Where would you put yourself on the "Christian Compass"?

[falling apart like the ashes of American flags]

Something I thought of that would be like the Political Compass, except the X axis is liberal-conservative and the Y axis is high church/low church. It'd be cool if someone actually made one and ranked famous theologians and preachers and where modern day denominations lie, though that would take someone who would know more than me.

I think I'd sit around -5 (liberal being the negative side of the axis), -8 (low church being the negative side.) I'm fairly orthodox theologically in comparison to someone like Spong or more mainstream folks who are still skeptical of say the Resurrection or Virgin Birth which is why I'm not further on that axis.

[Supersonic]

Interesting.

I would probably be -3 or -4 on the liberal/conservative axis. Any further and I would be worried about going into Christian left wing populism which is all too strife, and irritating, in the Church of England.

On high church/low church, I imagine I would be +6 or so, the Church of England as it is, is fairly high church, and I love tradition so, definitely up there. I guess it depends what is on the far end of each scale.

[RI]

I'd probably be around a (+6, +8).

[Free Speech Enjoyer]

Liberal/conservative: -6
High church/low church: -7

[falling apart like the ashes of American flags]

Liberal/conservative: -6
High church/low church: -7

You definitely do not strike me as that low church.

[Free Speech Enjoyer]

Liberal/conservative: -6
High church/low church: -7

You definitely do not strike me as that low church.

Whoops.  I had assumed the high church/low church stuff had to do with how much autonomy is delegated to the each church by the governing denomination (and since I'm more progressive than "big tent," even -7 is probably low for me).  After googling it to really understand what the difference is, I'd probably put myself around -3 or so.

[DC Al Fine]

Dammit BRTD, you beat me to this excellent idea!

Here's a sample compass I made using the scientific method of whatever popped into my head at the time.

[DC Al Fine]

Liberal/conservative: -6
High church/low church: -7

You definitely do not strike me as that low church.

Whoops.  I had assumed the high church/low church stuff had to do with how much autonomy is delegated to the each church by the governing denomination (and since I'm more progressive than "big tent," even -7 is probably low for me).  After googling it to really understand what the difference is, I'd probably put myself around -3 or so.

That still surprises me. You always struck me as the type that would love the beauty of an old school high church liturgy.

[falling apart like the ashes of American flags]

+10 on the high church axis would be the Latin Mass types (so yeah SSPX fits well up there) and -10 would have to be a Christian hardcore show full of moshing and crowdsurfing.

[Free Speech Enjoyer]

Liberal/conservative: -6
High church/low church: -7

You definitely do not strike me as that low church.

Whoops.  I had assumed the high church/low church stuff had to do with how much autonomy is delegated to the each church by the governing denomination (and since I'm more progressive than "big tent," even -7 is probably low for me).  After googling it to really understand what the difference is, I'd probably put myself around -3 or so.

That still surprises me. You always struck me as the type that would love the beauty of an old school high church liturgy.

Low churches seem more folksy.  I could easily attend a high church liturgy as well, but it's all about personal preference.  And I'm certainly not fond of megachurches.

[Tokugawa Sexgod Ieyasu]

Going by Al's metric, I'd probably sit at around -2, +7 or so.

Where do you think the governing bodies of the Catholic Church would be? I'd imagine somewhere around two or three points above and one or two to the left of 'conservative mainlines'.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

I view the free will/predestinationism axis as distinct from both the proposed axes here, and more important than either of them.

[Tokugawa Sexgod Ieyasu]

I'd be about halfway towards whichever side free will was on that axis.

[ilikeverin]

(-6,+5), I'd imagine.

[Joe Biden 2020]

I would probably be +3 (somewhat conservative, but more liberal than most of my church family, especially when it comes to gay rights and my largely Democratic voting pattern in the past 10 years) and +3.5 in that I love tradition, but am willing to buck tradition for the sake of saving souls.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

My guess:
Liberal/Conservative: +2
High Church/Low Church: -2

While my views are certainly liberal for my denomination, they're not quite the same as many liberal Christians (since I believe in the Resurrection, the Virgin Birth, miracles, etc.).  And while I love tradition in just about any area (maybe a little too much), I'm more than happy to buck it when I think it's wrong (like Sunday worship or the concept of communion as the actual body and blood of Jesus.)  Overall, a very strange score for my denomination.

[TJ in Oregon]

For me I'd say:

Liberal/Conservative: +6
High Church/Low Church: +8

I'd consider that perhaps the Liberal/Conservative number should be a little lower, but I can't argue really that realisticidealist is to my right, so I'll leave that at 6. I figured Liberal/Conservative in a religious context aligns more with what we'd consider "social issues" than "economic issues" so mine ought to be pretty high, but not that close to 10 because I would put say (at least in an American context) 10 would be a Calvinist or prosperity gospel mindset, which I certainly don't agree with at all.

On the high church/low church spectrum, I'm toward the high church end of mainstream Catholicism in so much as that I dislike most of modernized music in the Mass such as using guitars or most of what has been written in the last 50 years. I don't think such things are sacrilege, just bad. Music like Sing a New Church just doesn't actually say anything. It's like when you have to write an essay for English class and fill it with meaningless fluff, except in song form and sung in a church. The newer songs haven't been able (or haven't tried) to capture the hunger for God that you see in a Gregorian chants like Attende Domine.

Apart from the music, I'm not extremely high church in my preferences when it comes to "Smells and Bells", namely the use of copious amounts of incense or bells for consecration. If they use those things, that's nice but I'm not adamant about it one way or the other. I'm not a Latin Mass type and do not wish for a return to it even though I understand where they're coming from (the diocesan types anyway, not SSPX or the sedevancatists). I do enjoy when common parts of the Mass everyone knows in Latin are sung in Latin though, such as the Agnus Dei. One other thing I do that is somewhat rare among people my age, though not unheard of and quite common at the church I go to here, is receive the Eucharist on the tongue.

So I figured +8 sounds about right.

[Zioneer]

What numbers would Mormons get?

[fezzyfestoon]

-10, -10?

[DC Al Fine]

What numbers would Mormons get?

It's an awkward question to answer because the compass works better with just mainstream Christianity. Actually it fits Protestantism best I think.

To give it a guess, on the theologically liberal/conservative scale, I'd put Mormonism slightly left of centre, because the extreme right represents orthodoxy and as non-trinitarians, Mormons don't really count as orthodox even if they have similar views to other conservative groups. However they aren't very far left of centre because they don't deny the divinity of Christ or the resurrection like some ultra-liberals do.

I have no idea where to assign Mormons on the liturgical scale because I have no idea what your services are like? Could you enlighten us?

[MyRescueKittehRocks]

What about Assemblies Of God, Jesus Culture or IHOP.

[DC Al Fine]

What about Assemblies Of God, Jesus Culture or IHOP.

Assemblies of God would be moderately right wing on theology and hardcore low church. Don't know about the others.

[MyRescueKittehRocks]

That's about accurate regarding the A/G. Jesus Culture and Bethel Redding were A/G until the latter part of last decade. So the degree of where they'd be is so similer it isn't funny. I personally would be between conservative evangelical and charismatic given my pre-Pentecostal upbringing of the Holiness/Wesleyan churches. Thus a +6 on the conservative/liberal scale and -6 on the high/low church scale. Somebody needs to do a Calvinist/Arminianism scale.

[Del Tachi]

Conservative, high-church...

To speculate on the actually numbers would be silly.  It would depend on what questions were asked

[7,052,770]

(-7, +7) maybe?