Murder mystery: what killed Christianity in Europe?

[Razzle]

By which I mean, Northern Europe and most of Western Europe. But that wouldn't make a catchy title.

I just don't get it. I thought when I started looking into it, I'd find fairly straightforward historical explanations. But every theory I hear or come up with myself seems to have holes in.

The UK, for example:

Up to at least the first half of the 1600s, the British Isles were just as batshit crazy with religion as the average Puritan settlers to North America a century later. We were putting animals on trial and executing them for crimes including theft and bestiality, suicide was both a serious crime and a sign of possession by the devil, after which the body would have a stake driven through it like a fricking vampire, and Catholics and Protestants were taking turns to kill and persecute each other as the state religion ricocheted wildly between the two. 

Fast-forward to 1928, and the following exchange happened in parliament:

One member:
"It is perfectly ridiculous that an assemblage that contains a number of atheists should vote on the inner politics of the Church of England."
Another's response:
"I don't think there are any atheists here, not really. We all believe in some sort of a something somewhere."

Fast-forward further to the present day, and over half of us don't believe in any gods at all, and most of those who do are either first or second generation immigrants or are so vague about it that they can't accurately be labelled as Christians even if they use that word for themselves for various reasons.

Meanwhile, 40% of Americans are Creationists. The US has "In God We Trust" on its money, and we have Charles Darwin on ours. 

What the hell happened?  

If I could figure out the secret, I'd bottle it and export it all around the world!

[FatAndFaithless]

Centuries of top-down imposed government sponsored religion and the resulting 'divine' conflicts against other equally devout populations probably engendered a sense of mistrust towards religion, and eventually people realized they simply didn't need it.

Religion flourishes in America precisely because there is no 'official' religion, so the marketplace of ideas is up for grabs (for better or worse). The results are that you get the craziest ideas like creationism and scientology being spread around, but also the extreme critiques and dissections of those ideas without any interference from the government, something that wasn't possibe in ye olde Europe.

[Anomalocaris]

The two world wars happened, what was valued in actual tangible human society was brought to edge of destruction, and the dawning realization that both the cause and solution to such an actual tangible existential problem lay with humanity and not some figment of imagination born of Bronze Age superstition?

[Dystopia]

I found something in website about why Americans dislike atheists and I think the first two points may be important:

(1) America was settled, at least initially, by religious fundamentalists who wanted to set up a sort of theocratic republic (before anyone jumps down my throat and says, "The founding fathers were not Christians" - yes, I know, I'm not talking about Jefferson or Paine or Franklin, the people who signed the Declaration of Independence and wrote the US Constitution - I'm talking about the people who went to America in the 1600s. This left a DEEP cultural idea in the American people that they were a 'chosen people' living in a 'promised land' etc. God loves America; so for an American not to love God back is seen as a sort of treason.

(2) The popular religion that developed in the USA, especially along the frontier and in the South, was anti-intellectual. Unlike in Italy, where the Catholics have a hierarchy and a trained priesthood, the dominant form of Christianity in the USA comes out of evangelical traditions and 'revivalism', where anyone with a spattering of Bible knowledge and a good shouting voice could start a church. This led to a very simplistic, literalist, bible-based theology. The broader education and humanist philosophy of the priests in catholic (and anglican and lutheran) churches in Europe mitigated against this trend and produced a religion which is in some ways more 'porous'.

http://www.bornagainpagan.com/texts/024-...heists.htm


As a southern European my experience is that people value separation of Church and State highly and they dislike anything that breaks that principle, so that means you ought to respect everyone's personal beliefs and be free to pick what you want to believe in - There's not a mentality that you must be Christian to be good and many Europeans dislike the Catholic Church for being corrupt and overly rich. Also, I believe most of Europe must teach science in primary, secondary and highschool and things like Creationism aren't allowed in public schools (and Catholic schools teach evolution).

Most Europeans still consider themselves Christians but they are more like "cultural Christians" than anything else. You can easily be a Christian by simply going to Church once a year and reading the bible once a month, or not even reading it at all, it's not like you have to go to church every week to be considered part of a group - Most people don't have patience to go to church that often and find other ways of managing social needs.

In countries like Sweden quality of life and education levels are high so people naturally step away from religion.

Politicians are rarely asked their religious beliefs and it's strongly frowned upon to argue about it during political debates because your beliefs should have no impact on how you legislate.

Most countries in Europe have strong post-war constitutions that guarantee the separation of Church and State and that leads to amounts of anti-discrimination laws to protect minorities.

Things like the legalization of same-sex marriage and abortion, drugs and euthanasia also give people less reasons to be religious.

[Cyberman]

Here in the UK we caged it, basically. We made it respectable and so took away its teeth.

[Alex K]

Here in the UK we caged it, basically. We made it respectable and so took away its teeth.

Mhm, same here...

[DeistPaladin]

King Henry VIII.

When he made the Anglican Church the official state religion, he gave it a state subsidy, therefore removing any incentive to make it appealing to the public.

Who made America the only developed nation in the world such a theocratic mess? 

James Madison, when he barred Christianity from having any government support.

Evolution took its course. When Jesus was tossed out into the street and left to fend for himself, only his most appealing brands survived. This is why Puritanism, which got rid of all the fun pagan stuff, can only be found in reinactments and plays, while the most Charismatic of brands of Christianity have the megachurches. 

In the UK, Christianity got fat and lazy. It featured churches where followers gathered on Sunday to mumble some boring hymns and listen to boring vicars who gave boring lessons. The result was nobody took it seriously and Jesus died a slow lonely death. 

Go to any megachurch in America and you see how evolution has taken its course. You hear rock music, witness pomp and pageantry, hear professional speakers offer soaring oratory and experience other razzle dazzle. Give Christianity its due. The followers of Jesus in America know how to put on a show. Typically, these megachurches offer many social services, such as singles mixers. As a businessman who studied marketing and business strategy in school, I have to stand in awe of the marketing genius. 

Having separated church and state, America ensured that it would always be a theocracy.

Having made Christianity a state religion, Britain ensured that it would be a secular nation.

So to my freethinking friends across the pond, don't think of your tax resources going to the church as any burden. Think of it as an inoculation against the Jesus virus. Really, it's a small price to pay to keep Christianity fat, lazy and content in its gilded cage.  

EDIT TO ADD: looks like others have beat me to it and posted much the same thing.

[Regina]

Hitchens made a good argument that it was the world wars;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iBxo4kU6cgw

I'm not entirely sure I agree with him, since I think Christianity (or at least fundamentalist Christianity) was already on the decline in Europe by that point. However, I think in terms of the horror of the World Wars, it wouldn't be surprising if it made a lot of Christians question God. It's almost similar to how the black death in Europe led to people questioning the church. After disasters, religious people sometimes think "well where was God's intervention? He did nothing" and you get a decline.

I would say it was a long term decline rather than a sudden death of Christianity though. The reformation, the enlightenment and the horrors committed in the name of religion were all contributing factors. You also have nation-specific events, like the French Revolution, which many historians claim was the beginning of France's fierce secularism.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I think its death started with the 30 Years' War, and the end came with the Great War.

[DeistPaladin]

The Cold War also had an effect.

"Atheism" got lumped in with "communism".