Confucian Mormon Buddhist
Member
Few main reasons.
One is that people find it more difficult to believe in the Biblical interpretation of creation. Especially in the U.S., we tend towards literalism and fundamentalism. People are taught now, though, in stuff like evolution and the old Earth. Some don't find it problematic, but many do and abandon the faith.
Another is that it's gotten to be acceptable to spurn the religion, instead of at least paying lip-service to it. Religious freedom didn't really exist even after the Constitution was ratified, and only lately have communities gotten to where religion isn't the center of life.
Third, church isn't the center of everybody's social life. Used to be, it was THE thing in small communities that united them.
Four, society has gotten really soft. Instead of facing the moral standards of the Bible with dignity, it complains that the Bible doesn't meet their standards of debauchery. Many churches follow suit, but they then lose what made them special and become so useless everybody jumps ship.
EDIT: Oh, and yeah, religious people can, sometimes, be their worst enemies when it comes to keeping folks in the church. I can even think of one Baptist friend of mine, a Young Earth Creationist, who puts me off of Christianity. He's a nice dude, but he believes in the stupidest **** (I don't even mean YEC, I'm talking, like, chemtrails and following pastors who are involved in the tax evasion movement), believes God, on the whole, makes your life harder, and his religion seems to actually make his heart harder rather than softer.
One is that people find it more difficult to believe in the Biblical interpretation of creation. Especially in the U.S., we tend towards literalism and fundamentalism. People are taught now, though, in stuff like evolution and the old Earth. Some don't find it problematic, but many do and abandon the faith.
Another is that it's gotten to be acceptable to spurn the religion, instead of at least paying lip-service to it. Religious freedom didn't really exist even after the Constitution was ratified, and only lately have communities gotten to where religion isn't the center of life.
Third, church isn't the center of everybody's social life. Used to be, it was THE thing in small communities that united them.
Four, society has gotten really soft. Instead of facing the moral standards of the Bible with dignity, it complains that the Bible doesn't meet their standards of debauchery. Many churches follow suit, but they then lose what made them special and become so useless everybody jumps ship.
EDIT: Oh, and yeah, religious people can, sometimes, be their worst enemies when it comes to keeping folks in the church. I can even think of one Baptist friend of mine, a Young Earth Creationist, who puts me off of Christianity. He's a nice dude, but he believes in the stupidest **** (I don't even mean YEC, I'm talking, like, chemtrails and following pastors who are involved in the tax evasion movement), believes God, on the whole, makes your life harder, and his religion seems to actually make his heart harder rather than softer.
