Read the Whole Article here https://mbird.com/2021/03/the-narrow-door-of-the-cross/
Leigh Stein is the author of the new novel Self-Care. It’s a satire of the wellness industry and social media influencer culture. In a recent op-ed for the New York Times, “The Empty Religions of Instagram,” Stein confesses that she too fell for the accessible combination of self-care, social justice activism, and tongue-in-cheek Christianity proclaimed by the charismatic “preachers” on platforms like Instagram. Acknowledging that almost a quarter of all millennials in America claim no religious affiliation at all, Stein nonetheless questions if such statistics reveal a reduced rate of religiosity or if instead “our belief systems [are] too bespoke to appear on a list of major religions in a Pew phone survey.” Stein suspects the latter is the case. She writes,
Our new belief system is a blend of left-wing political orthodoxy, intersectional feminism, self-optimization, therapy, wellness, astrology and Dolly Parton. And we’ve found a different kind of clergy: personal growth influencers. Women like Glennon Doyle, who offer nones like us permission, validation and community on demand at a time when it’s nearly impossible to share communion in person. We don’t even have to put down our phones………………………………………………….