{"id":9623,"date":"2023-02-07T07:59:12","date_gmt":"2023-02-07T12:59:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/?p=9623"},"modified":"2023-02-14T16:55:08","modified_gmt":"2023-02-14T21:55:08","slug":"february-12-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/february-12-2023\/","title":{"rendered":"February 12, 2023–From the Heart"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jen Krausz,\u00a0Bethlehem, PA<\/b><\/p>\n

Warm-up Question<\/b><\/h4>\n

Would you say you are proud to live in America? If not, where would you like to live instead?<\/p>\n

From the Heart<\/b><\/h4>\n

A new poll by Morning Consult<\/a>, released in January, showed that only 16% of Generation Z adults (ages 18-25) said they were proud to live in America.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Looking at all adult age groups, 52% said they were proud to live in America and 73% of the oldest generation, Baby Boomers, said they were proud to live in the U.S. Even millennials, the next closest age group to Gen Z, saw 20% more of its members saying they were proud to live in America, although still a minority at 36%.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Pollsters cited COVID-19 lockdowns, social unrest, and a focus on inequality and police brutality as some possible reasons why our youngest generation might have lost a sense of what they call American Exceptionalism, or the feeling that America is a country that they can be proud of.<\/p>\n

Many in the younger generation now seem to group America with other nations that \u201cregularly repress civil rights,\u201d and they have a lower degree of trust in U.S. government institutions than older generations.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This change has taken place in only about the last ten years. In 2013, 85% of Americans said they were \u201cextremely or very\u201d proud to be American. It was only in 2016\u20147 years ago\u2014that the percentage dropped below 80%.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

It is possible that most young people just don\u2019t know what the rest of the world is like. They may not realize how good most people have it here in the U.S., despite its problems.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also possible that they hold an impossibly high standard for the kind of country that could earn their patriotism. Perhaps the youth of today are simply absorbing too many of the negative messages put out by the media, their teachers, and some of their parents about America, and have decided that it\u2019s not such a great place after all.<\/p>\n

Discussion Questions<\/b><\/h4>\n