what a nice day.

what a nice day.
ask for the favo of the LORD~
that's what am i gonna do~!

Survey: Americans switching faiths, dropping out

updated 12:47 p.m. EST, Mon February 25, 2008




(AP) -- The U.S. religious marketplace is extremely volatile, with nearly half of American adults leaving the faith tradition of their upbringing to either switch allegiances or abandon religious affiliation altogether, a new survey finds.

The survey found the Roman Catholic Church has lost more members than any faith tradition.

The study released Monday by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life is unusual for it sheer scope, relying on interviews with more than 35,000 adults to document a diverse and dynamic U.S. religious population.
While much of the study confirms earlier findings -- mainline Protestant churches are in decline, non-denominational churches are gaining and the ranks of the unaffiliated are growing -- it also provides a deeper look behind those trends, and of smaller religious groups.
"The American religious economy is like a marketplace -- very dynamic, very competitive," said Luis Lugo, director of the Pew Forum. "Everyone is losing, everyone is gaining. There are net winners and losers, but no one can stand still. Those groups that are losing significant numbers have to recoup them to stay vibrant."
The U.S. Religious Landscape Survey estimates the United States is 78 percent Christian and about to lose its status as a majority Protestant nation, at 51 percent and slipping.
More than one-quarter of American adults have left the faith of their childhood for another religion or no religion at all, the survey found. Factoring in moves from one stream or denomination of Protestantism to another, the number rises to 44 percent.
One in four adults ages 18 to 29 claim no affiliation with a religious institution.
"In the past, certain religions had a real holding power, where people from one generation to the next would stay," said Penn State University sociologist Roger Finke, who consulted in the survey planning. "Right now, there is a dropping confidence in organized religion, especially in the traditional religious forms."
Lugo said the 44 percent figure is "a very conservative estimate," and more research is planned to determine the causes.
"It does seem in keeping with the high tolerance among Americans for change," Lugo said. "People move a lot, people change jobs a lot. It's a very fluid society."
The religious demographic benefiting the most from this religious churn is those who claim no religious affiliation. People moving into that category outnumber those moving out of it by a three-to-one margin.
The majority of the unaffiliated -- 12 percent of the overall population -- describe their religion as "nothing in particular," and about half of those say faith is at least somewhat important to them. Atheists or agnostics account for 4 percent of the total population.
The Roman Catholic Church has lost more members than any faith tradition because of affiliation swapping, the survey found. While nearly one in three Americans were raised Catholic, fewer than one in four say they're Catholic today. That means roughly 10 percent of all Americans are ex-Catholics.
The share of the population that identifies as Catholic, however, has remained fairly stable in recent decades thanks to an influx of immigrant Catholics, mostly from Latin America. Nearly half of all Catholics under 30 are Hispanic, the survey found.
On the Protestant side, changes in affiliation are swelling the ranks of nondenominational churches, while Baptist and Methodist traditions are showing net losses.
Many Americans have vague denominational ties at best. People who call themselves "just a Protestant," in fact, account for nearly 10 percent of all Protestants.
Although evangelical churches strive to win new Christian believers from the "unchurched," the survey found most converts to evangelical churches were raised Protestant.
Hindus claimed the highest retention of childhood members, at 84 percent. The group with the worst retention is one of the fastest growing -- Jehovah's Witnesses. Only 37 percent of those raised in the sect known for door-to-door proselytizing said they remain members.
Among other findings involving smaller religious groups, more than half of American Buddhists surveyed were white, and most Buddhists were converts.
More people in the survey pool identified themselves as Buddhist than Muslim, although both populations were small -- less than 1 percent of the total population. By contrast, Jews accounted for 1.7 percent of the overall population.
The self-identified Buddhists -- 0.7 percent of those surveyed -- illustrate a core challenge to estimating religious affiliation: What does affiliation mean?
It's unclear whether people who called themselves Buddhists did so because they practice yoga or meditation, for instance, or claim affiliation with a Buddhist institution.
The report does not project membership figures for religious groups, in part because the survey is not as authoritative as a census and didn't count children, Lugo said. The U.S. Census does not ask questions on religion. E-mail to a friend

i couldn't fall in sleep on sat. night, thinking about God, the prophesy, and what jack had said, etc. at 4:00am, i decided to talk to God and see how he's doing. God spoke to me like BOOMM in 15 mins,
John 1:1-5
"1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. 4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it."

