Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 2, 1993 TAG: 9304290136
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Cody Lowe
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Surprise, surprise.
It's not a new notion. I suspect that just about every generation has been accused of "backsliding" by its predecessor.
We "baby boomers" have been singled out for the title, though, in part because we're so big that when we roll over in bed everybody else gets bounced around.
The topic comes up again now because our president is one of us.
One Time article declares that Bill Clinton isn't really one of those who "forgot God," since he never lost his faith, yet I think he's really fairly typical. Certainly, his religious track record is something I can identify with.
Reared in a Southern Baptist church, Clinton was a pretty faithful churchgoer into his undergraduate years in college. For most of the decade of his 20s, he became "an uneven churchgoer." By his mid-30s, facing a personal crisis after losing a gubernatorial election and becoming a father, he found his way back into a religious congregation.
I suspect, like many of us, Clinton never really lost his faith, though he may have lost touch with it.
For millions of us, dissatisfaction with the institution of the church, rather than a rejection of core beliefs, led us out of organized congregations.
Of course, we distrusted most institutions. We suspected the military of perpetrating war for profit, we suspected big business of ripping us off and capitalizing on death, we suspected government of lying to us to cover its own corruption.
So we chose to develop our faith on our own.
How could we trust the country's most segregated institution to teach us about love? How could an institution that was dead every day but Sunday know what was going on in the world? How could a church that had no idea why sexual mores were changing give us any guidance? How could a church that was more concerned with power than peace teach us morality?
Yet the church did, slowly, start to change. When many of us started coming back - we had changed some, too - we found the church more to our liking.
For me, the key was a little girl.
As my older daughter approached school age, my wife and I felt she needed to be exposed to the faith we took for granted.
Part of it was a need to preserve traditions that are an important part of who we are. Simple cultural literacy requires exposure to religion.
Most important, though, was the feeling that it was important for her to know that there were others who shared a system of ethical belief with her and her family.
As adults, we know all too well how easy it is to slip into the belief that everything is relative - that there are no absolutes and that morality can be molded to the situation.
In fact, the world is filled with a lot more gray than it is black or white. We have to concede that sometimes answers to the tough questions just aren't all that clear.
But we have to believe that there is right and wrong.
It starts with the little stuff, especially as children take their first big steps into society by starting school.
It's wrong to steal, to cheat, to hurt others physically or emotionally.
It's right to help each other, to forgive, to "love your neighbor."
It's important for children to know that they aren't alone as they struggle to do what is right. That we all struggle and that we can find strength in the common striving.
What many of us didn't expect to find when we took our children to church was that we get the same rewards they do.
And that, ultimately, is what keeps us going back.
Cody Lowe reports on issues of religion and ethics for this newspaper.
by CNB