
In U.S., Decline of Christianity Continues at Rapid Pace - smacktoward
https://www.pewforum.org/2019/10/17/in-u-s-decline-of-christianity-continues-at-rapid-pace/
======
jdietrich
To pre-empt a lot of comments in this thread:

The decline of religiosity is a global trend, strongly correlated with
economic development. The US has historically been an outlier and remains
unusually religious. The relevant question isn't really why religion is
declining in the US, but why it hasn't declined sooner.

Claims that the decline in religiosity are related to increases in crime or
social problems are not strongly supported by the evidence; there is not a
consistent relationship between religiosity and criminality or wellbeing.

[https://news.gallup.com/poll/142727/religiosity-highest-
worl...](https://news.gallup.com/poll/142727/religiosity-highest-world-
poorest-nations.aspx)

[https://web.archive.org/web/20131021065544/http://www.wingia...](https://web.archive.org/web/20131021065544/http://www.wingia.com/web/files/news/14/file/14.pdf)

[https://sci-hub.tw/10.1111/j.1751-9020.2009.00247.x](https://sci-
hub.tw/10.1111/j.1751-9020.2009.00247.x)

~~~
deftnerd
> The relevant question isn't really why religion is declining in the US, but
> why it hasn't declined sooner.

It's possible that religion is treating the symptom of another problem.
Assuming someone religious attends an organized function related to that
religion, it's making them part of a community and might be helping them feel
less lonely.

2018 study shows that half of Americans feel lonely. [1], but a similar kind
of study on people in europe surveying if people had anyone to ask for help or
discuss personal matters has a much smaller amount [2]

The European study indicates that income inequality has an effect on social
isolation, with the lowest incomes having twice the amount of isolation.

The income inequality in America is even more pronounced, and geographically,
many of the areas with the highest levels of religious beliefs seem (on a map)
to line up pretty well with levels of poverty and income inequality.

Usual disclaimer about correlation/causation and everything... But perhaps
economic conditions that cause people to tend to be socially isolated are
being self-treated by pursuit of religious groups because the community it
gathers results in a decrease in the isolation symptom?

[1] [https://fortune.com/2018/05/01/americans-lonely-cigna-
study/](https://fortune.com/2018/05/01/americans-lonely-cigna-study/) [2]
[https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-
news/-/D...](https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-
news/-/DDN-20170628-1)

------
deftnerd
Some side effects of this that are worth thinking about...

As churches see less membership, at some point congregations merge and one
church is shut down.

Many churches do outreach and provide services to the community, the poor, and
the homeless. This often includes shelter from the elements, soup kitchens,
food pantries, meeting places for groups like AA/NA/etc.

When a church shuts down, the distance that the population has to travel can
increase, and there might not be enough room to provide the same resources to
those populations.

Additionally, it's not necessarily a problem, but more of a musing... What
happens to all those old churches? The impact on the property market has to
have local effects...

I wonder how many churches are shut down, but are just maintained by a
skeleton crew of maintenance people in the hope that their customer base will
increase enough one day to restart their services and reopen the property.

I assume churches don't pay property tax, so as long as the church is in
hibernation mode and not actually totally dissolved, could they hold onto the
property indefinitely for just the cost of maintenance? Or would them not
providing religious services anymore cause them to lose the exemption?

~~~
dangus
I would think that many churches sell the property. I know people who live in
an apartment building that used to be a church.

While churches do provide services and outreach to the poor, I've always
wondered about what happens when they're serving the opposite effect by not
paying property taxes. Property taxes are the public education base in the
USA, and quality education is the way out of poverty.

Churches' outreach programs will also discriminate against causes they don't
agree with based on their own teachings - i.e., Christian churches might not
recommend that someone use contraception or get an abortion even if those
options are the best logical course of action.

~~~
deftnerd
Those are some excellent points.

You know how some people have pointed out that McDonalds wasn't in the food
business, it was in the real estate business to franchise owners? They often
hold prime real estate locations.

The Post Office also has prime real estate locations.

I think that Churches, collectively, hold some of the most desireable property
locations in our communities. Especially older churches in city centers have
been there and grown organically since cities were founded so now they're very
valuable.

------
AlexandrB
What's disheartening to me, a life-long agnostic, is that this change doesn't
seem to correspond to an increase in rational, scientific materialism. Indeed,
it seems like science is on the outs as well with increasingly common denial
of basic scientific facts when they conflict with ideology. Instead, this
seems to be a change of aesthetics - trading one set of pseudoscientific
beliefs (Christianity) for another (new age mysticism, astrology, goop.com).

