[JabavuAdams]

Online, when someone writes "Christian", it's hard to tell whether they're referring to fundamentalists, or not.

I'm from Toronto (Canada), and it would be a bit weird for someone in my social group to just offer "I'm a Christian" except in response to "What's your religion?". It seems that in a lot of the US "I'm a Christian" is short-hand for "I'm a Christian Fundamentalist."

[rhizome]

I don't think that holds. I would see "Christian" as implying they're evangelical, where fundamentalists have a specific code they're living by and proselytizing, so they tend to use their specific denomination. There are lots of different kinds of Christian fundamentalists, but the specific fundamentals of their church differ between groups (7th Day Adventists, etc.).

[te_chris]

I agree with gp, over here the evangelical churches are almost always more extreme in their doctrine so myself and my friends perceive them as fundamentalists. You often find other Christians present themselves by their sect to distance themselves from the evangelicals.

[rhizome]

I understand, but my sense is that fundamentalists are separatists where evangelicals are communitarian and trying to build the flock, so to speak. Fundamentalists are "you're with us or you're with the enemy." Maybe I have only experienced relatively friendly evangelicals, though. :)

[socceroos]

Well, my specific denomination named themselves evangelical presbyterian, but we're fundamentalists. While you can glean that we have a Presbyterian form of government and purport to be evangelical in nature, to be honest, you cannot read too much into a name - a group of Christians are best understood by their fruits.

I've always struggled to reconcile how someone could suggest they're Christian but only choose to believe certain parts of the bible and dismiss the rest as just stories (note, I'm not referring to how specific parts of the bible are illustrative in nature). For me, the whole thing crumbles away if you dismiss parts of it.

I've heard people suggest that it's more important to take away the good things and good examples than to actually believe in the stories as facts.

Anyway, that's just a slice of my opinion.

I'm interested in your statement that evangelicals are communitarian and fundamentalists are separatists, I see this practically in some church communities - but I see the opposite in others. I would consider my church more on the separatist side than communitarian.

[lotharbot]

> "I've always struggled to reconcile how someone could suggest they're Christian but only choose to believe certain parts of the bible [as literal facts]"

"For who that has understanding will suppose that the first, and second, and third day, and the evening and the morning, existed without a sun, and moon, and stars? And that the first day was, as it were, also without a sky? And who is so foolish as to suppose that God, after the manner of a husbandman, planted a paradise in Eden, towards the east, and placed in it a tree of life, visible and palpable, so that one tasting of the fruit by the bodily teeth obtained life? And again, that one was a partaker of good and evil by masticating what was taken from the tree? And if God is said to walk in the paradise in the evening, and Adam to hide himself under a tree, I do not suppose that anyone doubts that these things figuratively indicate certain mysteries, the history having taken place in appearance, and not literally."

That was written by Origen of Alexandria, one of the most prolific Christian writers ever, in the early 200s. Yes, that's the right number of zeros. Those very modern sounding remarks are 18 centuries old.

The rise of Liberal Christianity in the 1800s (which decided that everything in the Bible, including Jesus, was figurative) led to the rise of Fundamentalism in the 1900s (which decided that nothing was figurative). Prior to that, most Christians understood that parts of the Bible describe real truth, but within the mold of figurative stories. They would consider it "dismissive" to treat the stories as literal and therefore to miss the real truths being communicated figuratively.

It can be quite enlightening to read ancient mythology and discover the ways some Biblical stories use the same elements but turn them on their heads. For example, the Genesis creation account uses almost all of the same elements as the Egyptian creation account -- but the things that are "gods" for Egypt, like the sun and the moon, are treated as mere objects not even worthy of being called by name in the Genesis account (read it carefully; they're just "lights".) The point isn't to communicate that the sun and moon were created approximately 6000 years ago, but that they are objects with no personality or power or claim to godhood, which God created specifically in order to shine on the earth.

I hope this illustrates how someone can be a thoughtful and serious Christian, and yet not treat every part of the Bible as literal fact.

[socceroos]

"Prior to that, most Christians understood that parts of the Bible describe real truth, but within the mold of figurative stories."

Citation needed, otherwise you're just making stuff up. =)

[epmatsw]

At least in Georgia, "Christian" usually implies you're non-denominational as opposed to Catholic, Baptist, Lutheran, etc. It would be interesting to see a regional map of religious terms similar to the linguistic maps that are on the front page right now.

[k-mcgrady]

This is very true and is something I notice online a lot. People often bring up that Christian's don't believe in evolution and they believe the earth is only 5000 years old when that's not true of all of them. Catholic's for example follow scientific teaching on evolution.

