In Deepak Chopra's blog in The Washington Post, he discusses the interesting conclusion that people do not "lose" faith, but rather "shift" it to other (frequently more secular) pursuits. But the recent loss in church attendance does not signal some sort of secularization of America; rather, it shows that, in hard times, people often put their faith in things like community and volunteering. Behind this, Chopra purports, is the idea that many people in America are open to spirituality, but within an much more inclusive framework, not one that excludes people because their beliefs differ from their own (he specifically mentions Christian fundamentalism). Chopra ends with the claim that "as long as faith is placed in a positive value... the decline in church attendance isn't a crisis", but simply evidence that there are other ways for Americans to get their dose of spirituality without working through the religious/church system.
While I agree with Chopra's claim in principle, it will take a lot more than anecdotal evidence that volunteering has increased in times of recession to sway my mind. He makes the claim that "America is a secular society, based on faith in democracy, technology, opportunity, the law, and above all, science". I find this statement quite ludicrous, to be honest, particularly the latter portion about science. If this were the case, would we have not one, but two "rising stars" of one of the two major parties, Sarah Palin and Bobby Jindal, mocking the use of government funds on fruit fly research and volcano monitoring? This may be more of a recent phenomenon, with the rise of the neoconservatives and the Christian Right, but it's nonetheless important to note. As for the "rule of law" claim, I don't think I need to use specific examples to illustrate how that was thoroughly obliterated throughout the past 8 years (but just to humor you, Scooter Libby pardon? Firing of Justice Dept. attorneys? Gitmo?)
On the other hand, I definitely agree that "the worship of money was prevalent for the past eight years". From all the stories, proven or not, about how the Bush Administration handled various aspects of the Iraq War, handing out no-bid contracts, Blackwater, questionable connections between Halliburton and VP Cheney, and disappearing money, I think this is a great way to sum up the past 8 years. I might even take it a step further and say that it wasn't so much a worship of money, but a blatant disregard for the principles of our country and throwing them out in favor of profiteering.
When all is said and done, Chopra does hit some good points but, overall, I'm just not convinced. If we can pull ourselves out of this recession and put ourselves actually back on the track of respecting science, democracy, and law, then I'll believe what Chopra says. Until then, well, I remain skeptical.
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Chopra's claim that "as long as faith is placed in a positive value...the decline in church attendance isn't a crisis" is highly contestable. I agree with it because I believe that creating social value is one of the most important outputs of church attendance, and I recognize that there are many different ways to create this type of social good or value. But of course, many people who believe that church attendance is irreplaceable and compulsory will not agree.
I also notice that Chopra believes that a decline in church attendance is not synonymous with lack of spirituality. This is, I think, true. But, I also believe that Americans tend to value "religion" in its organized form more than spirituality. So, although this is reassuring to Chopra, this may not be reassuring for America at large.
I think Chopra's claim is based on the Protestant idea of a personal God. This means that people can hold their beliefs personally and worship and have a relationship with their God however they see fit; free of judgement from others. It follows then that people would want their spiritual pursuits to take on something concrete, and this shift into more social work rather than organized religion certainly fits the mold. However, whether or not Chopra is right in saying that this is just a different kind of religion as opposed to a lessening of religion, and the scary part of that is the close ties between religion and morality, throughout our society can hardly be determined on such subjective evidence.
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