Problem
Christian Smith calls this "moralistic therapeutic deism." After reading this article, respond to the following prompt: I'm confused by this.
I want to talk to you over the next few minutes about the concept of moralistic therapeutic D ism. I know there's a lot in that and hopefully you don't to me outright away hearing that I want to explain this to you. This is a concept that came out of a book from 2005, so a few years ago. But it was research done with adolescence that Christian Smith and Denton coauthors, they wrote on this topic of really what was the prevailing worldview or even religion of adolescence at that time within the US. And so the research was done over about a four year period and was published in a book called soul searching. It's fascinating to read, kind of towards the end of the book as they explain the concept of moralistic, therapeutic theism. So let me read their words to you. They say, we advance our thesis somewhat tentatively as less than a conclusive fact, but more than mere conjecture. We suggest that the de facto dominant religion among contemporary US teenagers is what we might well call moralistic, therapeutic D ism. The creed of this religion is codified from what emerged from our interviews. Sounds something like this. And so I'm gonna read you, there are five kinds of descriptions of moralistic therapeutic DSM. And then we're going to talk about the concept moralism, moralistic, therapeutic in theism as well. The five aspects they say a God exists who created in orders the world, in watches over human life on Earth. That's the first basically mindset they'd say, encapsulated in this idea of moralistic, therapeutic theism, The second God wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions. Three, the central goal of life is to be happy and to be free or to be happy and to feel good about oneself. For God does not need to be particularly involved in one's life except when God is needed to resolve a problem.
Then five good people go to heaven when they die. Now think about those concepts, the authors would say, no one is necessarily going to use that term to say this is the religion that I hold to. And yet those five descriptors are really what these adolescents were saying. Now, lest you would say, well, that was quite a few years ago and, and adolescence are different. Now my suggestion to you is, where do we think those adolescence got that worldview or that religion? They most likely were shaped by their parents and the generation before them. And then if you really think about it, who is shaping our next-generation, it's really those who came up with this type of an understanding. Let's talk to the moralistic, therapeutic, theism. Those three terms or those three words themselves, moralistic. What do we mean by that, or what did the authors mean by that? They mean that central to life, living the good life is to be happy and to be a good moral person. Really, the goal in life is being fulfilled. That someone needs to be liked by others. That really the goal in life would be to be true to oneself, and the goal in life was to be moral. Now, part of that you would say you might be able to agree with the question though, becomes, where is Scripture and that whose definition of morrow are we using? This seems like a very subjective understanding of moralism. The second concept, therapeutic, The away that the authors describe that they would say central is the feeling of being good or happy or secure or at peace. This isn't a concept about repentance or holiness, or obedience to the Word of God. It's really about having an inner peace or an inner happiness.
That is the prevailing mindset of many of the adolescence that they interviewed. The beliefs or the connection between what is important within one's life. Maybe what the Word of God would say is an authority in one's life was missing and a lot of the interviews that they had. And then finally the concept of de ism D as him as a concept. You might be familiar with this idea that God is kind of absent, absent t, God as some would describe that. Well, you see that in those five definitions are those five statements about moralistic, therapeutic D ism that God, He's there at times, but not always there. And really he's only there when we need him to get out of trouble. Some of the interviews that they did with these adolescence talked about, you know, God is there kind of watching over what's happening, but he's really not involved in our daily lives. He may be there from time to time, but he might not be there. There's an uncertainty of that. So as you think about this concept of moralistic therapeutic D, as I'm, I want to challenge you to think about where some of that thinking has crept into your life perhaps. Are we just seeking to be moral by our own standards? Are we just seeking to be happy? Do we just look to God to come and help us when maybe we're having a difficult day, but we don't really have interests and God being involved in all the aspects of our lives. I think unfortunately, we see this permeating a lot of our thinking at many levels that we might not even realize from time to time. So the challenge is to think through these concepts. Think about how they're affecting our lives and the lives of others in the lives that we're influencing. And then ultimately come back to a biblical understanding of who God is and what he'd require of us.
1) Do you think Moralistic Therapeutic Deism is an accurate reflection of society today?
2) What are relevant examples you can provide that support your conclusion?