David Kinnaman | Revolution in Jesusland

unChristian at Catalyst October 4, 2007

Posted by Zack in Georgia | 5 comments

The final session of the Catalyst “lab day” last night was fascinating. Gabe Lyons, of the Fermi Project, and David Kinnaman, of the Barna research group, teamed up a couple years ago to study perceptions of Christians among young non-Christians (as well as young Christians too). They turned the study into a book, unChrsitian: What a New Generation Really Thinks about Christianity… and Why It Matters. In the final session last night, Gabe and David presented the research, and then brought up Shane Claiborne and Rick McKinley, two Christians who have done a lot to reach outside of the Church, to join them in discussion.

David reminded the audience several times that results of big-study research are hugely complex, and warned against over-simplification.

So I don’t want to oversimplify.

HOWEVER, one thing really stood out, and subtly became the main focus of the evening forum. Apparently, all the anti-gay marriage ballot initiatives and other anti-gay campaigning have really been ravaging the perception of Christianity among the general public, and even among young Christians. He showed one graph that showed favorability ratings over the past several decades for gays shooting up from low single digits to 33% today. (That might have been just among young people, I can’t remember.)

Meanwhile, right along with that, the favorability rating for “evangelicals” among the same group plummeted from high numbers to 3%! David didn’t argue for a direct correlation between those two numbers. But he talked about how today most young people know openly gay people, and they are having a hard time reconciling what their church says and their valued relationships.

He gave an anecdote from the research of one person who said he was sitting in church, with a gay friend who they had brought, and the pastor was preaching that “God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.”

This topic requires a long, in-depth article, not a blog post. But you could hear a pin drop at moments last night, as the audience (a couple thousand strong) wrestled with the results. Shane and Rick gently danced around a different—more loving—way of relating to gays. But they weren’t arguing that homosexuality was Biblical. Looking around the audience, some people looked thrilled and enthusiastic about what Shane and Rick were saying. Others looked troubled.

At one point, Shane gave a rousing and beautiful little speech that closed with something like, “We need to be able to disagree with each other and with others, and still love each other.” Maybe 1/5 or 2/5 of the audience applauded enthusiastically. The rest sat still. I saw one head shaking.

Don’t misunderstand: that head that was shaking almost certainly would agree with the cliche “love the sinner, hate the sin.” In other words, he believes in loving gay people, but thinks homosexuality is “not the way God meant us to live,” right along with pre-marital sex. What he probably disagreed with was that his church should tolerate open and practicing gays as a member of the community. (Shane had earlier explicitly argued that the church must welcome gays.)

So, is the Christian right (with its high profile anti-gay campaigning) shooting the Church in the foot? That 3% favorability rating sure suggests it. There is a new generation, a new guard, who are trying to undo the damage by practicing “uncensored grace”. If Catalyst is any indication, they are well placed, and well prepared to succeed.