Is church and religion still a large part of Southern culture?
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From an outsiders point of view the majority of the US is extremity religious, the south more so, driving through Tennessee and Alabama there are just farms and churches and that's it.
In Florida the churches are full to bursting on Sundays and Wednesdays and many other times I pass them, the police actually stop 4 lanes of traffic every Sunday morning on the 441 just south of Ocala to let churchgoers leave church because there are so many of them, and they have 2 services, pretty incredible to me.
I live in Spain a very traditionally catholic country but don't know anyone here that goes to church, even their parents, they tend to still have holy communion and weddings in church but that's pretty much it other than the religious festivals when people suddenly become religious for the day, there will be a handful of older folk in church on a Sunday but not many.
The UK where I'm from have churches hundreds of years old in every village and town, many have been sold off and converted into trendy homes or even nightclubs,others have fallen into disrepair, The church of England have admitted that less than 2% of the population go to church on a Sunday, the largest religious group is reportedly Christians but by this they are not regularly church goers, they just say they are Christian when asked for a survey,
The most active religious community by far now in the UK are Muslims with Mosques being built in most large towns and their life is centred around the Mosques and the religion.
Christianity is definitely dying out in Europe but seems to be going strong in the USA particularly the south.
Roman Catholic Church is still strong in Poland. Ireland used to to be the same as most Adults did go to church up to 30 years ago
Actually, the fastest growing faith in the USA is no religion. Plus the USA has traditionally known as having a Protestant majority, and it not so these days and been so for a few years.
I gather religion in Poland is gathering pace for the usual reason - Immigration (well someone has to fill the empty cities resulting from the Poles coming here). In fact any rise of the Right in Europe is linked, if not caused, by Immigration.
It is apparent (and surprising) how the RC church got a huge knock -back in Eire - much caused by the Scandal.
Christians rarely if ever act like this Jesus character that they supposedly have their imaginary relationship with.
Living in KY, I definitely agree with this!
Back in the days Jesus walked the earth, him, his apostles, those that followed him, they were all viewed as trouble makers and generally hated by the secular authorities, looking back its easy to see why they were hated.
But in our times, churches and especially 'church going people' are very well liked and respected by the secular authorities, I think this alone is evidence that these churches are not really preaching the true word of God...if they were, I think the secular leaders and authorities would view them as a much larger threat and probably hate them just as Jesus was hated in his days.
Back in the days Jesus walked the earth, him, his apostles, those that followed him, they were all viewed as trouble makers and generally hated by the secular authorities, looking back its easy to see why they were hated.
But in our times, churches and especially 'church going people' are very well liked and respected by the secular authorities, I think this alone is evidence that these churches are not really preaching the true word of God...if they were, I think the secular leaders and authorities would view them as a much larger threat and probably hate them just as Jesus was hated in his days.
I don't think that's correct. The conflicts were most often with the religious authorities, not the Roman government, which didn't really care about conflicts among the people in the occupied land whose religion they saw as invalid to begin with.
I am not sure that churches and church-going people are "very well liked" and respected by the secular authorities as much as the secular authorities know they have to suck up to those organizations in order to win their support.
Just to give a little insight on myself since experiences vary by age, culture, race, etc; but I’m a 33 y/o black male. I grew up in the Northeast but had and still have many relatives in the South, primary South Carolina. Our family attended church sometimes, but religion wasn’t really a major part of our lives.
We visited the South often and I’ve spent numerous summers with relatives “down south” during my childhood. I remember church being a significant part of not only their social circles, but for many Southerners in general. Religion also seemed to be extremely important in their day-to-day lives. A lot of towns practically shut down on Sundays (in respect to the Lord) allotting time for attending church and large family dinners.
While I enjoyed my visits south with relatives, I often dreaded the amount of time I was “forced” to spend in church. There was Wednesday evening service IIRC, Bible Study on Thursdays, choir rehearsal on Saturdays and then Sunday service. Don’t even get me started on if there was a “program” on that Sunday. There also was ‘Vacation’ Bible School in June which usually was a week or two.
I realize what I’m describing is probably exclusive to the Black church experience. Most of my older Southern relatives are very religious and usually attend church AT LEAST once a week. Most of my cousins around my age however don’t appear to be very religious and don’t attend church regularly.
Statistics avow church attendance and religious importance is declining across the nation. I’m interested if this trend is noticeable in the South as well.
I am Native American from rural AZ. But I worked in the Florida Panhandle (the "Bible Belt") with many southerners - black and white. The Protestant religion is indeed still a big part of their lives - hence the term "Bible Belt". However, like other churches, attendance and participation are declining.
One of the factors in that decline (in my opinion) is the rush to marriage. The southerners tend to marry very, very young when they are mostly unprepared - early 20s by the latest. This is usually catastrophic - divorce rates are among the highest in the "Deep South" - 2nd only to Las Vegas, NV. The very large trend of divorce is not conjecture or an "emotional bias". It can be confirmed by population statistics or simply by browsing publicy available court dockets across the south for "dissolution of marriage". The typical southerner marries young, divorces, and remarries in their 30s or 40s only to get divorced again. The blended families, step parents, step children, step sibling, etc. hurt the coherency of the "Protestant nuclear family" (in my opinion) - hence the decline. This pattern is very, very common in the FL Panhandle - the land of SEC/ACC "southern football", Publix, Paramore (whose Protestant lead singer herself is divorced), and NASCAR. Study: South has highest rate of divorce - CNN.com
Paramore was a band known for "southern Christian pop music" with roots deep in the "Bible Belt". The words of their lead singer in the midst of divorce strike a strong reality check for southern marriages. Just look at the case of the Alabama governer whose affair was exposed by his wife's iPad. https://y101fm.com/features/lifestyl...faint-of-heart
One of the factors in that decline (in my opinion) is the rush to marriage.
I suppose that could be part of the issue, but I think it is much more so the increase in education and travel. Far fewer Southerners are satisfied living the kind of insular lives that were typical in previous generations. They want to learn about other places and other people, and perhaps even visit them.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain
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