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Books Measuring Boomers spiritual quest
SPIRUTUAL
MARKETPLACE: BABY BOOMERS AND THE REMAKING OF AMERICAN RELIGION By Wade
Clark Roof Princeton University Press, 384 pages, $24.95
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By COLLEEN CARROLL
In his newest book, religious commentator Wade Clark Roof examines
Americas religious landscape and details the ways Baby Boomers have
changed it. He credits the post-World War II generation for everything from
Americas growing tolerance of religious diversity to its growing distrust
of external religious authority, and his take on those changes is
overwhelmingly optimistic.
Roof, a sociologist at the University of California at Santa
Barbara who traces his own religious beliefs to the unrest of the 1960s, argues
against the stereotype of the self-centered Boomer and declares, There is
now greater spiritual maturity on the part of Boomer Americans.
Measuring spiritual maturity is no easy task. Roof makes an
admirable attempt by engaging his sources with probing questions that elicit
answers far more nuanced than those evoked by religious pollsters. His earlier,
best-selling account of Baby Boomer spirituality, A Generation of Seekers
(HarperCollins, 1993), relied on similar survey and interview questions
posed to more than 1,000 Americans born between 1946 and 1964. That research
characterized the 76 million Boomers as questers, many of whom
believe in God and embrace spirituality but remain deeply ambivalent about
organized religion.
Spiritual Marketplace returns to the same topic and the
same people. This time, though, Roof portrays a generation whose spirituality
has matured from a perennial quest for self-fulfillment to a more focused
search for depth and meaning. Only about a third of his original
dropouts -- those who felt most alienated from organized religion a
decade ago -- still fall into that category.
Slightly more of his interviewees now say they are involved in
weekly religious worship, though Roof found a similar increase in those who are
not involved at all. Roof admits that many Boomers still shop for beliefs that
make them feel good and churches that keep them interested.
But Roof sees a trend toward stability in Boomer spirituality.
More of them now prefer to stick to a faith rather than
engage in endless exploration of spiritual teachings, Roof
writes. As members of this generation grow older, they recognize that
spirituality must be cultivated through practice, and that there is no
quick fix when it comes to spiritual depth.
Roofs earlier work divided Boomers into such broad religious
categories as loyalists and dropouts. This book
presents five new subgroups. Not surprisingly, Catholics and ex-Catholics are
scattered across a spectrum that ranges from the orthodox believers he calls
dogmatists to the Charismatic Catholics he lumps with born-again
Christians.
Roof locates many Catholics in the category of mainstream
believers, a group of easygoing believers who define
themselves largely by what they are not -- born-again Christians or
traditionalists at one end, New Age seekers or secularists at the other. He
acknowledges that their lukewarm attitudes may spell trouble for religious
communities.
A third of them say God is found within themselves, and religious
structures may not be necessary. But Roof cites these believers -- and their
mild, middle-of-the-road rhetoric -- to refute the idea that America is engaged
in a bitter culture war between liberals and conservatives.
Roofs categories expose the diversity of American
Catholicism. They also expose a personal prejudice that seems to equate the
concept of objective truth with narrow minded believers who cling
to an encrusted institution. Such language -- and the bias it
betrays -- undercut his credibility.
Roof is so eager to prove the spiritual maturity of the Boomers
that he seems to find deep spiritual insights where there may be none. Whether
describing the self-discovery of a woman who says spirituality is a
feeling ... however it feels is OK or celebrating the mental
mobility of a woman who cannot decide if her religion is Christianity,
Buddhism or Star Trek, Roof adopts the relativist outlook of his
subjects when evaluating their spirituality.
He fails to differentiate between Boomers who put spirituality and
religion at the center of their lives -- whether in the form of evangelical
Christianity or Zen Buddhism -- and those who barely dabble in their spiritual
development. He elevates virtually anyone who ever considered spiritual
questions to seeker status and leaves the reader wondering if his
analysis is critical enough to be credible.
Despite those flaws and a dense academic style that makes for slow
reading, Roof offers an insightful analysis of Boomer beliefs. For the American
Catholic church, his insights are both encouraging and alarming.
Roof offers compelling evidence of a spiritual awakening that has
made Boomers more willing to proclaim their faith, integrate it into their
lives and explore it in depth. He predicts a future in which the casual
believers will fall away from organized religion while the committed ones
revitalize it.
Still, many Boomers remain suspicious, even dismissive, of
religious tradition and objective religious truth. Reforms made to accommodate
their distrust of authority or to attract seekers who may never commit could
divide the church at a critical time in its history and repel Catholics who
already feel lost in a sea of spiritual alternatives. The challenge for
mainstream believers of all denominations, Roof says, is to strike the right
balance between innovation and tradition, between openness to seekers and
fidelity to the core believers whose constancy keeps the faith alive.
Colleen Carroll writes from St. Louis.
National Catholic Reporter, February 4,
2000
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