Liberals have stuck to a pretty consistent strategy in dealing with American Christianity: If you repeat something often enough, people will start to believe it. With the media’s help, they set out to convince the country that evangelicals were dying on the political vine. But, as so often happens, they were proven wrong on the biggest of stages when, in 2016, the church’s “withering” influence proved to be anything but.

Since then, teams of researchers have been trying to get a read on the state of Christianity in America — and what they’ve found might surprise you. After years of hearing the same dire predictions, even churchgoers probably assumed the country’s faith had dwindled. Like us, you’ve seen the headlines about declining church attendance or the Millennials’ rejection of faith and just assumed the stories were true.

Not so fast, says Harvard University. Its latest study shows that U.S. Christianity isn’t only alive, but growing. It’s a surprising thing to swallow with the media’s drumbeat of liberal bias, but powerful new statistics point to a resurgence of the faith culture the Left so easily dismisses. In a lengthy commentary by Glenn Stanton in The Federalist, he pours over the data and explains, “Not only did their examination find no support for this secularization in terms of actual practice and belief, the researchers proclaim that religion continues to enjoy ‘persistent and exceptional intensity’ in America. These researchers hold our nation ‘remains an exceptional outlier and potential counter example to the secularization thesis.’”

Believe it or not, the authors of Harvard’s report “found that the percentage of church-attending Americans relative to overall population is more than four times greater today than it was in 1776.” In fact, Stanton points out, “The number of attendees has continued to rise each and every decade over our nation’s history right up until the present day.” Despite the hemorrhaging of mainline congregations, most analysts say the brunt of the losses are liberal churches. “When the so-called ‘progressive’ churches question the historicity of Jesus, deny the reality of sin, support abortion, ordain clergy in same-sex relationships and perform their marriages, people desiring real Christianity head elsewhere,” Stanton reminds people. “Fact: evangelical churches gain five new congregants exiled from the liberal churches for every one they lose for any reason. They also do a better job of retaining believers from childhood to adulthood than do mainline churches.”

In other words, Christianity is shifting — not dying. The number of people who read their Bible, go to church weekly and pray regularly has been “steel-bar constant” for the last half-century. “Patently persistent,” as Harvard calls it. It also happens to be in astounding contrast to other nations. “Attending services more than once a week continues to be twice as high among Americans compared to the next highest-attending industrial country, and three times higher than the average comparable nation.” If the people who once practiced a lukewarm Christianity have found other ways to spend their Sunday mornings, it’s probably no great loss to the cause of Christ and has zero effect on the culture.

“The United States ‘clearly stands out as exceptional,’ and this exceptionalism has not been decreasing over time. In fact, these scholars determine that the percentages of Americans who are the most vibrant and serious in their faith is actually increasing a bit, ‘which is making the United States even more exceptional over time.’” Of course, part of the reason for this consistency is the number of children Bible-believing churches tend to have. Christian parents are outpacing the offspring of other populations, and that’s helped to keep the fabric of faith alive.

Speaking of kids, what about the doom and gloom we keep hearing about Millennials leaving the church? Is the next generation as lost as the media makes it out to be? Yes and no. One thing to keep in mind about Pew’s research and others’, Stanton cautions, is that a lot of these Millennials who are “abandoning their faith” didn’t have much to begin with. “Pew reports that of young adults who left their faith, only 11 percent said they had a strong faith in childhood while 89 percent said they came from a home that had a very weak faith in belief and practice.” Questioning your beliefs, he points out, is also just part of the maturation process.

So the next time you hear that Christianity is “going the way of the Yellow Pages,” don’t buy it. Liberals only argue that to disparage and diminish you. Don’t let them. As much as they’d like to believe otherwise — and as long as there are Christians living out their faith every day — faith is alive and well in America!

Originally published here.

NFL Faces Ad-versity From Vets’ Group

The NFL can’t afford more bad publicity, but that’s exactly what it’s getting after its latest clash with veterans. You’d think the league’s abysmal ratings would have it rethinking its business model. Not so far, according to Fox News’s Todd Starnes. Instead of shying away from the anti-Americanism that’s hurting it, the NFL is embracing more!

As if five months of anthem controversy isn’t enough, Commissioner Roger Goodell is heading into the league’s biggest game with a black cloud hanging over the sport. Its relationship with the military already on shaky ground, Goodell didn’t exactly further the peace process when he blocked American Veterans (AMVETS) from airing a Super Bowl ad on patriotism. The ad includes a two-word message: “#PleaseStand.” “It’s a simple, polite request that represents the sentiment of our membership, particularly those whose missing or paralyzed arms or limbs preclude standing,” group National Commander Marion Polk explained.

Apparently, the NFL didn’t take it that way and rejected the ad outright. The Super Bowl, insisted league spokesman Brian McCarthy, “is designed for fans to commemorate and celebrate the game, players, [and] teams” — not, apparently, the men and women who guard the freedom that makes that celebration possible. “It’s never,” McCarthy said with a straight face, “been a place for advertising that could be considered by some as a political statement.”

