The divide between C.P.Snow's Two Cultures is nowhere more obvious than in the churches. American churches are unashamedly and completely contained within one of those cultures. The church is operated by and for the exclusive benefit of Feelers. Thinkers need not apply. They won't tell you, but they expect Thinkers to leave their brain at the door.
The churches I grew up in (and continue to patronize) emphasize as part of their doctrine, that there is such a thing as absolute Truth and that God abhors lies. Then they turn around and insist that their ``Christianity is a relationship, not a religion,'' and (almost proudly) that ``the church is full of hypocrites, and if you find one that isn't, don't join it, because you'll spoil it.''
Thinkers are not hypocrites. The highest Thinker value is to tell the truth, even when it is uncomfortable. It is Feelers who are hypocrites, who value ``relationship'' (meaning affirmation) over truth, and are thus willing to hide the uncomfortable truth and to live a lie for the sake of pleasantry.
What this means is that the churches are implicitly (and often explicitly) promoting Feeler values and deprecating Thinker values. This is not just the conservative Bible-oriented churches, but all of them. Even more so the more ``liberal'' churches who make no claim to adhering to Bible absolutes. Absolutes are a Thinker value, but even the self-proclaimed abolutists give it second place after ``relationships'' (the Feeler value).
As a consequence, the Feelers feel affirmed in the churches, and the Thinkers are not. The only Thinkers are reluctantly there because of their wives, or else for some reason have decided to try to pretend to be Feelers, to live the values promoted in the church -- at least while they are inside the building. This kind of disconnect gives rise to people like Ken Lay, who was a member in good standing in his church on Sunday, and on Monday as the head of Enron was able to bilk his investors out of millions of dollars.
Ken Lay was exceptional. Most church members are real Feelers, who are mostly women. Count the skirts. The proportion of women in the churches matches the proportion of women Feelers. Church is -- nevermind what the Calvinists tell you about election -- a volunteer activity. The people who feel welcome come, and the people who feel out of place stay away.
Even more exceptional is my friend ``Bill,'' an over-the-edge Thinker and a technologist, married to an unrepentant Feeler wife, ``Martha.'' There are many people like this couple, but Bill has done his spiritual homework. He studied Greek and Hebrew, and he knows that the Christian message is true. That's a Thinker value. Because it is true, he cannot just ignore it and stay home. He cannot merely come and pay up his ``fire insurance'' but otherwise sit passively in the back pew. Bill survives by pretending to be crazy. He also helps people with their computer problems, which tends to mitigate and compensate for their distrust of all things Thinker.
``Dan'' is another technologist married to a Feeler, but he has been successfully morphed into a Feeler by the church. He still insists that he tests out as a Thinker, but his religious conversation is about relationships. He tries to engage unbeliever Thinkers, but they brush him off with devastating put-downs like ``Everything you've given me as to why you believe is based on either emotion or credulity of unsubstantiated ancient texts... None of this even begins to prove that Jesus loves me.'' The educated Thinker needs truth and reason, not love and relationships.
[This chapter needs more work]
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rev. 2008 May 16