How Christianity can level up

[Castelnau]

The traditional right/monarchism was getting its ass kicked by socialist/communists in the hearts and minds war so it leveled up to facism in the 1930's Europe to win over blue collar workers. When is Christianity going to level up in the current age when there are all kinds of social media, apps, memes and LGBTism, fanboyism and atheism going rampant on our culture?

Suggestions

1. Christians need to engage in meme warfare.



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Some Christians may find it off-putting or even belittling Christianity and Jesus. Well I believe at this point in the game we should be desperate and desperate people need to resort to unconventional tactics. When we have churches with GAY FLAGS flying then I believe we have nothing to lose with Jesus Pepe or whatever else that comes out of this.

2. Christianity needs to be more aggressive

Christianity somehow got fused with this liberal, wimpy, tolerant, pacifist attitude which is why so many churches have turned into Churchanity churches.

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Christianity does not need to get boxed in or apologetic over its stance on homosexuality or any other liberal freakshow movement it needs to come out swinging. Christianity is not in the majority nor does it have a lot of power anymore. Like for most of its history Christianity is a minority, persecuted religion. In America but especially in other countries like India. We need to stop taking Christianity for granted and be ultra aggressive in defending it and make this clear to dumbass white liberal Christians who want to apologize and concede everything in the religion out of white liberal guilt.

3. Christianity needs to be more entertaining (especially for young christians)

I'm not saying church should be entertainment but there's a way to make the teachings of Jesus more interesting than the way it is being taught. I can only speak of my experience but in one church I can barely understand my pastor and in the other the sermons are more interesting but ultimately simple messages. There is a lot of drama in the New Testament I believe but because there is a lack of context (history of Judea) Christians, especially kids are being taught the New Testament as just magical bible stories that happened in random desert land instead of a real life place where the Roman Empire ruled. Jesus's story should be taught very dramatically because it was dramatic not just from a Christian standpoint but a secular human history standpoint.

4. Christianity needs to address topics more relevant to today's culture.

There should be more sermons on dating, porn, social media use, the current satanic culture (Netflix's Sabrina reboot), new atheism, etc. I feel churches are still operating in the 50's. Maybe with podcasts and Facebook pages but their content is still the same unless they've been taken over by LGBTists and pushing LGBTism disguised as Christianity.

5. Church tithe/offering system should be more interactive

Instead of having parishioners simply give money, they should be made to feel that they are investors in the church. And I'm not a biblical expert so I don't know if you're not suppose to view it that way but the fact is giving offering just feels like a chore. Very stale and transactional. Why not have parishioners more involved and offer charts and graphs online and data so you feel more involved and maybe even give more because you know the money is being used in a very effective way. The church should be marketed like a tech startup (something that is very sexy to the younger generation) and parishioners as investors and we give money and the payoff we get is not more money but in souls saved.

 

[yarqur]

Kingdom of God is nigh and more laborers are needed for the harvest. You could start by reading the Bible.

 

[DanielH]

Kingdom of God is nigh and more laborers are needed for the harvest. You could start by reading the Bible.

Are you agreeing with OP's points or just throwing out “read the bible”? Who interprets it? When allowing anyone to interpret it themselves you get thousands of denominations which leads to America not being truly Christian, which you mentioned in another thread. So what are your actual suggestions? Acts 8:30-31, how are we supposed to interpret the Bible without guidance? Who or what is that guide?

 

[yarqur]

I can't say I'm agreeing with what basically looks like likening Christianity to some kind of product that has competitors, but I do agree with many points. Christianity isn't one religion among many valid ones, the Word of God is the absolute truth that shows everything that is in contradiction with it to be lies.

The Holy Spirit of course is our guide, but the Bible is also a coherent book that interprets itself when it is read and studied as whole - the Holy Spirit and the Word are one actually. Logic is something that at least I have got from God, as if in a basic toolset when I was born again, and somehow I think he would give it to all other real Christians too. It's all in the Bible:

1 Corinthians 2:
12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them , because they are spiritually discerned.
15 But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man. [judgeth: or, discerneth] [judged: or, discerned]
16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.

Most of the things that especially Paul taught are so simple and straight forward that there must be something spiritually wrong if someone can't understand it. Like feminism preventing women to see their rightful place because of their personal feelings about it, or just adolescence of a new convert (well the latter is not technically wrong). Prophecy is another thing, but I do not speak anything that God doesn't speak first as if it was God saying it, and no one should.

