Double-Down

Well, it ain't spring; but you can feel that it's just around the corner.  Alison and I have been out birding a fair amount and our feathered friends are definitely feeling like it's time to make more birdies.  Love is in the air...

Lots of Harbor Seals sunning themselves at Auke Bay

One of our late Uncle Ted's airport wind profiler gizmos.  Also a great perch...

A female Common Goldeneye in the pond by Fish Creek

She was very cooperative as a subject...

The Mallards not so much...

Tons of Mallards out Fish Creek as well as a fair number of American Wigeons, Barrow's Goldeneye, and Surf Scoters.  The Northwestern Crows are plentiful and noisy as hell...  We saw a Belted Kingfisher and, of course, Bald Eagles.  All of these guys are locals...don't think there are any migrants passing through yet; but I may be wrong.  We will keep you posted on the bird front...

In other news, I just finished reading an interesting article in the current addition of Foreign Affairs titled:  'God and Caesar in America - Why Mixing Religion and Politics is Bad for Both.' 

The article makes a number of interesting points including a reminder of how recently the marriage of religiosity to political conservatism was consecrated.  Who remembers that back in the 1960's Democrats were more likely to be church goers than Republicans?


The most fascinating point of the article however is the suggestion that the latest American religious awakening may well be past its prime and there is substantial evidence that the millennial generation (persons under the age of 30) are increasingly turning their back on religion generally.  In 2011 over one third of Americans in their early 20's self-identify as having no religious affiliation.

The best evidence indicates that this dramatic generational shift is primarily in reaction to the religious right.  Politically moderate and progressive Americans have a general allergy to the mingling of religion and party politics.  And millennials are even more sensitive to it, partly because many of them are liberal (especially on the touchstone issue of gay rights) and partly because they have only known a world in which religion and the right are intertwined.  To them, "religion" means "Republican," "intolerant," and "homophobic."  Since these traits do not represent their views, they do not see themselves - or wish to be seen by their peers - as religious.

The authors also suggest that at least some clergy have come to recognize the trend.

Indeed, one of the most significant differences between our 2006 and our 2011 data was the drop-off in political activity within U.S. religious congregations.  In 2006, 32 percent of Americans who belonged to a congregation reported hearing sermons with political content "once every month or two" or "several times a month."  By 2011, that figure had fallen to 19 percent.  The trend held among those of all religious traditions, in all regions of the country, among conservatives and liberals, young and old, and urban and rural.  Presumably, clergy across the country have sensed what we see in the data, namely, Americans' growing aversion to blurring the lines between God and Caesar.  So they have opted to stick with God.

As I said - an interesting article.  On the other hand, something too good to be true is often not true.  And at least one major denomination has, for the moment at least, apparently elected to double-down on their political activity.

From a March 9, 2012 Associated Press article:

Pope Benedict XVI waded deep into U.S. campaign politics Friday, urging visiting U.S. bishops to beef up their teaching about the evils of premarital sex and cohabitation, and denouncing what he called the “powerful’’ gay marriage lobby in America.

As debate over health care coverage for birth control rages in the United States, Benedict said there was an urgent need for Catholics in America to discover the value of chastity — an essential element of Christian teaching that he said had been subject to unjust “ridicule.’’

U.S. bishops are currently locked in an election year battle with the Obama administration over federal funding for birth control.

Two days later the U.S. Catholic bishops announced  a major campaign to fight the proposed mandate that all private employers must provide contraceptive services as part of employee health plans.

The bishops may well win the contraceptive coverage battle. But it will do nothing to help them win the hearts and minds of the young among their flock.

Last week there was also an interesting article in The Economist on sex education in the UK that raised some of the same points as in the Foreign Affairs article.

Some pupils at Catholic schools in Lancashire recently received a sex education pamphlet entitled "Pure Manhood:  How to become the man God wants you to be".  This offers such pearls as "safe sex is a joke" and "the homosexual act is disordered, much like contraceptive sex between heterosexuals."  To that, youths are likely to respond:  whatever.