A new survey of American’s is giving some shocking results. Well, they’re shocking until you realize they’re coming from the same clown college that trained the likes of Dembski et. al. That is of course, Baylor University, the largest Baptist College in the world.
So what does the survey report?
Half of all Americans believe they are protected by guardian angels, one-fifth say they’ve heard God speak to them, one-quarter say they have witnessed miraculous healings, 16 percent say they’ve received one and 8 percent say they pray in tongues
What was the methodology here?
The wide-ranging survey of 1,648 adults, who were asked 350 questions on their religious practices last fall
350 questions? Really? I have to wonder how many people honestly answered all of these. I mean, it’s rare I even have a university multiple choice question that consists of that many questions.
So what makes this even more fun? How about some comments and more data from Rodney Stark, Baylor’s co-director:
The survey, which has a margin of error of four percentage points, also revealed that theological liberals are more apt to believe in the paranormal and the occult – haunted houses, UFOs, communicating with the dead and astrology – than do conservatives. Women (35 percent), blacks (41 percent), those younger than 30 (40 percent), Democrats (40 percent) and singles who are cohabitating (49 percent) were more likely to believe, the survey said.
Baylor researchers also criticized a much-ballyhooed “new atheism” as a barely discernable trend, saying the number of Americans who are atheists has stayed at 4 percent since 1944.
Why? Atheism is a “godless revolution that never happened,” the survey said, adding that irreligion often is not effectively transmitted to children who, when they reach adulthood, often join conservative religious denominations.
Moreover, atheism is hardly taking over the world. Europe does have more atheists than the U.S., the survey said, but no country has more than 7 percent except France, which is at 14 percent of the populace. Farther to the east, Japan is at 12 percent and China is at 14 percent.
Mr. Stark dismissed the popularity of several recent books on atheism, saying they are mostly the products of “angry” people who are largely ignored by theists.
“The religious people don’t care about the irreligious people,” Mr. Stark said, “but the irreligious are prickly. I think they’re just angry.” [Emphasis added]
Really? Angry people who are largely ignored? How about the fact you need to publish a survey supporting your own idealogical basis, or that D’Souza writes regularly about Dawkins et. al. or that Dembski (from Baylor) feels he needs to write books bashing what he perceives as an atheistic evolutionary bias in science?
Mr. Stark finishes talking about megachurches:
“There are many critics who think the megachurches thrive on people who enjoy dramatic Sunday services with fine music but don’t wish to become very ‘religious’ on a day-to-day basis – that the megachurch appeal is a mile wide and an inch deep,” said “What Americans Really Believe,” a companion book to the survey.
“But it is not true. Those who belong to megachurches display as high a level of personal commitment as do those who attend small congregations.”
Mr. Stark added, “Apparently they are preaching Jesus and that’s why they get so big.”
The one thing that I appreciate from this article is that the Washington Times refers to him as “Mr.” rather than “Dr.” or “professor” as those titles are earned.
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That may not be surprising on paranormal beliefs — the more conservative and fundie churches tend to hate all superstitious beliefs but theirs.
But Rodney Stark does not seem to be aware of the numerous “flea” books that have been written in response to the “new atheists”. The admins of richarddawkins.net list no less than 32 of them in their most recent posting on them:
http://richarddawkins.net/article,2988,A-flea-we-missed,RichardDawkinsnet
And dismissing atheists as “angry” — yawn. He doesn’t seem to fault his coreligionists for their anger, like in the recent communion-wafer scandal and in the recent scandal over someone’s painting of Jesus Christ with a male lover.
Rodney Stark is a bad writer and worse researcher. Dennet quotes him in Breaking the Spell – and some of his studies (which Stark did with a colleauge so perhaps it was more rational) – and Stark was flabbergasted. He states in Discovering God (after thanking Templeton) that the “new atheists” are ignorant or arrogant or rant – some “-ant” that is negative.
Stark is completely and utterly lame in his conduct. Another sociologist to watch out for, like Steve Fuller (pronounced Full-uh, as in “full uh nonsense”).
Yes, he used to call himself an agnostic, but he’s now peddling lame Xian apologetics, like Xianity the scientific, rationalistic religion and Xianity the superfeminist religion.
Even taking into account all of the very reasonable criticisms of the survey, one wonders if it really is all that off the mark. I agree that the poll may not representative of the entire country, but based on the number of churches in America, religious-oriented television programming, bible-thumping politicians, etc., I wonder if a more comprehensive survey would reveal that the number of believers in this garbage is higher than this poll suggests.