On Being Right

In addition to, or perhaps at the root of, Dan Kinnaman's reasons young Christians are leaving the church, I would like to add rightness. We are a religion obsessed with the answers, and those answers have driven divisions, from congregational splits to denominational schisms to bloody wars. Last week, Cathleen Falsani at Sojourners published a great piece on the prevalence and divisiveness of smugness in the Church. I argue that young people, who tend to be more open to "living in the question," find the certitude of the Church particularly difficult to handle. From issues of science to sexuality to politics, Christians have no qualms claiming to be on God's side, as though they have transcended the difficulties posed in scripture and culture to arrive as the Lord's mouthpiece. Increasingly influenced by a globalizing world, in which varied worldviews and perspectives collide to recreate one another, young Christians are acutely aware that anyone declaring to have everything figured out is unquestionably full of it. Call it post-modernism or call it a cop-out, but Millennial Christians are increasingly cautious about the unquestionable Word of God, particularly when interpreted and disseminated by a remarkably homogenous group of individuals. Or at least that's what I think... Thoughts?