, and sealed the collapse of the Confederacy. I grew up in a Time when we were still lamenting that and idolizing Robert E Lee and applauding Confederate veterans in gray uniform as they rode in open touring cars at the end of every parade up or down Harrison Avenue. Do I still lament? No, but my growing up was a lesson in the Truth of Lieutenant Cable's song "You have to be carefully taught to hate the people your parents hate." 

That history reminder about the Battle of Gettysburg brought to mind that I attended Gettysburg Theological Seminary on the grounds of the battlefield, went to classes in the building that shifted back and forth as Confederate and Union headquarters during the battle and served as a field hospital for both sides. I came and went daily, including driving backroads through throngs of monuments marking places made holy to various groups by the shed blood of beloved sons, husbands, brothers, fathers. I loved my years at Gettysburg Seminary, half my lifetime ago, and the memories still. 

In this era of declining religion, my Lutheran seminary in Gettysburg has combined with the Lutheran seminary in Philadelphia; as a United Church of Christ seminary in Lancaster, PA has combined with a Moravian seminary in Bethlehem, PA; and as several Episcopal seminaries have closed or combined or gone all or almost entirely online.  

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Another thing, tangent related, was reading down a list of Resolutions adopted and published by last week's 81st General Convention of the Episcopal Church in Louisville, Kentucky, where our son Joe lives. One resolution was a proPalestinian statement calling for a two-state settlement, Palestine and Israel, the draft of which reportedly was shuttled around among, and back and forth between, interested sponsors about whether the resolution would include the word "apartheid" against Israel (ultimately it was not used). 

In my lifetime of being one, I know Episcopalians to be as certitudinous as the next religious; a mix of folks of many views that as a body has evolved on social issues; and that its lay and clergy governance holds cutting edge outlier viewpoints on social policy. Differences within the denomination have triggered some splits, which happens in every religious community. I've not always agreed with the sociopolitical positions taken by my denomination, some Yes some No. But then I don't have to, this is not a church where conformity is the thing. 

On the subject of two-states in the Holy Land, my view is epiphany that is still coming out of 7 October and its aftermath: the Palestinians do not want peace with Israel, the Palestinians do not want a two-state solution, the Palestinians want the Jews out altogether; Israel does not want peace with the Palestinians, Israel does not want a two-state solution, Israel wants the Palestinians out altogether. The situation is beyond peaceful resolution. Moreover, on 7 October the Palestinian position forfeited all claim to moral high-ground in Hamas' unspeakably cruel and evil atrocity; while the Israeli response of total war is both understandable and mercilessly overwhelming in losing all morality. A morally "just war" is not possible when driven by raging hatred. 

Anyone who lived through the era of the Third Reich and the Holocaust revelations that followed Germany's collapse should realize that a Jewish homeland is essential, that it must be supported by decent people everywhere, and that it must be just as much a "Jewish State" as the Islamic republics are Muslim, and as many Americans regard the US as a "Christian nation" or Italy or Ireland as Catholic nations.

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What else to my rambling nonsense this lovely morning? I'm going to blog along, post, and then delete/suspend. 

An online article, "The Hollowing Out of an American Church" caught my eye with its picture (above) and opening words, "There’s a church in upstate New York — in the town of Utica, as it happens: Grace Episcopal. Built in 1860, it’s what you might expect of a small-city Episcopal building of its time — an era in which the American form of Anglican Protestantism represented both confidence and taste." What I thought might be a slam at the Episcopal Church is yet another essay lamenting the declining "Mainline Protestant" Church in America. I liked the top picture, its attention-grabber. 

So, I clicked to read it, but was only allowed to read a paragraph before the paywall said I need a paid subscription to read further. So I scrolled down and read dozens of Comments (never post a Comment, it only marks you as a nameless idiot arguing with anonymous imbeciles), and then I started over and discovered that, although I could not Read the essay without a paid subscription, I could Listen to it Read Aloud for free, so I did that. 

It's another article about why the Church is declining. A main statistic cited is that FROM 1950 when 50% of Americans were members of a "Mainline Protestant" denomination, it has dropped TO 9% today. The essay rehearses standard observations about why Christian denominations are dying out in our changing culture. 

But there is a factor that I do not recall seeing in innumerable articles that try to explain why the church is dying. It is a "class" issue, perhaps politically or socially incorrect to point out. An entire category of educated, middle-class Americans whose grandparents were "Mainline Protestants" are no longer interested in what the church offers. 

Christianity is a religion of doctrines and Bible stories, and modern educated people who in earlier, less educated generations would have been Mainline Protestant, do not find the old "tribal" stories and doctrines credible, compelling, relevant. More, these people no longer submit to the church's once accepted "authority over their eternal souls" - - in fact, modern Mainline Protestant churches do not preach a gospel of repentance for the forgiveness of sins and faith confession bringing personal salvation from hellfire into a heavenly afterlife that is still appealing to a different demography of Americans. The "Mainline" opting instead for a gospel of Love God Love Neighbor in This world in This life, and being the cutting edge on changing social economic political issues.  

Families whose heritage was Mainline Protestant have other priorities for the Time their grandparents devoted to church and church activities as a matter of cultural normalcy. During recent generations, wealth has grown, education, perhaps wisdom, discernment, willingness to question, doubt, and reject; and opportunities for use of Time, including Sunday "blue laws" have disappeared along with social stigma about Sunday activities. It's a class, education, and wealth thing: a study showing growing college education among Mainline Protestants might suggest that the church is declining because what it offers unchanged and unchanging from antiquity, an entirely different world view, is no longer credible to the category of educated, and to themselves more sophisticated, Americans whose families were Mainline Protestants seventy years ago. 

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Wednesday supper: a foldover PBJ and a glass of ice cold milk, with memories of Sunday evenings as a child.

RSF&PTL

T88&c