Dan:

Don't overread my response. The apocalyptic dimension is central to Jesus. I am editing a work on Jesus with a team of scholars that treat how important this is as the starting point for understanding Jesus.

I feel confident that Tom Wright would be more comfortable on my take on orality over Ehrman. Meier is somewhere inbetween. Sanders would be the one more like Erhman. Ever read a story to a child or grandchild who lives in an oral world and tried to significantly change the story? We also can check the impact of orality by what we have in our recorded tradition. We do not get the scope of change Ehrman suggests, especially when it comes to the core of the story.

By the way, I have made the New York Times Best seller list, so I appreciate the advice!

My point in blogging Ehrman is that he does have a following and I think he is profoundly wrong on some key matters.  As for the Newsweek piece, although in many ways well done, also obscures a key fact in the poll, namely that evengelicalism is growing as well. The "decline" is from people who nominally had identified with the Christian faith. I blogged on that point already.