What do teenagers believe?

This is the inaugural post where the title of the post (what do teenagers believe) serves as a link to an article. This is a link to a very interesting interview from Christianity Today about the beliefs of teenagers. This fellow draws two conclusions. 1. American teenagers are more like their parents in their religious beliefs than is normally assumed. They are not as rebellious as teenagers are suspected of being. 2. Those religious beliefs are more accurately described as Moralistic Therapeutic Deism than Christianity. As I am want to say, it is the gospel of "It's nice to be nice to nice people."

This is the anticipated effect of democracy on Christianity, according to Tocqueville. Christianity will have to justify itself on the grounds of equality, thus any religious authority (even that of God?) is suspect. Like much else in democracy, religion will be reduced to the lowest common denominator, not really questioning the assumptions of materialistic egalitarianism of America. Tocqueville writes, "We shall have occasion to see that of all the passions which originate in, or are fostered by, equality, there is one which it renders peculiarly intense, and which it infuses at the same time into the heart of every man: I mean the love of well-being...The more the conditions of man are equalized and assimilated to each other, the more important is it for religions, whilst they carefully abstain from the daily turmoil of secular affairs, not needlessly to run counter to the ideas which generally prevail, and the permanent interests which exist in the mass of the people."