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Americans are hardly more religious than people living in other industrialized countries. Yet they consistently—and more or less uniquely—want others to believe they are more religious than they really are.

When you ask Americans about their religious beliefs, it's like asking them whether they are good people, or asking whether they are patriots. They'll say yes, even if they cheated on their taxes, bilked Medicare for unnecessary services, and evaded the draft. Asking people how often they attend church elicits answers about their identity—who people think they are or feel they ought to be, rather than what they actually believe and do.

self-reported church attendance has been held up as proof that America has somehow resisted the secularizing trends that have swept other industrialized nations. What if those numbers are spectacularly wrong?

2008 Gallup Poll. General population's feelings toward various groups, and the numbers are positive, neutral and negative: Methodists (51, 45, 3), Jews (about the same), Baptists (49, 40, 11), Evangelicals (40, 38, 22), Mormons (25, 46, 29), Muslims (18, 34, 48), Atheists (12, 40, 48).

2008 Gallup Poll. General population's feelings toward various groups, and the numbers are positive, neutral and negative: Methodists (51, 45, 3), Jews (about the same), Baptists (49, 40, 11), Evangelicals (40, 38, 22), Mormons (25, 46, 29), Muslims (18, 34, 48), Atheists (12, 40, 48).NonChristians on same: Methodists (32, 58, 10), Jews (43, 49, 8), Evangelicals (13, 36, 51), Mormons (26, 46, 28), Muslims (19, 54, 27), Atheists (36, 48, 16). Big issue here is that Baptists are not involved in this "Evangelical" number so that if one factors them in the whole thing shifts. Baptists had a higher rating of people who liked them. 74% of nonChristians were either positive or neutral toward Baptists. He suggests the word "evangelical" is now a pejorative term; it provokes negative responses.

The group most anti-Evangelical is university professors. 53%

Somehow for Bell God's rejection of people and judgment of them for not responding to His kindness and grace is a reflection on God and not on the one who has refused to respond to God!

Now where is the justice in this assessment of God by Bell? Our choice and refusal ends up being an indictment on God's character for responding by accepting the choice we made. And it is not as if God did not reveal the importance and consequences of the choice we make as He was making the offer.

what Bell misses is that this action was not made in the blink of an eye. It was a considered and revealed judgment that God announced would be his response if we refuse to acknowledge Him and His way and His right as God. God laid all his cards on the table long before we responded. God played His hand when He had Jesus die for us and offer us the joyous life Bell so well describes.