What's your opinion on Liberal Religion?

[emjay]

superficial/social reasons

I guess I feel that the social reasons can be far from superficial. For some people. Human connection is absolutely necessary for life, and church communities provide that. 

The only Christian I know personally is my niece, who is in a big liberal church in a biggish midwestern city. They work with new immigrants, do same-sex weddings, have a pro-trans page on their web site. 

I guarantee you that if I quizzed her about the hypostatic union she would say something like "that's above my pay grade." For her it is all about how we structure society to help each other.

Human connection is necessary for all of us.  That’s one of the reasons to prefer liberal religions compared to the alternatives.  Liberal religion is about human connection, and promotes human connection.  The alternatives are divisive and ruinous of that connection by design.

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To both of you, I feel like maybe I've stumbled into an issue beyond my pay grade, in the sense that maybe what you guys are both describing is a uniquely American phenomenon? (thus why to me, being from the UK, it could be both literally and figuratively, a foreign concept)... due to the pervasiveness of religion, particularly Christianity, in so many aspects of your culture (if Belacqua also lives in the US). Ie if liberal churches are wholly or in part a direct response to cultural or political influences/pressures... basically if the language of the land literally is religion itself, and the only way to make any real statement is through religion. Do these churches actually have the word 'Liberal' in their names... or is it just a generally understood label/designation... and if so, should that be taken in part as a political statement if nothing else? Like when I typed 'liberal church' into Google I was inundated with autocompletes 'liberal churches near me' or 'liberal churches in [this or that state]'... suggesting a generally US phenomenon... and asking my dad if he can relate to any of this in his experience of UK churches, and the answer is no he can't; he's just as confused about it as I am, since religion here is not so ubiquitous or divisive as to need distinctions like that.

But all this wasn't what I was (or thought I was) talking about with Belacqua... that being the question of how someone could join a religion in name only, not out of belief but for other 'superficial/social' reasons. But this may be the bigger picture I was missing, as in this wider context where religion is the language of the land and intricately interwoven into all aspects of it, social, political, economic etc, and is as such basically unavoidable, then that makes a lot more sense... ie you've got to work with what you're given and within the framework (ie of your society) you're given. Likewise it perhaps puts what you were saying elsewhere, GN, of the socio-economic pressures you had around religion in your upbringing, into better perspective.

So, with all that in mind, then sure I agree that in that context, where religion is basically unavoidable in the culture, liberal religion... as a direct response to, or backlash against more oppressive forms of religion... is a good... or at least better... thing. But obviously I think the more ideal situation is where religion is not so ubiquitous/divisive in the first place as to cause all of this, however utopian or unrealistic that may be in the context of the US.

I'd guess this is also what the OP, @vulcanlogician, means when he talks about Liberal Religion (being, I believe, in the US also?)? I wasn't sure tbh when I first read this thread... to me, the first thing that came to mind when I thought of 'liberal theists' was what I would call 'wishy-washy' or 'pick 'n' mix' type theists, ones whose positions you (or indeed sometimes even they) can't really pin down, and which generally can be just as frustrating to argue/debate with as fundamentalists. But I think it's pretty clear you're not talking about that... ie not talking about intellectual differences so much as real world consequences of Liberal Religion in the US?