My suggestion to your concern is, that we should first read the Bible, and then if we are uncertain about something, we can ask our brothers and elders for guidance, and then read some more Bible to see if what they say makes sense. Like the Bereans (Acts 17). The Bereans didn't ask for or need interpreters and they are commended for it, what makes them special? It's enough they read the scriptures in genuine search for the truth.

From where I'm looking the whole "who interprets it" objection actually came from the imposters that want to deceive the unwary and twist the scriptures, and keep you from reading it I guess. Because when you read the Bible like 3 or more times, especially the new testament, then how can someone in their right mind miss the obvious anymore. It's easy to see what is wrong with each of those thousand denominations just by comparing their teachings to the Bible. We only have to agree on what is written, and it speaks for itself clearly.

 

[DanielH]

Well I have to commend Protestants for their zeal and studiousness. I'm going to disagree with you on the lack of a need for a Church to help interpret scripture. As a former Protestant I'll recommend Orthodoxy and leave it at that.

 

[Aboulia]

What did one Protestant say to the other when they got into an argument about theology?

Spoiler

But, that's just like your opinion, man

 

[Uponthisrock]

The parable of the mustard seed talks about the growth of the church and its eventual and current corruption, allowing the birds (agents of Satan) to find a comfortable home.
I believe the loss of popularity and the diminishing membership and identification with Christ is actually a very good thing. I use the above mentioned parable to support my position.
Consider it similar to a boxer getting in shape for competition. You have to lose the fat and the church needs to cut a lot of fat.
The power of the church is diluted.
I don't disagree with many of your points I think the issue with "Christian marketing" ie: Music, movies, preaching, figure heads like the fool Olsteen or Churches like Hillsong (obviously neither of the last two have anything to do with Christ) are that they are for Children. That vague feeling of poor quality or the clean Sunday school vibes you get by experiencing any of it leads one to believe they have out grown God.
The worst thing that happened to the modern church was the demonization of the Fire and Brimstone preacher which lead to the seeker friendly movement.

 

[infowarrior1]

Well I have to commend Protestants for their zeal and studiousness. I'm going to disagree with you on the lack of a need for a Church to help interpret scripture. As a former Protestant I'll recommend Orthodoxy and leave it at that.

Protestants are less inclined to be passive bystanders and encouraged to take a more active role.

 

[DanielH]

Protestants are less inclined to be passive bystanders and encouraged to take a more active role.

Which ones?

 

[infowarrior1]

Which ones?

Read this:

Luther's Knocking

I have been in Italy one week, and have had countless rich, stimulating conversations with Italian Catholic friends. Yet I find that I s...

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The Wages of Monophorism

“Monophorism” was Blondel's term for a reigning clerical authoritarianism which on principle refused to recognize that grace can be a...

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A stronger notion of the Priesthood of all believers applied in the form that emphasized individual responsibility before God prevailed from the very beginning that helped contribute to this result.

 

[ItalianStallion9]

Well I have to commend Protestants for their zeal and studiousness. I'm going to disagree with you on the lack of a need for a Church to help interpret scripture. As a former Protestant I'll recommend Orthodoxy and leave it at that.

Because Orthodoxy is less common in America, I can compare Prots to Catholics. Catholics seem to have a focus on tradition, church doctrine, pope's words, etc. Prots read their bible more frequently - thus more familiar with prominent stories and figures (again just from my observation). For example, some of the Catholics I know haven't heard of Nicodemus or Saint Dimas (Penitent thief on the cross).

At this point we can get into the issue of interpretation, which is why some here mentioned there's tons of disagreements and interpretations in the Prot branch. I'd argue reading your bible is better than not reading it, and as someone who's been in Catechumen classes with a local Orthodox Priest - I can see the pros and cons of the loose interpretations of loyal/frequent Prot bible reading.

 

[Hermetic Seal]

Christianity somehow got fused with this liberal, wimpy, tolerant, pacifist attitude which is why so many churches have turned into Churchanity churches.

Login to read

voxday.blogspot.com

Christianity does not need to get boxed in or apologetic over its stance on homosexuality or any other liberal freakshow movement it needs to come out swinging. Christianity is not in the majority nor does it have a lot of power anymore. Like for most of its history Christianity is a minority, persecuted religion. In America but especially in other countries like India. We need to stop taking Christianity for granted and be ultra aggressive in defending it and make this clear to dumbass white liberal Christians who want to apologize and concede everything in the religion out of white liberal guilt.

