christian right

Saying the Christian Right is no longer a force to be reckoned with in the
U.S. is like saying the same thing about consumerism, or individualism.

Conservative Protestantism is central to the U.S. ideological formation.

Specific leaders (ie, Jerry Falwell) and organizations (ie, Christian
Coalition) may come and go, but there will be others, make no mistake.

"Bible-believing" Christians, including self-described evangelicals and
fundamentalists, are now as large a proportion of all Christians in the
U.S. as the mainstream Protestants.  This proportion has been steadily
growing for 30 years.  (Recent research by Michael Hout and Andy Greeley
shows that a large part of this is because the bible-believers have more
children, but the growth is real, whatever the cause.  The good news is
that the rate of conversion of adults may be much less than previously
assumed.)

It is wishful thinking to see the recent setbacks of the organized
political wing of this movement as some sort of decisive defeat.
Marxist predictions of the demise of religion are as faulty as those of
terminal capitalist crisis based on the tendency of the rate of profit to
fall.

RH