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by Odin When I was in high school I went to Immanuel Mission Church in Hollywood, FL. In my youth group was a boy named Brian Kang. Brian was not popular with the adults; he was usually in trouble, and the kids teased him for his nonconformity. In my leadership position I could see Brian reach out for the love and sanity that Christ supposedly offered, and heard the pastor tell him it wasn't his until he stopped sinning. I saw Brian deal with his extremely difficult life, made more difficult by the lack of support and constant condemnation he received from the "family" that supposedly cared. Their best solution was to chastise Brian, cast out his demons, and "pray" for him. I never saw anyone share genuine care for him in my time at that church. When I think back I see how obvious it was then what the outcome would be. I learned just yesterday that Brian killed himself. He was only 18 or 19. As I understand it, that was 18 or 19 years of sadness and i...

The increasing secularization of American society has taken a particular toll on Protestant identity, presenting the prospect that after more than 200 years of history, the United States may soon no longer be a majority Protestant country, according to a new study by the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago. The percentage of the population that is Protestant has been falling and will likely fall below 50 percent by mid-decade and may be there already, the research reported. From 1972 until 1993 the Protestant share of the population remained stable. But then a decline set in. In 1993, 63 percent of Americans were Protestant, but by 2002, the number was 52 percent, NORC research found. During the same time, the number of people who said they had no religion went up from 9 percent to nearly 14 percent. The survey listed people as Protestant if they said they were members of a particular Protestant denomination, such as Baptist, United Methodist or...