In “Our Constrained 21st Century American ‘God’,” I described the dominant spiritual and moral belief template of our age: Moralistic Therapeutic Deist Universalism, wonderfully exposed by Christian Smith and Melinda Denton in 2005. Its encompassing tenets:
- A God exists who created and orders the world and watches over human life. [Deist]
- God does not need to be involved in one’s life, except to resolve a problem. [Therapeutic]
- God wants people to be nice and good to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions; the goal of life is to feel good about oneself. [Moralistic]
- Good people go to heaven. [Universalist]
Given that these tenets dominate today, the greatest project of our age is to convert those who cling to them. The group of potential converts begins with those called the Nones: individuals who adhere to the Moralistic Therapeutic Deist Universalism framework, but otherwise have little to no affiliation with faith, whether Christian or not.
Then we traverse a spectrum to (coining a term) the Somes, or “partial believers;” for example, professed Protestants, most of whom attend services; confirmed Catholics who occasionally attend Mass and pray; etc. Somes fully or partially agree with Moralistic Therapeutic Deist Universalism, and mostly operate in life accordingly. Moreover, like the Nones, Somes acknowledge that, and behave as if, they are completely content with their spiritual life.
In short, Somes are missing key beliefs and behaviors needed to become (coining another term) a Full. But even Fulls are fair game here, to the extent they backslide into their formative Moralistic Therapeutic Deist Universalist mindsets, as it is human nature to do.
To simplify this complex project, note these elementary facts: (1) conversion is primarily God’s work, (2) outsiders can help advance that work, and (3) conversion is almost always slow.
The first two facts console us, but the third frightens. Especially for me, given that this all germinated on the feast of St. Alphonsus Liguori. The Doctor of the Church famously noted that God has granted each soul a different limit on their number of sins, and each soul can eclipse that number at any time:
O sinner! You must tremble even on account of the sins which I have forgiven you; for if you add another, it may happen that this new sin, along with those which have been pardoned, may complete the number, and then there shall be no more mercy for you.
This explains the urgency outsiders often feel regarding the second fact of conversion.
The picture painted by survey data adds to the fright. According to Pew (2025), only 2.6% of United States adults receive the Eucharist at least weekly, go to Confession at least yearly, and pray at least daily.
Also, some portion of that 2.6% disagrees with major Church teachings (e.g., Christ’s Presence in the Eucharist, abortion, Communion for cohabitors, same-sex unions, married priests; see here, here, and here).
This vast landscape of Nones and Somes aligns with other surveys about core beliefs (such as here, here, and here). For example:
- Only 11% of US adults believe in the Holy Trinity (9% of those who attend a Catholic Church) (here).
- Only 8% of US adults believe that God provides boundaries to behavior (here).
- Only 4% of US adults fully or near-fully hold a “Biblical worldview,” the points of which, as defined by the Protestant survey team, very closely align with the Catechism (here).
The Outsider’s Courageous First Assertion
Thus, millions of people need to be told that Moralistic Therapeutic Deist Universalism is heresy. But few of us dare to assert this, and for good reason. Doing so seeks to demolish the entrenched comfort zones of well-meaning people, who happen to be listening attentively and trustingly, sometimes even during tragedy. Full disclosure: given how difficult I find that, I have relied on an alternate way . . .
In his 1938 biography of Christ, Father Marie-Joseph Lagrange explained one of the reasons why Jesus used parables to explain the Kingdom of God: “It was a subject that could not be approached directly, so great was the danger of coming into conflict with preconceived and stubbornly-held ideas.”
The comfort zones of the Israelites depended on an earthly, political kingdom to overthrow the Romans and Herodians, so much so that any Messianic notion outside that, too soon pronounced to so many, would prompt them to drown out the message, or even to kill our Divine Messenger at an hour too early for God’s plan. So, the Lord taught Truths in succinct, beautiful, agrarian, metaphor-laden stories. Those who refused to try to understand those Truths merely went away confused or ignored Him. Thus, in that aural society where writing was expensive and limited, parables worked well to proclaim discomforting Truths and to educate the willing.
Medieval and Renaissance paintings and sculptures also served this purpose. In our culture, can movies and novels perform the similarly daunting yet essential work of declaring heresy? In 300-400 pages or 100-150 scenes, the creator could entertain, wrap up an entire story, conclude an overwhelming theme or two, and allow the viewer and reader to enjoy, escape . . . and learn.
Many Nones may ignore it. But perhaps Somes will read, see, listen, and ascertain, inching closer to Fullness. Such stories might allow the viewer or reader a way to independently traverse the fundamental conditions for conversion.
Tomorrow, in Part 2, we will explore the simple truths of the more direct approach to meeting those conditions: the courageous exchange.
Author’s Note: For an example of fiction that depicts the conversions of a “None” and a “Some,” check out Rogers’ recent novel, Virtual Eternity: An Epic 90s-Retro Florida Techno Pro-Life Love Story and Conversion Journey. Besides conversion, the novel addresses abortion and fetal tissue harvesting, a 90s gaming system that fatally despairs its players, romances and breakups, and a journey to heaven and hell.
Photo by JHON RESTREPO on Unsplash