~~~
nopriorarrests
When people stop believing in God, they don't believe in nothing — they
believe in anything.

G.K. Chesterton, circa 1924

~~~
wglb
A fellow that is not exactly neutral on the subject.

And really not true.

------
simonsarris
A great sorrow I think. Not for Christianity per se but all that comes with
it.

What is most essentially "home" in the world is the set of rituals you make
for yourself and others, things that allow you to dwell more poetically in
place. Traditional rituals, like those found in religions, enhance our sense
of belonging in the world, or if the world is a rough and scary place, at
least within a society. I think we do not have the words for all the good
parts of religion and ritual, and because they are not easily articulated,
they are easily dismissed as irrational or nonexistent.

People instead will attack any religion, or any set of rituals that are not
easily explained with a dollar value, _gleefully_ as things that need to die,
in service of a more rational world, by which they only mean a world more
easily explainable to them. Since they cannot easily explain what's lost, they
assume it must be nothing. I think this is a mistake due to a lack of
attention.

People do not think about this, for that matter I fear people hardly think of
our sense of dwelling and belonging at all. Culturally, the idea of
"belonging" anywhere has been entirely subsumed by "wandering"[note]. This
makes for a more consumer-friendly world, but a much less nice one to live in
day to day. I fear that until we have the easy words to properly describe what
it is we have lost, people will simply continue to cheer its loss, perhaps
pausing once in a while to wonder aloud why they feel somewhat lost.

[note] ask people about their aspirational hobbies, they are amost always
quick to point to "travel", and "experiences". Weirdly a lot of the
"experiences" wording people use comes from a study commissioned by
LivingSocial ("millennials prefer experiences over things", as if that's the
dichotomy) to hawk the selling of experiences. The pseudostudy seems to be
outliving the failed company.

~~~
dangus
I would guess that the high level of religious affiliation in the United
States is somewhat abnormal for a developed and wealthy country.

Can you find another Western nation out there with similar levels of religious
affiliation?

I think I see this decline as a correction. It's not actually normal to have
so many people finding religion important to their lives in a large,
connected, developed society. The USA's unique history and geography lent
itself to high levels of religious affiliation, but since the Internet has
connected us all a little closer, it's been harder for religious institutions
and religious parents to prevent younger people from obtaining unfiltered
information.

Enjoyable secular rituals are also easy to find if you look right in front of
you - the Thanksgiving Day parade, the SuperBowl, Halloween and Trick-or-
Treating, Valentine's Day, city-wide marathons, County Fairs, street
festivals, etc...the list is nearly endless.

And tradition itself isn't a religion or belief in something. The fact that
the Catholic church has you cross yourself, stand and sit at specific times,
or eat a cracker are not examples a belief in anything, they are physical
ritual and tradition. One can partake in all those activities without having a
thought in their mind. There are also secular traditions that have no root in
surviving religions, like putting a tree in your house during the holiday
season. Plenty of atheists put up "Christmas trees" because it's fun!

~~~
simonsarris
There are so many implied claims in what you say, it is difficult to give a
response. We would almost certainly be talking past each other.

> I think I see this decline as a correction. It's not actually normal to have
> so many people finding religion important to their lives in a ...

Why use that as your normative base? Why not say that everything after, say,
Descartes or Jesus or the printing press is abnormal level of religion, and
that we are in a lull of divinity? Why do you think anything about the
religiosity of anyone in the last 1-30 centuries is _normal?_

> in a large, connected ... but since the Internet has connected us all ...

 _Are we_ in a large, connected society? _Has_ the internet really done as you
say?

~~~
dangus
The normative base I’m talking about is the religious importance levels in
various countries:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Importance_of_religion_by_coun...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Importance_of_religion_by_country)

The United States is one of the most religious countries for being as wealthy
and developed as it is. Many of the similarly developed nations that remain
religious are the oil theocracies.

