Pew and pews

The decline over the last decade in the share of Black (-11 percentage points) and Hispanic adults (-10 points) who are Christians is very similar to the decline among white adults (-12 points), according to Pew. The number of college graduates leaving the faith (-13 points) is similar to those without degrees (-11 points). The decline in organized religion is indeed much bigger among Democrats (-17 points) than Republicans (-7 points) and among Millennials (-16 points) compared to Baby Boomers (-6 points), but the trend is very broad.

It's not particularly easy to get excited about Pew's latest research into America's religious life because it's difficult to be optimistic. In almost every area of our culture, the practice of religion (most specifically, church attendance) is on the wane, as it has been for some time. People appear to be less religious than they were.

I'm hardly an expert on Japanese religious practice, but I do remember being told that despite the fact of there not being a church or temple or synagogue on every other block, as is true here, Westerners shouldn't begin to believe that the Japanese are secular people. The lack of brick-and-mortar churches may not mean that the people aren't not religious.

Nonetheless, in most Western democracies, we've always judged the level of spirituality in terms of church attendance. Those who do, are; those who don't, aren't. Today, those who don't have outnumber those who do. That's new.

What's more, the old definitions--"conservative/liberal"--don't really hold much water. Traditionally conservative people in the evangelical world may well blame "liberalism" for the obvious decline--"the church isn't as strong as when I was a kid. We've cow-towed to the liberals, and the result is religious practice that's got no discipline at all. We don't know what it is we believe anymore."

On the other hand, traditional liberals look at a county like the one I live in and point at politics as the savior. If 80% of the populace--highly religious--chooses Donald Trump as the man to lead the nation, the church has lost its way and become, quite frankly, little more than a political party who won't don masks in an epidemic.

I was 18 years old on the very first Sunday I lived in Sioux Center, Iowa. That day and that night (two services) I attended First CRC in town because I was CRC and First was closest to the campus. A bunch of us walked those five or six blocks together, got there a bit late, and were ushered upstairs to the balcony, where there was still one pew--way in the back--untenanted.

I remember that night better than any Sunday I lived there, because the church was jammed, even the balcony. I can't begin to remember the sermon, but the preacher was likely the president of the college. Still, what I remember is being packed in. The place was overflowing.

Today, I'm a member of the fellowship that meets in that same church. We haven't used the balcony in years, if ever. Covid has fractured attendance. We're there in shifts so there are far more empty chairs than occupied.

A half-century ago, there were only two Christian Reformed churches; today, there are six, one of them Spanish-speaking. The town is almost twice the size of what it was in 1966. There are more churches, period, in town, but several have no evening services, and, of those that do, none, I'd guess, fill balconies.

Does that mean that Christianity is on the wane? I can't help thinking that yes is an easy answer to a complex phenomenon. The degree to which ethnicity is linked to religious practice among most Euro-American fellowships is, in many cases, dying or already dead. The vast majority of students enrolling at the college down the street from First CRC, Sioux Center, in 1966 had their membership in the CRC. Today, the percentage of students at the college (now, "university") who are members of that denomination is less than half. Whole denominations, across the board, are in decline.

What Pew has been watching for decades is a sea change in religious practice throughout this country. If you think it's just you or yours, you're badly mistaken.

In my lifetime, perhaps the most significant cultural change has come in religious practice. That's what Pew uncovers every time they determine to ask questions, once again, about how we do our faith.