Up & Coming Weekly

6 UCW OCTOBER 14-20, 2009 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM MARGARET DICKSON, State Representative and Contributing Writer COMMENTS? 484-6200 ext. 222 or call 919-733-5776 or email MARGARETD@NCLEG.NET THIS WEEK WITH MARGARET THIS WEEK WITH MARGARET Wise parents often counsel their children on taking up certain subjects in polite conversations. Avoid topics like politics, money, sex, and religion, they say, because these are deeply personal, fraught with emotion, none of your business, and have no exact answers, only dearly and sometimes irrationally held opinions. I believe I heard a bit of that advice from my own mother and father. I have clearly failed at keeping my political opinions to myself, but I rarely converse on the other issues for all of the reasons above. Nevertheless, here I go on one of the really personal and thorny ones. Religion. It is not what I think about religion, though. It is what we Americans told Parade magazine we think about religion these days and how we go about practicing our beliefs. Parade is the venerable Sunday supplement that slides out of newspapers across the country every week. The one with the questions about movie stars and other celebrities on the inside cover. A recent edition, the same one with the article on Sela Ward's "Deep South Charm," featured what Parade calls its "new national poll on spirituality." The magazine does not report how many Americans were polled, but it is full of statistics regarding our religious beliefs and practices. Those who fear that we are becoming a Godless nation, take heart. The nation founded on religious faith and the freedom to enjoy it still believes in God — 69 percent of us say just that, and only fi ve percent confess to disbelief in God. More than 3/4s of us say we pray outside religious services and about the same percentage says parents have a duty to bring their children up in a religious context. Things get a bit less predictable after that. While nearly half of us say we are "religious," half also say we attend religious services "rarely or never." Even so, 24 percent of us say that our religion is the most important thing in our lives. A third of us say it is important, but not the most important thing. Another quarter of us say religion is a part of our lives but that it is not particularly important. Nor do we have much fear in our religious faiths today. Fewer than half of us believe our worldly actions determine what happens to us after death, and while most of us say we pray regularly, it is because prayer brings us comfort and hope, not because God demands we do so. And what do we ask of God when we pray? Most of us pray for the well-being of others. Slightly fewer of us pray for forgiveness, and nearly a quarter of us pray for money or material goods. Unlike earlier generations, religious practitioners today are tolerant of other faiths. While 78 percent of us say we would never convert to another faith, we do not believe ours is the one true way. A full 59 percent of us say that all religions are valid. In addition, we feel strongly that religion is a personal and private matter. While we might believe that religious faith can help address the world's problems and provide hope to suffering people, we do not want religion and politics to mix. An unimpressive 15 percent of us say religion should be a critical factor in political decisions. In a new and different vein of thought, nearly a quarter of us say we are in a different category altogether, "spiritual but not religious." I have heard this statement in recent years from several friends and acquaintances, although I am not clear on exactly what that means. I am not sure they know either. Religious scholars and social scientists are no doubt pondering and debating the role of religion in modern American life, and I am comfortable watching from the sidelines, pondering myself. I do not know what the changes mean, but I see many of the same attitudes Parade documents around me as well. I see people leaving traditional religious denominations and moving to religious communities with more loosely defi ned faiths and less rigid organizations. My observation is that religious changes are part of the growing diversity of our nation as we develop from a country founded by white European Christians in the 17th and 18th centuries to the vastly more populated United States of the 21st century, with more than 300 million people whose heritages span our globe. For some of us, such religious changes are unsettling, alarming, even terrifying. For others of us, they are welcome and liberating. However we feel about them, I sense that the changes are real and evolving. I also sense that for the Southern Bible Belt of which North Carolina has historically been a fi rm part, the changes are diffi cult and painful. Adjusting Even the Bible Belt by MARGARET DICKSON you should be marketing with us. you should be marketing with us. 51% of our Readers plan to buy car accessories this year. 51% of our Readers plan to buy car accessories this year. If your business could help If your business could help this car, this car, For Sales & Marketing Call 484-6200 For Sales & Marketing Call 484-6200

• Cover