As I mentioned, the Internet has allowed people to read opinions beyond their
own filtered literature. A religious school or household won’t buy books that
question religion. But an entire generation (the millennials shown in the
article) grew up with Internet connections that largely took them beyond those
filters.

I know that part is speculation on my end, but eliminating the Internet’s role
in inter-connectivity as a possibility is an odd hypothesis. I have friends in
Japan in shared interest groups for Japanese pop stars, how would that have
happened before the Internet? Writing letters?

------
rinchik
What else is new?

Religion is the most conservative institution ever created. It does not adapt
(well, almost..) it doesn't change (also, almost..) and it's no wonder that
with developments in science and culture, religion doesn't seem as important
as it used to be.

It's been going on for a while, in suburbia the main purpose of religion has
nothing to do with religion, it's mostly about community, church is the place
when you meet a talk with your neighbors. That's it.

Well, strong economy is also there to "blame", one talks to God only when one
needs something, nothing wrong with that just to make a point that when
everything is good religion is on decline.

------
rpmcmurdo
Good! I come from a family that is split between A) secular/atheist people and
B) deeply religious people from the South. Group A has done well, all have
happy families, and are overall good people. Group B are, to put it nicely,
uneducated bigots who blame a lifetime of bad decisions on everyone besides
themselves, oh, and they are also some of the most hateful people you will
ever meet. The only people in group B who turned out okay were the ones who
rejected religion or turned out gay (and newsflash, they were exiled by their
so loving families).

------
cabaalis
I am a Christian, and I believe this is caused directly by a few factors:

1\. The history of actions taken by theocracies is not good. There is a strong
modern social justice movement, and even saying something bad 10 years ago is
enough to cancel someone. Now imagine a group that committed multiple
genocides over the centuries.

2\. A growing rise of "spiritual but not religious" has led young people to
eschew attending church. These young people grow up and have young people of
their own who are now never exposed to Christianity.

3\. Relegation of religion to personal matters alone, taboo in public.

4\. Christians have allowed the book of Leviticus to overwhelm their message.
Because of what is said about LGBTQ, Christian == bigot in many people's
minds.

I'm sure there are fellow Christians who visit HN. I think these are the
primary obstacles that must be overcome in order to grow the cause. All the
mission work and happy Easter messages in the world won't make a lick of
difference against these 4 issues.

~~~
teunispeters
The intolerance of Christian groups for non-Christian is a part too. I think
it has to do with the myth of being persecuted that hasn't been true since
Constantine.

~~~
teilo
Tell that to the Catholics in England and colonial America, or the Protestants
in Ireland, or the Jacobites in Scotland, or churches of various denominations
in many Islamic countries or territories, such as the Congo.

~~~
teunispeters
In general for every group X, you can find a subgroup Y who's done terribly
toxic stuff somewhere.

The larger and more coordinate the group, the more likely. It doesn't need
religion. It needs humans, organising, to happen.

~~~
teilo
Of course. Even subgroups within the Christian church itself have been guilty
of such atrocities at various points in history. But to say that all organized
persecution of Christians ended with Constantine is just historically wrong.

------
haunter
Wonder what will replace the community for a lot of people in the near future.
In a lot of places the church is a de facto community place. There usually a
lot of posts in HN about the modern life, loneliness, depression, isolation
etc. and I think if you strip away the outward trappings and dogma, this is
what religion is good for. Not in a "believe in Jesus" or "trust in God" kind
of way, but in a "how to orient your life" kind of way. Which is to say, the
actually useful portion of religion generally teaches that your best life is
probably not focused on you. It isn't about finding yourself, or being true to
yourself, or really thinking about yourself at all. It's in being of benefit
to the human beings around you. And in serving those around you, you become
something that is worth being. There are parentless children, drug addicts,
parks that need cleaning etc. And not christianity per se but local churches
do a great deal of job in these. We will see what the future holds.

------
Invictus0
If the trend continues, we can expect parity in Christianity and religiously
unaffiliated by roughly 2040. However I would expect the decline to increase
in rate at some point, as the network effects due to the ubiquity of the
Christian community start to fall apart.

