“Americans are an "almost chosen people," which is meant to suggest that there are clear parallels, literal, theological and everything else, between the American story and the Old Testament story of Israel and then the broader story of the Christian church. It's OK to recognize the parallels. It's OK to invoke them. But, you have to keep that "almost" in front of the "chosen." You can't go all the way and say, "America is Israel, America is the Church." That's where I think patriotism shades into, what I call, the heresy of nationalism.” PeopleThinkingWayStoriesChristianAmericaChurchClearFrontsIsraelChosenNationalismShadeTestamentParallelsHeresyLiteralTheologicalOld TestamentInvokeChristian Church Author:Ross Douthat
“Independent of the critique I'm making, I'm just trying to paint a more comprehensive portrait of American religion than you get from a right versus left, religious conservatives versus secular liberal, believer versus atheist, binary. Too often, we just look at religion in America through that kind of either/or lens. I think it's much more complicated than that.” ThinkingTryingLooksKindAmericaLeftReligiousIndependentPaintAtheistComplicatedBelieverSecularPortraitsVersusLensesComprehensiveCritiqueBinaryEither Or Author:Ross Douthat
“America's problem isn't too much religion or too little of it. It's bad religion: the slow-motion collapse of traditional Christianity and the rise of a variety of destructive pseudo-Christianities in its place.” LittlesProblemAmericaChristianityToo MuchTraditionalVarietyDestructiveCollapsePseudoSlow Motion Book:Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics Source: Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics
