Religious Literacy - Stephen Prothero - Books - Review - New York Times

Religious Literacy - Stephen Prothero - Books - Review - New York Times: "Decline-and-fall books, like E. D. Hirsch Jr.’s “Cultural Literacy” and Allan Bloom’s “Closing of the American Mind,” can leave the reader torn between depression and elation: by detailing how stupid everyone else is, the authors leave us feeling better about ourselves. (“I know which has more members, the Supreme Court or the Supremes!”) So it was with smug anticipation that I opened “Religious Literacy,” Stephen Prothero’s jeremiad about declining religious knowledge. Most Americans “cannot name one of the four Gospels,” Prothero writes, “and many high school seniors think that Sodom and Gomorrah were husband and wife.” Religious illiteracy cuts across generations, and the devout scarcely know more than the secular do. In one survey of high school students, most evangelicals did not recognize that “Blessed are the poor in spirit” is from the Sermon on the Mount."