------
scarmig
Turn Christianity into a vehicle for conservative identity politics instead of
a community and moral framework, and the people victimized by it will cease to
identify as it. Simple as that.

~~~
gmoot
Catholicism has never been that, and it's declining too.

~~~
AlexandrB
Catholicism as an organization has a _lot_ of skeletons in the closet. I'm
surprised it's not declining faster.

------
dang
This community doesn't seem to have the capacity to discuss religion.

Edit: ok you guys, message received. I won't do it this way again.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Wow that's the sort of comment that usually gets removed. An unnecessary slur
on an entire group of people with no supporting argument. Being disagreeable
for the sake of being disagreeable. I'm disappointed.

~~~
dang
It's partly strategic. The presence of a moderation comment like that in a
thread often seems to evoke higher-quality comments. I'd bet that it such had
an effect in this case—the thread improved almost immediately—but who knows.

You're right that I should have written something longer and not in haste. But
I'm a bit surprised by the strong reaction to that one; it's atypical. Perhaps
to some readers it felt like a disparagement of their own view on
religion—which of course it was not.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Sorry if I was catty. It was a bit of cold water in the face, is all.

Personally I like to avoid such threads. You can't really be understood,
whatever you contribute.

~~~
dang
I don't think you were catty, and you were far from the only person who had an
adverse reaction to my comment. I've learned something. So thanks!

------
nighthawk1
One set of rules is enough. Don’t want to have to follow common law and some
made up religious laws as well.

------
notadoc
Will be interesting to see what happens when the country trades the Protestant
worth ethic, concepts of morality, duty to family, for .... whatever is
adopted as faith instead.

Identity politics seems to be the new religion for many.

------
gscott
Joined with a rise in suicides [https://www.nbcnews.com/health/mental-
health/suicides-homici...](https://www.nbcnews.com/health/mental-
health/suicides-homicides-rise-young-people-n1067786)

and mass killings [https://news.wttw.com/2019/08/13/northwestern-research-
shows...](https://news.wttw.com/2019/08/13/northwestern-research-shows-us-
mass-shootings-rise)

and violent crime [https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/25/us/violent-crime-
murder-c...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/25/us/violent-crime-murder-
chicago-increase-.html)

and homelessness [https://www.cbsnews.com/news/homelessness-on-the-rise-in-
som...](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/homelessness-on-the-rise-in-some-u-s-
cities/)

What do Christian churches do? (quick Google search random).

[https://www.uchristianchurch.org/mission-and-
outreach/](https://www.uchristianchurch.org/mission-and-outreach/)
[https://www.diamondcanyon.org/missions](https://www.diamondcanyon.org/missions)
[https://www.newhopechristianchurch.com/missions](https://www.newhopechristianchurch.com/missions)
[http://northridge.online/about/missions](http://northridge.online/about/missions)

~~~
keithnoizu
Assuming there is direct causation here rather than simple correlation I'll
take it. The long term harms of religion far outweigh these items. You don't
have to look much further than the death toll in the middle east for an
example.

~~~
hinkley
One of the services a church provides is a community. For some religions it’s
wielded as a weapon though. Leave, and lose everything. Take a peek at
/r/exmormon for a bunch of examples.

What people need is a secular community to replace it, and not all find it.
Some of the things listed above are exacerbated by feelings of isolation or
lack of purpose.

A lie is best concealed between two truths. Churches know how to organize
people. It’s a rare set of people management skills that has nothing specific
to do with the Divine. They’ve just had more opportunity to hone those skills.

But as humans we often trust people who show expertise in multiple areas to be
telling us the truth about other things as well. There are plenty of good
things that happen at churches, but they don’t have to happen at a church. And
the more they happen in the secular world, the more people figure out they can
pick and chose things that make them feel like decent human beings without
signing up for the others. That’s either a terrifying or comforting statement,
depending on which way you are coming from.

~~~
keithnoizu
I absolutely agree. America really needs some mandatory citizen participation
program. Force everyone to work 5 hours a month towards some project while
increasing social cohesion.

~~~
hinkley
It doesn’t need to be mandatory if someone makes them fashionable. We have
plenty of other colors besides Pink and (RED), for instance.