He is the Word, and the Light. As a child of God, my job is to be like Jesus, be the light of the world. V 4 and 5 is becoming my mission statement~^^
for some reason, i knew that this is something Pastor David will share on sunday...and..amamzing, he did...hehe~~~


God bless u all, my borthers and sisters! remember, u'll are the light of this darken world~~~~~SHINE ~~!!!

p.s. Keep praying for me and my school...so far i enjoy all my classes~~hopefully i will win both lost souls and classes by the end of this semester!!

love.

what are you doing, Joy?

everyone is seekin after the Lord, what are you doing?
what's in your mind everyday??
what are u living for everyday??
are you really happy and satisfy with yourself??
what do u wanna say to God?
what's in your heart??
God, what do u think about Joy?
do you like her?
what kind of person is she in your eyes?
does she love you?
does she care about you?
does she even know you??
what's her siuation? what's her future will be like??
what are u trying to say??
God.......she has so much weight on her heart.
do u think she'll have a breakthrough?
do u think she could overcome it?
what do u want from her?

02-22-08

今天晚上我们去Open Bible参加刘竹春牧师的Prophetic Healing Conference. 我和eric是最后一个被预言祷告的。被祷告之后我的心里沉重。因为我真的不知道自己要的是什么，该怎么做才对，才好。 哎。。神啊，真的有那么复杂吗？ 还是我在confuse myself??!!

1.我在左右的看，突然说“我知道了”，心里明白神的旨意。但是常常被reality和神的心意所拉扯着。 Joy,你要定睛仰望上帝。 是为神，不是人。
set boundary between the world and His world.

主啊。。。求你怜悯我。拿走我的骄傲，使孩子可以谦卑的来寻求你。赦免我的罪。教导我怎么样可以定睛遥望你。

this love

no love is higher,
no love is wider,
no love is deeper,
no love is like your love.

you have simply touched my heart by a silent rainbow in the blue sky.
my lover loves me, and i love him too.

i would not treat anything for this love.he's all i need.
take me with you my lover, you would not leave me alone, you like to take me everwhere you go. i trust you. i love you.

"young women see me would call me happy" (songs 6:9) because i'm with you.
everything will change, but you.
my god my everything. my strong tower, my refuge.
how much do you love me? show me,show me, i can't wait to find out how much that is !!
how much do i love you? i'll show you,i'll show you, i want to surprise you!

i love you because when i'm weak, you still show interests in me.

my shield and my stronghold, my god in you i trust. i'll run, i'll run, i'll run into your chamber, i'll run after you wherever you go.

how can i express my love to you?
you are more than a lover, more than a friend, more than a savior, more than a king to me....
who i am, that you love the most?? i don't get you sometimes...

~first blog~

Respect the LORD.
woke up around 10 am, thinking about "life style"...what kind of life style do i have?! the answer is ....none. i have no life style ! ..omg, what a loser!! No, i have to have a life style! as i was thinking about the kind of life style i wanted, i started to speak in tongue, which is my favor thing to do, especially when i feel nervous or speechless. "God, you are real, though i can't feel much of your presence, but i still trust in you." my dialog with Him is always touching His heart, praising songs starting fill my mouth, melody,words,thanksgiving...what can be more beautiful than your beloved sings love songs to you!? i ask God for personal encounters, challenges, and a godly life style, eventually, these will testify who i am! ^^V
So i opened the Word of God, Psalm 111 and 112

v.10"Wisdom begins with respect for the LORD; those who obey His orders have good understanding. "
v.1"Happy are those who respect the LORD, who want wht He commands."