I think the reason all Christian's have been lumped together is US Politics. Candidates want to show they believe in God but don't want to side with any particular faith and therefore use the Christian moniker..

[derleth]

Moreover, the only candidates who do take a stand as being of a specific faith are doing it to appeal to voters who largely fit the Young Earth Creationist/The Bible Is Literally True In Every Word mold, so that's the faith they profess.

Then, when they win, say, a House seat on the strength of a single district (a small part of a single state), they automatically have a national platform they can parlay into a global platform if they say something batshit crazy enough, thanks to the global 24-hour news cycle and the endless linking and repetition in the blogosphere.

It's a classic case of a very loud minority making the uncritical thinkers of the world believe "They're all like that".

[lotharbot]

Fundamentalism is a small (but vocal) subset of Christianity. Despite the name making it sound "old", it's only been around for about a century.

[jlgreco]

The subset is not particularly small in America.

According to the latest Gallup poll, 46% of Americans are sufficiently fundamentalist (christian or otherwise) that they believe that "God created humans in present form".

32% think that "Humans evolved, with God guiding", which is still a lot of the religious in America, but far fewer than many seem to expect. Fewer than those who reject evolution completely.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/21814/evolution-creationism-intel...

[dragonwriter]

> According to the latest Gallup poll, 46% of Americans are sufficiently fundamentalist (christian or otherwise) that they believe that "God created humans in present form".

That's not particularly either Fundamentalist or fundamentalist; "Fundamentalism" is a particular school of Christian theology for which specific creationism of that type is not distinguishing, and "fundamentalism" in the generic sense inspired by Christian Fundamentalism is "the demand for a strict adherence to orthodox theological doctrines" and cannot be identified by simply belief in a particular doctrine on a matter of "what happened", its defined by beliefs of how you treat people who disagree with your beliefs on such doctrines.

[lotharbot]

creationist often means fundamentalist, but not always.

EDIT: there is definitely a lot of fundamentalist influence in the US on certain topics, particularly on literal creation. But that influence has been waning for 30-40 years. And many of those who have been influenced on one or two topics are nonetheless very much not-fundamentalist on other topics.

[jlgreco]

That is subject to interpretation, but I disagree. If you can't consider your creation myth to be a metaphor, a nice back-story, or whatever... then basically you are unwilling or unable to budge on what should be a pretty uncontested point. Maybe you are progressive on other fronts, but at least in that regard you are a fundamentalist.

I would say that fundamentalist does not imply creationist (you'll find fundamentalist Roman Catholics for instance), but creationist does imply fundamentalist. Creationism is one of many fundamentalist stances.

[lotharbot]

> "you are unwilling or unable to budge... in that regard you are a fundamentalist."

In Christianity, "Fundamentalist" refers specifically to a Protestant/Evangelical movement that was named for a series of essays published before and during WWI, which outline certain specific doctrinal positions. The movement arose largely in response to opposing beliefs which themselves date to the mid-late 1800s. Being "unwilling to budge" might make someone a literalist or a dogmatist, but being a Fundamentalist is more specific.

Among Americans who call themselves Christian, few are anything close to true Fundamentalists [0]. Most are hybrids whose beliefs have been assembled in bits and pieces from pastors, books, etc. which includes some fundamentalist-inspired ideas, some ideas that resemble fundamentalist ideas but are actually much older, and some ideas that are completely opposite of fundamentalist ideas. People whose beliefs are mostly Fundamentalist are a very small subset of Christianity, both globally and in the US.

[0] note that "no true Scotsman" is only a fallacy if one is using inappropriate criteria to determine group inclusion/exclusion. It's not a fallacy to point out that James Doohan wasn't really Scottish.

[jlgreco]

If you want to define "Fundamentalist" to be something other than current real-world usage, that is fine. I'll just pick a new, less 'technical', word: Nuts.

If you are a creationist, you are an utter nut, full stop. A significant portion of Americans are religious nuts.

And, to clarify earlier discussion on the behalf of JabavuAdams, "Online, when someone writes "Christian", it's hard to tell whether they're referring to fundamentalists^Wreligious nuts, or not."

All better?

[vacri]

Fundamentalism in Christianity stretches at least as far back as the Spanish Inquisition. Modern Europe has been shaped by centuries of infighting over the fundamentals of the religion. Similarly, Galileo is frequently proffered as an example of the church demanding its holy book's passages over actual observation.

To describe fundamentalism as modern is flat-out bizarre.

[rdouble]

The term 'Fundamentalism' refers to a specific American religious movement that took off around 1920. It has it's roots in a series of essays called "The Fundamentals" which were published in 1909-1910.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fundamentals

[vacri]

Perhaps as a label, which I guess is what's being referred to here, but the ethic goes back a much longer way.