Most U.S. Protestant pastors doubt Beck, Obama are Christians-poll
What do conservative TV and radio personality Glenn Beck and U.S. President Barack Obama have in common? Most U.S. Protestant pastors doubt their Christian credentials.
These are among the findings of a survey released this week by LifeWay Research, the number-crunching arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, which sometimes does interesting pastor polls.
The poll in question, of 1,000 U.S. Protestant pastors, asked: “Which, if any, of the following people do you believe are Christians?” It then gave a list of five prominent personalties: TV diva Oprah Winfrey, former U.S. President George W. Bush, Beck, Obama and former Alaska governor and conservative sweetheart Sarah Palin.
Only 27 percent of the respondents said they believed Beck, who is a Mormon, was a Christian and only 41 percent — well less than half — answered in the affirmative regarding Obama. Bush scored the highest at 75 percent and Palin was second at 66 percent. Oprah came in rock bottom at 19 percent. The national telephone survey took place Oct. 7-14.
It all raises some interesting questions and may raise a few eyebrows.
Let’s start with Beck, who often speaks the political and even spiritual language of conservative evangelical Christians– and counts many as his fans – but cannot score theological points with them because of his Mormon faith. Many evangelicals regard The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as an oddball cult and the survey’s results show it may be as much a political liability for Beck the activist as it is for Mitt Romney the candidate, the former and perhaps future Republican presidential contender.
Most U.S. Protestant pastors see Islam as dangerous – survey
Here’s an interesting survey that was released on Monday by LifeWay Research, which is the number crunching arm of the South Baptist Convention, America’s largest evangelical group.
It says that two-thirds of Protestant pastors in America regard Islam as a dangerous religion. You can see their press release here. The full survey has not been posted on their site.
But in a nut shell, the survey of over 1,000 pastors of different Protestant denominations found that 45 percent strongly agreed with the statement “I believe Islam is a dangerous religion,” while 21 percent agreed to it “somewhat.”
The survey was conducted in October, before the massacre at the Fort Hood army base in Texas allegedly by a Muslim soldier.
Ed Stetzer, president of LifeWay Research, said: “… our survey asked whether pastors viewed Islam as ‘dangerous,’ but that does not necessarily mean ‘violent.’ ‘Dangerous’ can be defined in a variety of ways, including from the perspective of spiritual influence. Regardless of the definition, the numbers tell us that Protestant pastors are concerned.”
Given the very conservative cast of the SBC and strong evangelical Protestant support over the years for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, some people will automatically take the survey with a grain of salt. But the survey did include clergy from mainline Protestant denominations as well as evangelicals.
Not surprisingly, it found that: “Mainline denomination pastors are less likely than evangelicals to say Islam is “a dangerous religion.” While 77 percent of evangelical pastors either somewhat or strongly agree Islam is dangerous, only 44 percent of mainline pastors feel the same way, and 38 percent strongly disagree.”
I dont know what topic is discussing here. i am a Muslim by birth. i m 31 years of age . worked in very famous banks in Pakistan as wel as dubai. i want to convert as Christan, if i announced here in Pakistan or UAE every one would feel honor to kill me. can any one guide me how i can get the amnesty and conversion
-
Resident FaithWorld Expert
-
In a similar poll by PEW, it was revealed that conservative Christians had the least knowledge of the Bible & their own religious denomination. For an accurate evaluation of any person; “it says in the Bible”, is a nonstarter. It means nothing. No religious affiliation is a guarantee of good content of ones character. The same holds true for Muslims, who must depend on dubious clerics to tell them what it says in the Qoran, as most do not understand Arabic, & simply mouth the sounds. I can relate to that, in a sense; having grown up Catholic & an altar boy during the final years of the universal use of Latin for the Mass.At the age of 10 or so;I could mouth pages of Latin, & hadn’t a clue what I was saying.But, more to the point; it shouldn’t matter what religion, if any, the president follows. Perhaps this should be kept confidential, & successful candidates should have to abstain from church attendance while in office.