Ministry Today

The American Outworking of Belief

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Written by Marcus Yoars

QUOTE: “It’s just part of a 200-year working out of ideas about personal autonomy and equality that are sort of built into the American experience. The notion that someone is going to burn in hell because they have their own beliefs is just not resonant within our larger political ideals.” —Alan Wolfe, director of the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life at Boston College, responding to the cultural shift toward an individualized, a la carte Christianity—as indicated in Barna’s recent study that showed American Christians are increasingly unwilling to believe their non-Christian neighbors will go to hell [csmonitor.com, 1/14/09]