You might check out Leon Podles' The Church Impotent, which is a good read on this topic. There are a lot of reasons why the western church has gone soft, but on the flip side, the "macho" Christianity of guys like Mark Driscoll has done plenty of harm as well. Protestant churches with a stereotypical "Alpha" at the helm usually end up as destructive personality cults and go down in flames because their leaders are filled with pride and have little or no accountability.

Are you Michael Foster from Twitter? You sound exactly like him. If not, you'd probably feel right at home in his church.

3. Christianity needs to be more entertaining (especially for young christians)

I'm not saying church should be entertainment but there's a way to make the teachings of Jesus more interesting than the way it is being taught. I can only speak of my experience but in one church I can barely understand my pastor and in the other the sermons are more interesting but ultimately simple messages. There is a lot of drama in the New Testament I believe but because there is a lack of context (history of Judea) Christians, especially kids are being taught the New Testament as just magical bible stories that happened in random desert land instead of a real life place where the Roman Empire ruled. Jesus's story should be taught very dramatically because it was dramatic not just from a Christian standpoint but a secular human history standpoint.

Pursuit of entertainment and "relevance" is what non-denominational churches have been doing for decades, but the problem is that it tends to produce Christians with no real foundation or knowledge of much of anything. Cultural context is massively important for properly understanding the faith, but most churches don't bother with it because it does little to achieve their aims of getting butts in the seats, generating profits, or pursuing "relevance."

4. Christianity needs to address topics more relevant to today's culture.

There should be more sermons on dating, porn, social media use, the current satanic culture (Netflix's Sabrina reboot), new atheism, etc. I feel churches are still operating in the 50's. Maybe with podcasts and Facebook pages but their content is still the same unless they've been taken over by LGBTists and pushing LGBTism disguised as Christianity.

I don't know what sort of churches you've gone to, but every nondenominational church I've ever attended loved to talk about sex nonstop, because it grabs people's attention, but most of the content was vapid with a provocative veneer. Gimmick-master Ed Young Jr. famously streamed for 24 hours from a bed on top of his church promoting his Christian sex book, and years of cumulative dissatisfaction with the perpetual absurdity of the evangelical paradigm was one factor which drove me toward the Orthodox Church.

5. Church tithe/offering system should be more interactive

Instead of having parishioners simply give money, they should be made to feel that they are investors in the church. And I'm not a biblical expert so I don't know if you're not suppose to view it that way but the fact is giving offering just feels like a chore. Very stale and transactional. Why not have parishioners more involved and offer charts and graphs online and data so you feel more involved and maybe even give more because you know the money is being used in a very effective way. The church should be marketed like a tech startup (something that is very sexy to the younger generation) and parishioners as investors and we give money and the payoff we get is not more money but in souls saved.

While on some levels this is an interesting idea, evangelicalism has been treating church like a business for decades and it's led to several huge problems:

• People bouncing around from one church to the next, restaurant-style, as they get bored or seek better entertainment (cooler band, more charismatic pastor.)
• Churches that care more about numbers (more butts in seats! More tithes! Bigger auditoriums! Bigger screens and fog machines!) than turning out mature, discipled Christians.
• A susceptibility toward capitulating to cultural trends borne from a fear of alienating their "clientele." The inroads that feminism, critical race theory, and other leftist causes have made in evangelicalism have their roots in this.
• A lack of focus on spiritual matters in favor of number-crunching and business-style meetings
• The notion that the church ought to be looking up to the loathsome culture of Silicon Valley rather than, say, the Church Fathers of the first millennium for guidance. (Related: Father Josiah Trenham's critique of Silicon Valley in this lecture series.)
• A persistent feeling that your church cares more about shaking every last penny out of you than your spiritual growth and well-being, alienating men and everyone seeking something more substantial.

Pursuing whatever is "very sexy to the younger generation" is absolute foolishness and a dead end. I've sat in churches that drooled over this line of thought for far too many years, and it was a waste of time.

From where I'm looking the whole "who interprets it" objection actually came from the imposters that want to deceive the unwary and twist the scriptures, and keep you from reading it I guess. Because when you read the Bible like 3 or more times, especially the new testament, then how can someone in their right mind miss the obvious anymore. It's easy to see what is wrong with each of those thousand denominations just by comparing their teachings to the Bible. We only have to agree on what is written, and it speaks for itself clearly.

The Bible wasn't written in a vacuum and while many parts are easy to understand, others aren't, especially if you lack the appropriate context. Interestingly, this is acknowledged in scripture itself, in 2 Peter 3:16, where Peter mentions how the complexity and nuance of Paul's epistles has resulted in them being abused and misused. Not to mention that all of those denominations will tell you that they're "just following the Bible" but come to radically different conclusions about a whole variety of topics. And often in the early Church, heretics would wield scripture to support positions like Arianism, but that didn't make them right.

