PROPHECY AND POST CHRISTIAN BRITAIN
20/03/07 13:22
Well finally some good news?? The decline of church-goers in England has slowed. Zenit is reporting...
"According to the census 6.3% of the population, just over 3.1 million people, are now in church on an average Sunday, compared with 7.5% in 1998.
"... churchgoers are significantly older on average than the population. No fewer than 29% of churchgoers are 65 or over, compared with 16% of the population. Believers in the younger age groups also tend to go to church less often, and there is a progressive decline in belief as age drops, with very few churchgoers in the younger age brackets. Less than 10% go to church in the 20-29 age group, and this falls to 5% in the 15-19 group."
"A more detailed look at the situation of the Catholic Church came in another report, published this summer by the Pastoral Research Center. Over a three-decade period Mass attendance has declined by 40%, according to a summary of the report published in the Times newspaper on July 4. The report covered the period 1963-1991."
"Over the same period baptisms were halved, while marriages and confirmations plunged by 60%. As well, first Communions declined by 40% and the number of adult converts fell 55%.
"The Chicago Tribune newspaper last May 11 examined the crisis of faith in Britain. The article noted that 72% of the British people called themselves Christian in the 2001 census, but only 8% regularly attend services.
"Britain is showing the world how religion as we have known it can die," Callum Brown told the Chicago Tribune. Brown is a historian at the University of Dundee in Scotland. He was pessimistic about the future, observing that after two generations of people with little experience of regular church participation, it will be difficult to turn the situation around.
Throughout bible history God used the enemies of His people to punish them for their sins. Is God permitting the rise of Islam to punish our abandonment of faith?
"And all these curses shall come upon thee, and shall persue and overtake thee, till thou perish; because thou heardst not the voice of the Lord thy God, and didst not keep his commandments. Because thou didst not serve the Lord thy God with joy and gladness of heart for the abundance of all things, thou shalt serve thy enemy whom the Lord will send upon the... and he shall put an iron yoke upon thine neck till he consumes thee. The Lord will bring upon thee a nation from afar, and from the uttermost ends of the earth, a most insolent nation, that will show no regard to the ancient, nor have pity on the infant, and will devour the fruit of thy cattle, and the fruits of thy land, until thou be destroyed, and will leave thee no wheat, nor wine, nor oil, nor herds of oxen, nor flocks of sheep, till he consume thee in thy cities, and thy strong and high walls be brought down, wherein thy trustedst in all thy land. Thou shalt be beseiged within thy gates, and thou shalt eat the fruit of thy womb, and the flesh of thy sons and thy daughters, in the distress and extremity wherewith thy enemies shall oppress thee." 28th book of Deuteronomy
"But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?
Read More...
|
