this post was submitted on 14 Feb 2024

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Preteens rejecting several biblical teachings, survey reveals (www.christianpost.com)

submitted 11 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 39 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (3 children)

So you don't have to go to the site, here are the statements from the survey and percentages that marked "agree"

Jesus Christ is the only way to experience eternal salvation, based on confessing your sins and relying only upon His forgiveness of your sins
36% of preteens
34% of parents
54% of pastors

the Bible is the true word of God that should be a guide to knowing right from wrong, and living a good life.
25% of preteens
44% of parents
62% of pastors

there are absolute truths — things that are right and things that are wrong, that do not depend on feelings, preferences, or circumstances — those truths are unchanging and knowable
21% of preteens
28% of parents
36% of pastors

the main reason to live is to know, love and serve God, with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength
27% of preteens
33% of parents
56% of pastors

real success in life is consistently obeying God
17% of preteens
19% of parents
42% of pastors

I consistently consult the Bible when trying to determine right from wrong
26% of preteens

I believe turning to the Bible is the best way to distinguish right from wrong
21% of preteens

the means to eternal salvation is by confessing your sins and asking Jesus Christ to save them you the consequences of their sin.”
36% of preteens
35% of parents

The fact that they can barely get a majority of their own pastors to agree to those statements should be the real lesson here. They're just going through the motions and trying to keep from working at McDonalds.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 11 months ago

26% of the kids surveyed recognized the question and knew the expected response

[–] Ashyr 10 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Former pastor here, I think your interpretation of the data is probably inaccurate.

The issue isn't pastors struggling to adhere to their own beliefs, the problem is these aren't very good questions from a theological perspective. They're very narrow and don't reflect the complexities of real life.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago

I suppose the problem is that someone thought those survey questions would provide the information they were looking for. If you're looking to illustrate lack of buy-in, you do like you said, ask the most narrow and fundamentalist questions you can. This is especially true if you're asking ten- to twelve-year-olds these "basic principal" questions. This would also help to illustrate a divergence of the youth group from the parent group, who are more capable of parsing and answering the questions.

I think it'd be safe to say that, if you asked those same questions of similar age populations even forty years ago, you'd see a similar divergence between adult and preteen answers.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 11 months ago

Wait, what are they believing if they don't believe Jesus Christ is the only way to eternal salvation?? That's the whole point of the religion, or at the very least the whole point of the New Testament.