Is that so? Where was McCarthy last year when the ads were so political that they made more headlines than the actual game? For corporate heavyweights like Google, Coca-Cola, 84 Lumber, Budweiser, and Airbnb, staying on the sidelines in the early days of the Trump administration wasn’t an option for Super Bowl LI. They left product placement in the rearview and opted for controversial statements on everything from immigration to sexuality. “We all belong. The world is more beautiful the more you accept,” Airbnb insisted. Google squeezed in plenty of subliminal messages — and some not-so-subliminal rainbow flags.

Then there was 84 Lumber, which didn’t win over a lot of conservatives with its attack on Trump’s immigration crackdown in its commercial bashing of a Mexican border wall. “There is an example of an unsophisticated advertiser making a political statement, and not really caring whether it helps them sell any lumber,” said Allen Adamson, founder of Brand Simple Consulting. Then, of course, there was Audi, which tried to make a statement about equal pay — only to be outed for having an all-male board.

As usual, the only thing more astounding than the NFL’s censorship is its hypocrisy. And since when did honoring the flag become a political statement anyway? It used to be just good manners. “Perhaps Goodell was concerned that a ‘political statement’ in the game-day program might take away from the ‘political statements’ being made on the football field when players take a knee,” Todd suggested. And for all of its radical politics, Polk points out, the NFL certainly doesn’t mind exploiting the military when it’s convenient. “Veterans are good for more than just military aircraft flyovers, photo opportunities during halftime, or props to sell camouflage-style NFL apparel, although the NFL’s stance … says otherwise.”

If there’s room for the “free speech” of Colin Kaepernick, then surely there’s room for the majority of Americans who are disgusted by his display. “Freedom of speech works both ways,” Polk warns. “We respect the rights of those who choose to protest, as these rights are precisely what our members have fought — and in many cases died — for. But imposing corporate censorship to deny that same right to those veterans who have secured it for us all is reprehensible and totally beyond the pale.”

Originally published here.

Have States Thrown in the Towel on Bathrooms?

The far-Left has been trying to speak support for its bathroom agenda into existence since the fight first broke out on the national scene a few years ago. Unfortunately for it, the battle that launched a thousand protests hasn’t turned out exactly as planned. And not for lack of trying.

As usual, liberals tried to win on gender the way they won on marriage: through coercion, not consensus. That strategy backfired in places like Houston, where people hadn’t even adjusted to the idea of same-sex marriage, let alone the redefinition of gender. Impatient with the progress of the transgender agenda, Barack Obama tried to force his hand, demanding that public schools let kids use whatever bathrooms, showers, and locker rooms they wanted.

The American people revolted, prompting rallies, boycotts, and lawsuits across the 50 states. Lawmakers tried to tackle the issue. School boards followed suit. And before you knew it, the issue of privacy was dominating the political conversation. Then came Donald Trump. The fiercely outspoken Republican had no trouble calling out the ridiculousness of the bathroom agenda. To prove it, one of his first acts was rolling back Obama’s mandate.

Democrats, on the other hand, still can’t seem to let go of the issue — despite its devastating impact on their 2016 candidates. “Rust Belt Dems broke for Trump because they thought Clinton cared more about bathrooms than jobs,” a Washington Post headline read. Even now, a full year and change into Trump’s administration, heartland Democrats are pleading with the national party to give up its transgender politics. “Heartland Democrats to Washington: ‘You’re Killing Us’” is the latest Politico news. “New report blames elitist national party for alienating voters, and threatening the party’s chances in 2020.”

“The Democratic brand,” Illinois State Rep. Jerry Costello told Politico,“is hugely damaged, and it’s going to take a while to bring it back. Democrats in southern Illinois have been more identified by [transgender] bathrooms than by putting people back to work.”

Now, as both sides regroup under Trump, The New York Times is trying to claim victory in the privacy war. “With elections looming and major corporations watching, the social issues that have provoked bitter fights in recent years across the conservative South — including restroom access for transgender people and so-called religious freedom measures — are gaining little legislative momentum in statehouses this year… Democratic and Republic officials, advocacy groups, and researchers,” the Times suggests, “say that other, less contentious subjects are taking center stage, while fewer new hot-button social bills are being introduced.”

But that doesn’t mean that conservatives are “wary, weary, or both.” Could it be that with Obama’s regime in the rearview mirror, states can move on from bathroom battle? President Trump took the action most Americans wanted when he overturned a mandate that was not only contrary to popular opinion but natural law. Now that states aren’t under the government’s attack, they aren’t under the pressure to pursue other policies. And surely, conservatives in southern states didn’t want to spend any more time on bathrooms than they were forced to. If anything, they just wanted to return to the status quo Donald Trump gave them. For now, the battle may well be in the corporate world, where executives are testing the limits of consumer patience with extreme gender politics. Let them. In the meantime, states are finally free to focus on other issues — thanks to an administration now operating within the limits of the Constitution.

Originally published here.

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This is a publication of the Family Research Council.