He studied sucide and religion, name is totally escaping me.

Durkheim.

church is the opiate of the evangelicals, a soft lulling static that is beyond irrelevant to the problems of the world.

Yes, very often yes. But not always. I have seen real transformation happen in “institutional churches”, and I have seen “institutional churches” do some amazing and important work in the world – work that my little house church (much less an informal circle of family and friends) could not have possibly pulled off on our own.

So yeah, I hear your critique and I’m with you. I agree. But I just want to qualify it by pointing out that it’s not all bad. There are rays of hope… perhaps more than we think.

I just finished a semester and sociology was one of the classes I took. I found myself agreeing to a degree with Marx, not fully, but to an extent. One thing I witnessed in my class was this all consuming, “this is what I’ve been taught”. When I mentioned the new social environment there was a complete silence as though I was talking about another planet so far away I couldn’t be right. Even in the light of Marx and other sociologist evidence of what is happening they still could not accept it. Fitting enough it fits from what I understand Tickle to be speaking of. (although I haven’t finished reading her book) I’ll have to dig up my notes so that I can better get across what I’m saying. Right now I can’t think of the guys name. He studied sucide and religion, name is totally escaping me. I would take another sociology class just get a firmer grip on what I learned last semester because it spoke so well to what I’m feeling.