Today's NY Times column Global Transformation of Christianity there are depressing facts about a world trend that should not have surprised me: there is a significant part of the non-western "majority world" turning to Evangelical Christianity. "Statistics vary but even conservative estimates guess there were around 98 million evangelical Christians globally in 1970. Now, there are over 342 million." World population in 1970 was 3.7 billion, and it is about 7.8 billion today. So while total population doubled, Christianity increased 3.5 fold. True, the percentage of Christians can be computed to have been 2.6% in 1970 and now is 4.4%, only a small minority.
Globally, the Muslim population is forecast to grow at about twice the rate of the non-Muslim population over the next two decades – an average annual growth rate of 1.5% for Muslims, compared with 0.7% for non-Muslims. If current trends continue, Muslims will make up 26.4% of the world’s total projected population of 8.3 billion in 2030, up from 23.4% of the estimated 2010 world population of 6.9 billion.
Initially, the numbers made me feel anxious about the future. I see the growth of people searching for an answer to their 'spiritual longing', and I can hear the pastors of my childhood filling that need with the nonsense of Christianity. Even more horrifying in a way are the legions of people deciding the Quran is the true path. To my way of thinking, the religious person prefers simple, empty mantras to both their own direction and the world's direction. Those of us who believe in rational thought as a guiding principle rather than a mystical superhuman deity fear we will need to placate fanatics and suppress our disdain for directives that originate in thousands year old ignorance. For the religious, trust is placed among those who have professed the same faith.
Will we have a world turning more and more to prayer as the answer to problems? Will the grifters of the evangelical movement rule? Allowing for both Evangelicals and Muslims to be 90% sincere (that is, the vast majority of the members are sincere believers), why should the trend of growth concern me?
Truly, what do I care if anyone prays five times a day or believes angels help them? Why should I judge anyone for any reason? If I object to proselytization, am I not a tad hypocritical because I want people to conclude, like me, that prayers are futile, the afterlife is a falsehood, and religious beliefs are stupid?
I need to think hard on this topic. It does not take much imagination to project the futility of my present attitude. It seems certain that much of my misery or dissatisfaction is self-inflicted. If true, there are no changes in the world that would relieve my frustrations. It could be a thought akin to the philosophy of Buddhism. Suffering is an internal rather than an external force. Nothing in the external can address the internal cause. Self awareness is key to limiting suffering, and insofar as suffering diminishes happiness, effort should be directed towards the internal suffering.
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