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Shall the Religious Inherit the Earth?

By Susan R on Sat, 06/11/11
Forum category
Society & Culture
Topic tags
culture
http://video.foxnews.com/v/987374617001: FoxNews video interview with Eric Kaufman, author of http://www.amazon.com/Shall-Religious-Inherit-Earth-Twenty-First/dp/184… Shall the Religious Inherit the Earth? Demography and Politics in the Twenty-First Century .
Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens have convinced many western intellectuals that secularism is the way forward, but most people don’t read their books before deciding whether to be religious. Instead, they inherit their faith from their parents, who often inoculate them against the elegant arguments of secularists. And what no one has noticed is that far from declining, the religious are expanding their share of the population; in fact, the more religious people are, the more children they have. The cumulative effect of immigration from religious countries and religious fertility will be to reverse the secularization process in the West. Not only will the religious eventually triumph over the non-religious, but it is those who are the most extreme in their beliefs who have the largest families.

Eric Kaufmann examines the implications of the decline in liberal secularism as religious conservatism rises—and what this means for the future of western modernity.
I’ve heard these ideas used as support for homeschool regulations, because many homeschool families are religious, and have several children.

So- do you think he has a valid perspective? What could this mean to us as Christians?

Discussion

Profile picture for user Ed Vasicek
Ed Vasicek

NewImplications

Tue, 06/14/11
Yes, Susan, I think this perspective is somewhat valid. Christians in Egypt, for example, were once a large minority and now a small minority because the Muslims have so many children while the Christians do not.

I do not think we should view our children as pawns in a population game, but there is some truth to this idea.

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