At the heart of the American experience is a profound contradiction: How are we so incredibly religious and yet so seemingly decadent?
While only 35% of Britons believe in God and 43% say they have no religion, 92% of Americans are believers and 80% are church-goers. Those same Americans, though, also make 68 million pornographic search engine requests every day, spending more than $3,000 on pornographic websites every second.
How are we to understand the materialistic impulses that had us spending $52.4 billion on Black Friday weekend shopping alone, and the bizarre accompanying stories like the woman who injured 20 shoppers by firing pepper spray into a crowd to clear her path to an Xbox?
Every four years, our presidential election cycle suggests the answer: Our public figures are obsessed with gay marriage and abortion to the exclusion of all other values.
Watch the Republican debates on television and you would think that America faces not a single social challenge other than stopping gays from marrying and women from aborting fetuses. America is a religious nation whose religious convictions have been hijacked by these twin issues, even though they have little to do with most Americans.
While approximately 7% of the American population is gay, more than 50% of all marriages end in divorce. In fact, gays seem to be the only men in America who are still passionate about marriage. Straight people don't need help from gays to destroy the institution of marriage, having a done a mighty fine job of it ourselves, thank you very much. But rather than pastors pushing real policies that might stem the tide of divorce -- like making marital counseling tax-deductible -- they dwell on a politically divisive distraction.
In 1999 I published a book, Kosher Sex, which was pilloried by Jewish and Christian clerics for offering explicit erotic advice about how to make the marital bedroom passionate again. Yet the No. 1 cause of divorce in America is sexual boredom and lack of erotic interest, with the Washington Post reporting that one of three American couples is entirely platonic. Were pastors more willing to teach, say, the Song of Solomon, with its deep erotic secrets, rather than obsessing over gay marriage, millions of American children might not end up as yo-yos shuffling between parents' homes on weekends.
In 2008, the American economy nearly collapsed. For bankers and consumers, homes were never big enough and cars never new enough. If ever there were a time for American religious and political leaders to examine materialism, gluttony and greed, it was then. But my evangelical brothers and sisters responded instead with Proposition 8, a national campaign to overturn gay marriage in California.
Abortion has also become a major distraction ignoring the values that underlie it. Almost all abortions are sought by single women who have been impregnated by men in an out-of-wedlock relationships. Yet where is the national conversation about a culture that degrades woman and portrays them as the libidinous man's plaything?
Tim Tebow is pilloried for the unseemly act of prayer in the secular cathedral of the stadium. But women jumping up and down in lycra to the accompaniment of pompoms and cleavage creates no offense. From the 4.2 million porn websites in the U.S. to the recording industry peddling soft porn and magazines idealizing dangerously thin models, the dream of women being appreciated as much for the their brains as for their bust is undermined. Yet we see no push for school uniforms, for example, that could inculcate values of modesty and respect for the body among American teenagers.
In the African-American community, nearly 70% of all children are born out of wedlock, resulting in single mothers raising children on their own. Aside from Bill Cosby's courageous speeches on the subject, pastors largely ignore men's obligations to their children in favor of the Supreme Court's obligation to the unborn.
It's a cruel failure of leadership on the part of our religious, political and cultural icons. And this campaign year already looks like it'll only perpetuate the problem.
Rabbi Shmuley's newest book, Kosher Jesus (Gefen), examining the Jewish life of Jesus, will be published on February 1st. In 2010 he published "Renewal" which detailed the 7 universal Jewish values that could bring healing to America. Follow him on Twitter @RabbiShmuley.
Follow Rabbi Shmuley Boteach on Twitter: www.twitter.com/RabbiShmuley
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Lorna Byrne: Why We Should Listen to The Angels' Call for Different Religions to Pray Together
By the way, the economy didn't nearly melt down because the common man is too materialistic; the problem was banks pulling shenanigans. But you knew that already.
I believe that was exactly the Rabbi's point, yes. There are 613 commandments in the Hebrew Torah. Why on earth are politicians--and commenters like you--spending so much focus on just one of them (because it never does actually outlaw abortion, but I'll admit that it forbids (male) homosexuality), and ignoring all the rest every election season?
You don't think abortion is something that has to do with most Americans? Up to half* of all women in the U.S. will have an abortion in their lifetime, and for every one of these women there is a corresponding man involved. Abortion is a fundamental part of healthcare for women.
*
Health Topics: Facts for Women: Termination of Pregnancy
Half of all women in the United States will have an abortion in their lifetime.
depts.washington.edu/uwcoe/healthtopics/.../term_facts.html
Technically, it started toward the end of 2007.
I know it's kind of irrelevant, but we need to keep reminding Republicans that Obama isn't responsible for the whole mishegoss.
Obama wasn't President until 2009, so he can't be blamed for the economy of 2008 either.
Education and teaching reasoning and logic from a young age would solve many of our problems.
This is true, but this can be done with both a secular and religious upbringing.
If a religious started stressing reasoning and logic it would die out in a few generations.
True respect for girls and women does not require them to cover their bodies, it does not require shame. It requires men to change their way of thinking and to grow their brain so that they can understand what true respect is. It requires them to grow a sense of shared humanity rather than indulging in their perceived priveleged status or position of power in this world.
Having to cover yourself to please a religion is just as blind as following fashion trends. A self-respecting woman is true to herself and doesn't submit to the judgments of either.
The average American Christian just wants to be the "feel secure that you're not gonna burn in hell for all eternity with no-strings attached" type of Christians. Instant gratification with no effort and no consequences.
The whole, "put forth the effort to model Christ and emulate his teachings in your daily life" thing? ... Not so much.
That kind of work is way too hard, adds too much stress to daily life, and frankly takes too much away from watching TV.
Then you have Goldman-Sachs, which started out as a Jewish partnership enterprize in commercial paper for entrepreneurs in 1869, then shifted focus away from trading and towards investment banking in 1930. Now Goldman's swindle people and the government out of their money. Where is good or god in that business?
And then, where are the Christian-Judeo ethics in America, when more than 91 percent of single women say they would marry for love, yet three out of four of them would not marry an unemployed man. See:http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/21/three-out-of-four-women-would-not-marry-someone-unemployed_n_881318.html
Who said, "America is a religious nation of religious convictions"? Religion in America is nothing more than a conglomeration of social cults, Who worships money above everything else, and conveniently uses god for their own justifcation and influence. Ever wonder how easy it was for TV Evangelists to make people subconsciously feel bad, (like sinners), so they could rake in the money off these gullible people?
And, they teach religious convictions?
How about more like: We are seemingly religious and yet so incredibly decadent. It's about time to admit that actions reflect belief. More and more Americans are godless. Period. Thank God. We've had how many centuries to give this stuff called "religion" a chance?