If it was really as simple as you seem to think, the protestant reformation would have resulted in one unified Protestant Church of those following The Clear Meaning Of The Bible, but the reformers couldn't even agree on crucial topics like what the Eucharist is on the basis of scripture alone.

 

[Chains of Peter]

This notion that we have to "improve" Christianity has led to many fads that have since died off in (mainly) American Protestantism. The truth of the matter is that God has already given us everything we need through the Church, the Sacraments, Scripture and the Fathers. Scripture and Tradition provide a framework of understanding God and the world He created and the Sacraments are the means by which we partake of the Divine Essence.

The problem I can see already in this thread is that even among guys who are "based," our idea of what constitutes the Christian faith is fragmented. We know it is centered around Jesus Christ, but is there more to it than that? Did He institute a physical, visible Church whose mission it is to preach and sanctify, or is anyone a Christian who says the Sinner's Prayer? Is the Bible divinely inspired or not? Does the Church precede the Bible or not? Etc. etc.

Now as a Catholic I'm obviously biased about what the best way to go is, if you couldn't tell from my opening paragraph. But I've had my foot in the major branches of Christianity including fundie Protestantism and Eastern Orthodoxy (but missed out on the mainline Prot denominations entirely). I believe the other contenders for "who is the real Christianity" fail precisely because they think they can do it better. (To be fair to the Orthodox, they have had numerous good faith attempts at a corporate reunion with Western Catholicism).

In terms of evangelization, we have to discard the notion that we have to "trick" people in liking our faith, and give the Holy Ghost more credit. Lay out all the cards at what the basics of the Christian religion and see how people react. Most importantly, we musn't hide things that we think people don't want to hear. You may not believe it, but I've gotten mostly positive reactions in Kiwifarms, of all places, for discussing moral theology.

In fact, I'd say the best thing to do is to open with the nasty ugly stuff. Ramit Sethi* calls it the D to C (Disgust to Curiousity) principle, where you say the hard thing, and it elicits such a strong emotional reaction that people want to learn about the "why" of it all.

Most importantly, don't take it personally when people reject your message. And don't despair either; faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Be patient--for some people, it takes years or decades for the fruits of the Gospel/Sacraments to be made manifest. I mean, look at @Roosh 's conversion. I don't think he would have come to this point if he DIDN'T get baptized as a child.

*Ramit Sethi banned me from his sites when I called him out for supporting Black Lives Matter.

 

[Jive Turkey]

Engage in theology. Learn some basic Christian philosophy. I told my friend about the unmoved mover argument, and now he regularly says "I see there is a higher power in control". He has even referred to that higher power as God.

One of the reasons I left Christianity as a teen is because the people teaching religion are unequipped to answer very basic theological questions, because so many people in the church go there to virtue signal, rather than to understand and grapple with the faith.

Edit: I also think we need to remember God is in control. By being obedient to Him his will will manifest. It will manifest either way, but we are called to be servants, not strategists. I think in general Logos is rising. Most conservative parts of the internet are far more Christian than they were 2, let alone 5 or 10 years ago.

Just like a couple of years ago you would meet all these bluepilled guys in real life. They are pretty rare now. Almost all men know the redpill basics now. There is a deluge of information that cannot be held back forever. The Truth always bubbles up eventually

 

[ItalianStallion9]

One of the reasons I left Christianity as a teen is because the people teaching religion are unequipped to answer very basic theological questions, because so many people in the church go there to virtue signal, rather than to understand and grapple with the faith.

Agreed. To me a huge flaw of American Prot denominations is they largely ignore centuries worth of history. After learning about the 40 martyrs of sebaste, the Byzantine Empire, Gregory the Illuminator...I'm even more driven to learn about the strong Christians of the past. Also, lots of the aspects of mainstream denoms (prosperity gospel, acceptance of perverse lifestyle, poorly written worship songs) seem to push away men.

To me, a lot of those worship songs seem like Celine Dion love songs.

I wish more churches would dive into Christian history, deep theology, and stop with watered down teachings.

 

[GodfatherPartTwo]

I wanted Fire and Brimstone but they gave me liberalism and New Age. I'm convinced that many Churches today are subverted in the same way that all of our institutions are subverted; by bad actors who are deliberately leading men astray.

 

[ItalianStallion9]

I wanted Fire and Brimstone but they gave me liberalism and New Age. I'm convinced that many Churches today are subverted in the same way that all of our institutions are subverted; by bad actors who are deliberately leading men astray.

Interesting take. Many American churches are teaching about white guilt, condoning BLM, accepting female clergy, and a few are even greenlighting LGBT agendas. I've wondered if this is due to conforming to societal pressures or if it's a more egregious and deliberate agenda. I'd like to believe it's pressure to conform to society, but I'm open to everyone's opinion.

 

[Diocletian]

The traditional right/monarchism was getting its ass kicked by socialist/communists in the hearts and minds war so it leveled up to facism in the 1930's Europe to win over blue collar workers. When is Christianity going to level up in the current age when there are all kinds of social media, apps, memes and LGBTism, fanboyism and atheism going rampant on our culture?

Suggestions

1. Christians need to engage in meme warfare.

I don't think meme warfare will do anything to advance Christianity. Its a given that the right memes well and the left doesn't, but the difficulty with meme warfare vis a vis religion lies in the fact that you're trying to help people and change their beliefs by using funny insightful pictures. Christianity is experiential, emotional, and intellectual and doesn't translate well to glibness. Look at the following:

Spoiler: Christian Meme

As Christians we can see the obvious truth behind this and it will get a chuckle or a few likes out of us, but do you really think its going to reform or even help to reform a girl who's whoring herself out on OnlyFans? I don't. Its preaching to the choir. Whoring and other things like drugs and depression are deep-seated issues that can't be addressed by memes.

Christian memes are pretty bland and uninspiring compared with classical Christian art; I'm not saying that we all need to be or can be Michelangelo, but to use visual imagery to advance Christianity those images must have the kind of real permanence which memes totally lack.

Spoiler: Spoilered for size

2. Christianity needs to be more aggressive

Christianity definitely does need to be assertive about the fundamental issues it teaches, but it also needs to publicly and unequivocally state that it is the Truth and that all other belief systems--Judaism, LDS, Hinduism, Buddhism, etc. are completely false. Not only that, I think Christianity needs to fight for supremacy in culture and seek to influence it.

3. Christianity needs to be more entertaining (especially for young christians)

I'm not saying church should be entertainment but there's a way to make the teachings of Jesus more interesting than the way it is being taught.

I think Christianity needs to go beyond just teaching about Christ and incorporate the lives of saints as well as pivotal Christian figures such as Charles Martel or modern figures dealing with modern problems. Christ is of course the basis of Christianity but without everything else--the history and community--you don't have much. This would obviously tie in with

4. Christianity needs to address topics more relevant to today's culture.

which is something I agree that Christianity is failing at. I think this is Christianity's best avenue. Re-read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Who did Christ minister to? The lowest people in society--the sick, the poor, the insane, the lame, the immoral, and even the dead. Modern society is producing millions of these types of people every single day and not offering any solutions beyond more immorality, more insanity, and more death. That is where Christianity's strength lies.

5. Church tithe/offering system should be more interactive

Instead of having parishioners simply give money, they should be made to feel that they are investors in the church. And I'm not a biblical expert so I don't know if you're not suppose to view it that way but the fact is giving offering just feels like a chore. Very stale and transactional. Why not have parishioners more involved and offer charts and graphs online and data so you feel more involved and maybe even give more because you know the money is being used in a very effective way. The church should be marketed like a tech startup (something that is very sexy to the younger generation) and parishioners as investors and we give money and the payoff we get is not more money but in souls saved.

Churches need money for upkeep and to fund charities; I agree that better public accounting of what happens to that money would be helpful but I'm skeptical that most people would be interested in chart autism or that it would even be healthy. In a way it doesn't seem that far off from Faceberg likes; your online reputation goes up with the numbers of souls you've saved.

On the other hand, the problem with marketing church like a startup is that you would run into similar problems as Rock Band Church. Tech startups often end up being flashes-in-the-pan (like rock bands) and slightly more sophisticated people understand that a lot of those startups are little more than vehicles for early investors to cash out via over hyped IPOs. That kind of ephemerality is completely contrary to Christianity, which provides the Eternally True Answers to all of the fundamental questions of reality and existence.

 

[MichaelWitcoff]

Christianity levels up in the lives of Christians who take it seriously.

 

[infowarrior1]

Christianity levels up in the lives of Christians who take it seriously.

Indeed. As if the Gospel and the subsequent work of God in those who believe and receive the Holy Spirit isn't sufficient.

God draws near to those who draw near to him. And he will even work mightily though few even when they are as few as 7000 who haven't bowed their knees to Baal.