There was an interesting article in the UK Times yesterday about the global success of ‘US-style muscular Christianity’ - that is, evangelicalism. The article is by John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge and is based on their book God is Back: How the Global Revival of Faith is Changing the World.

The basic thesis is familiar enough. There is some evidence for decline in church attendance in North America (they cite Jon Meacham’s Newsweek article on ‘The Decline and Fall of Christian America’). But in South America, Africa and Asia the evangelical church is flourishing. Adherents of the much ridiculed faith of Ned Flanders (they think of this very much as an American export success) can be found ‘in churches the size of football stadiums across Latin America, in 4,850ha (12,000-acre) “redemption camps” in Nigeria, in storefront churches in the slums of Rio and Guatemala City, in brick-and-mud tabernacles with metal roofs and dirt floors in rural South Africa’.