America: Losing Our Religion - Free Archive Audio

Christianity in Crisis

"It was the result of having multiple pastors

tell me, essentially, the same story about

quoting the Sermon on the Mount,

parenthetically, in their preaching -

'turn the other cheek' - [and] to have

someone come up after to say,

'Where did you get those liberal talking

points?' And what was alarming to me is

that in most of these scenarios, when the

pastor would say, 'I'm literally quoting

Jesus Christ,' the response would not be,

'I apologize.' The response would be,

**'**Yes, but that doesn't work anymore.

That's weak.' And when we get to the

point where the teachings of Jesus

himself are seen as subversive to us,

then we're in a crisis."

▪  NPR radio interview with American

theologian Russell D. Moore conducted

by Scott Detrow on August 8th, 2023.

▪ About 4,500 Protestant churches closed

in 2019, the last year data is available,

with about 3,000 new churches opening,

according to Lifeway Research.

🇺🇸 It was the first time the number of

churches in the U.S. hadn’t grown since

the evangelical firm started studying

the topic.