America's Changing Religious Landscape - Pew Research Center

[Cearbhall]

There was a thread about this study when the findings were released a year and a half ago, but it came up again in conversation, and I think it's worth revisiting.

• Overview
• Full report
• Press release
• Harvard Divinity School commentary

It's an interesting study. I think the page 11 "Generational Replacement Helping Drive Growth of Unaffiliated, Decline of Mainline" is particularily revealing, the oldest generation being 85% Christian and the youngest 56%. The direction is quite clear but the US is still a very religious country compared to most of the Europe. I recall the church going rate being 30-40% in the US, while it's 2-5% in Finland, for example.

I think this study would make a good thread of it's own?

 

[Tree of Life]

Are these the same people that said Hillary was gonna win?

 

[Haramis]

I think a lot needs to be done from an outreach and involvement perspective. Most churches I've visited are not particularly welcoming. I get the sense they're grudgingly tolerant of new members. They tend to have a huge focus on "Sit and listen", which is in no way engaging.

The concept of church service is unappealing to me and a lot of people my age. I really have no desire to sit around and listen to someone lecture for 45 minutes to an hour.

What I really like, are small groups. They're great and the only thing that keeps me in church. They're also pretty neglected in most churches. They're really laser focused on getting people through the door for a service(I'm guessing because that's where the offering plate is).

Most churches have almost zero events. No activities for anything other than children and the elderly.

The reason the church is in decline is specifically because it refuses to adapt.

 

[John Hyperspace]

I don't like the idea of "religious" being a corollary with "church-going"; in fact, I would almost go the opposite route in that "church-going" is indicative of a people that don't yet grasp the true idea of religion. I see church-going as a ritualistic form of earthly worship, which is not really true worship. It's materialism, a worldly function of "Does everyone see me being religious?" I see true religion as a spiritual idea that casts earthly things along the wayside as it progresses to a higher understanding of religion. A religion not in a set of rules, to be manifested in earthly rituals in earthly buildings; but as a spirit of love, manifesting itself in always helping others, in making peace and serving truth in aiding in understanding.

So when I see something like "5% church-going" in a nation; that could be a very good thing. It may mean that nation's populace is advancing beyond the earthly understanding and finding truth in the spiritual things where it belongs. Then again, it could also mean that the populace has become disallusioned by what we may term "churchianity" and has thrown out the proverbial baby with the bathwater.

At any rate, I'm confident that at some point, there will be no more church-buildings or temples, no more carnalization of rules and rituals, and everyone will be truly religious for the first time. Earthly understanding is training wheels for children; at some point, we'll have to grow up, and take off the training wheels.

But, I also remember something someone once said: "There are three types of lies: lies; damn lies; and statistics." So I'm not really able to draw any meaningful conclusions for the links. I hope they indicate that earthly religions are falling by the wayside as more and more people ascend to spiritual worship. John 4:24, James 1:27. There is unity in the Spirit; there is only strife and division in the earthly: 1 Corinthians 3:3, Ephesians 4:3, Psalms 133:1.

 

[Cearbhall]

Are these the same people that said Hillary was gonna win?

Pardon?

 

[Chesterton]

I certainly hope that little trend continues. Society's doing great. Everybody's so happy nowadays.

 

[keith99]

7 years and the percentage of atheists has almost doubled.

That may just be the tip of the iceberg. Soon it will be safe to be atheist and then the real surge will happen.

 

[Cearbhall]

The concept of church service is unappealing to me and a lot of people my age. I really have no desire to sit around and listen to someone lecture for 45 minutes to an hour.

I suppose this has always been true of young people as a whole, compared to older folks.

Personally, I love religious services. I purposely chose a religion that has weekly services at a location near me.

 

[Haramis]

I suppose this has always been true of young people as a whole, compared to older folks.

Personally, I love religious services. I purposely chose a religion that has weekly services at a location near me.

And you have 95% of churches to choose from. Someone like me, has perhaps 5%. Perhaps I'm not even a majority of people. Let's say only 20% of people are like me. That's still a gap in S&D of 4/1.

 

[Tree of Life]

Pardon?

The people that say that Christianity is on the decline and other stuff is on the rise. Are these the same people that said Hillary was gonna win?

 

[Cearbhall]

The people that say that Christianity is on the decline and other stuff is on the rise.

Pew Research...it's in the title.

Are these the same people that said Hillary was gonna win?

I don't know if they engage in election polling. You'd have to go on their site and look at the political section. Click the Overview link. If you want to compare the research teams, the team for this study is listed on the second page of the full report.

 

[MehGuy]

Nothing surprising there.

One of the first generations to grow up in the free speech wild west we call the Internet.

Not sure if I'd be an atheist right now if it weren't for the Internet.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

The death of Religion or specific Churches has so often been predicted in history that it is becoming tedious.

We saw Plethon and his peers predicting it in the Renaissance.
We see the deists of the Enlightenment predicting it.
We see it predicted during the French Revolution with its anti-clericalism.
We see it predicted in the 1848 uprisings and by Chartists.
We see it in Marxist dialectic and the various Socialist movements from the late 19th century onwards.
We see it from Naturalistic Materialists in the early 20th.
We see it predicted by Shaw and others who thought we'd be praising a impersonal 'life-force'.

