I think what I found is that Christians, at least in the realms that I have been in over 40 some years, we don't like ambivalence. We want answers and therefore we want the clarity of yes or no, right or wrong, good or bad. And you know, if you think about that in PLJ and categories, it's called concrete operations. Like we don't train people to think within the complexity because we have the truth. Right. So why is there a resistance to naming these rallies in the big room, in the Sunday morning room, in whatever the main? Why do gatekeepers still resist this kind of truth telling? Oh, what a brilliant question.
Curtis talks with the “elder statesman” of Christian counseling, Dan Allender, about how therapy has influenced the American church - in much needed and also problematic ways. They explore how therapy has provided an important place for Christians to bring to Jesus the real, hard, and sometimes traumatic realities of life - often in ways that the church could not. They also examine how “moralistic therapeutic deism” increasingly describes the actual civil religion of Americans.
For examples of great books by Dan and his lifelong friend, Tremper Longman III, consider these two classics: Bold Love and The Cry of the Soul: How Our Emotions Reveal Our Deepest Questions About God.
For the original description of “moralistic therapeutic deism” as the religion of American youth, check out Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers by Christian Smith and Melina Lundquist Denton.
Sponsorship details for Good Faith can be found here.