This is merely the latest in a long running set of such predictions. Religiousity is not declining, nor is Atheism increasing in my opinion. There have always been atheists as there has always been theists. Mostly it seems that people are more willing to call themselves atheist as all kinds of terms that previously existed are now being lumped under atheist, usually with some non-sensical hyphenation thrown in. The so-called 'rise' of Atheism is more an artifact of the death of nomenclature like Agnostic, Deist, Spiritist etc. and the more social acceptability for non-churchgoers to adopt the label, in my opinion.
Church attendance has declined before then picked up again, such as in Britain before the rise of Methodism or France after WWI. It is a poor predictor of Religion though, as many of the most religious do not necessarily seek out a Church or create new groups themselves. Take the Great Awakening as an example, a very religious time but not really associated strongly to existing Churches and hence people predicted the death of organised religion.

The biggests problem here is that this is based on statistics. As Tree of Life pointed out, statistics are often flawed like Clinton winning by big margins in pre-election predictions or Brexit losing.
As Disraeli said (sometimes misquoted as Mark Twain): "There are three kinds of lies: Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics."

 

[Cearbhall]

The death of Religion or specific Churches has so often been predicted in history that it is becoming tedious.

This is specifically about the United States. Making note of measurable trends in the religious affiliation of a specific society is not an irrational doomsday prediction.

Nations, cultures, and regions have indeed gone through serious and permanent religious upheavals throughout history, sometimes resulting in Christianity or another religion becoming obsolete. North America has already experienced this once. Such a prediction, however, was not my purpose in making this thread or spreading this study. I am not being smug or overstating what is portrayed within. I merely meant to start a discussion.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

This is specifically about the United States. Making note of measurable trends in the religious affiliation of a specific society is not an irrational doomsday prediction.

Which I believe to be seriously flawed. Not only the supposed 'trends' but the premises themselves as I outlined above with historic examples of similar supposed 'trends'. The idea of Atheism replacing Religion is unlikely as these are existential questions. People are not suddenly going to abandon religion in droves for other forms of existential anxiety.

Nations, cultures, and regions have indeed gone through serious and permanent religious upheavals throughout history, sometimes resulting in Christianity or another religion becoming obsolete. North America has already experienced this once. Such a prediction, however, was not my purpose in making this thread or spreading this study. I am not being smug or overstating what is portrayed within. I merely meant to start a discussion.

This is disengenuous. Societies have seen their religion replaced with another one, not the abscence of one - in spite of 2000 years of people predicting this will happen.

Nor did I think you 'smug' etc. There is no need to use such emotive language, I meant no offence nor a personal attack. I was merely discussing the topic.

 

[Arthra]

Acccording to the survey referred to in the initial post:

"Religious intermarriage also appears to be on the rise: Among Americans who have gotten married since 2010, nearly four-in-ten (39%) report that they are in religiously mixed marriages, compared with 19% among those who got married before 1960.3 The rise in intermarriage appears to be linked with the growth of the religiously unaffiliated population."

I think that implies our population in the US is becoming more cosmopolitan and diverse.... and this is a good thing as we have a view of the world ... the entire planet that suggests we live in an diverse and inter-related world. We have more of a world perspective and can appreciate how inter related we all are... The planet has "shrunk" for us so issues we face today are more on a planetary scale than say when our great great grandparents we alive...

 

[Cearbhall]

Which I believe to be seriously flawed. Not only the supposed 'trends' but the premises themselves as I outlined above with historic examples of similar supposed 'trends'. The idea of Atheism replacing Religion is unlikely as these are existential questions.

If you're doubting the veracity of the trends that Pew has found, or doubting that they are indicative of a long-term societal shift, might I recommend supplementing their data with Gallup's annual aggregates of their own polls, which gather similar data and stretch back to 1948:

Source

 

[cloudyday2]

... North America has already experienced this once. ...

Just curious, when did this happen before? I know that the US religious landscape has always been changing in various ways. Are you thinking of the changes in the period of the "monkey trials"?

 

[cloudyday2]

Nothing surprising there.

One of the first generations to grow up in the free speech wild west we call the Internet.

Not sure if I'd be an atheist right now if it weren't for the Internet.

Amen. I wonder if the rate of decline of Christianity may be slowing now. The internet and forums became more user friendly 10 years ago, and Christians from all age groups were suddenly exposed to ideas that made them lose faith. Now we are in steady state, and the newcomers to these skeptical ideas are mostly younger people instead of people from all age groups. That is my hypothesis. It seems that the people from my generation who were inclined to lose faith may have already lost their faith now.

 

[Cearbhall]

Just curious, when did this happen before? I know that the US religious landscape has always been changing in various ways. Are you thinking of the changes in the period of the "monkey trials"?

No, I was referring to the conquering of pre-Colombian civilizations. After thousands of years of various groups dominating their respective regions, the influx of European immigrants to the continent led to Judeo-Christian culture taking over.

Another good example would be Ireland.