September 22, 2009 11:13 AM
- Text
God Is Back!
(Weekly Standard)
This column was written by Mark D. Tooley.
Is America getting more secular? Not according to a new survey on Americans' religious beliefs, "American Piety in the 21st Century," published this month by Baylor University. According to the Baylor survey, 82 percent of Americans are Christians, 90 percent believe in God, 70 percent pray regularly, and half attend church at least once a month.
If Baylor is correct, Americans are demographically as religious, and as Christian, as they ever have been. But their denominational affiliations have become somewhat less structured. Less likely now to be Methodist or Lutheran, they are drifting towards more informal forms of evangelical Christianity.
Similar surveys in recent years have shown an increased number of Americans claiming no religious affiliation. But the Baylor survey proposes that those seemingly-secular increases merely reflected the decline in formal denominational affiliation. When Baylor delved into the practices of supposedly unaffiliated respondents, it discovered that many of them do attend church or Bible studies, pray, and associate with some form of Christianity or other organized religion.
Many, especially in evangelical churches, do not realize that they are worshipping as part of larger organized bodies. Mega-churches, such as Rick Warren's 20,000 member Saddleback Church in California, do not advertise their denominational flavor — which may help them attract the religiously uninitiated. Saddleback, for instance, is connected to the Southern Baptist church, but does not broadcast this affiliation.
The Baylor survey found that only about one in ten Americans is not religiously affiliated, a statistic similar to past decades (and less than the 14 percent claimed in other recent surveys). This difference may not sound large, but it represents 10 million Americans.
Many of those 10 million Americans who had inaccurately been counted as non-religious belong to evangelical Christianity, which now accounts for one third of the American population, and is the nation's largest religious demographic. Mainline Protestants and Roman Catholics account for a little over one fifth each. Members of black Protestant churches account for 5 percent and Jews for 2.5 percent. Frustratingly, the Baylor survey lumped together all other categories — Eastern Orthodox Christians, Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, Muslims, Buddhists, and Hindus — which together account for less than 5 percent.
Some results are expected. Easterners are likelier to be Catholics. Southerners are the most likely to be evangelicals. Westerners are the most likely to have no affiliation. Young adults are three times as likely to lack a religious affiliation as older Americans.
Even among that 10 percent who are firmly nonaffiliated, 60 percent believe in God or a higher power, and one third pray regularly. Ten percent of the unaffiliated are attending church regularly. Ten percent of the religiously unaffiliated believe that Jesus is the Son of God.
Is America getting more secular? Not according to a new survey on Americans' religious beliefs, "American Piety in the 21st Century," published this month by Baylor University. According to the Baylor survey, 82 percent of Americans are Christians, 90 percent believe in God, 70 percent pray regularly, and half attend church at least once a month.
If Baylor is correct, Americans are demographically as religious, and as Christian, as they ever have been. But their denominational affiliations have become somewhat less structured. Less likely now to be Methodist or Lutheran, they are drifting towards more informal forms of evangelical Christianity.
Similar surveys in recent years have shown an increased number of Americans claiming no religious affiliation. But the Baylor survey proposes that those seemingly-secular increases merely reflected the decline in formal denominational affiliation. When Baylor delved into the practices of supposedly unaffiliated respondents, it discovered that many of them do attend church or Bible studies, pray, and associate with some form of Christianity or other organized religion.
Many, especially in evangelical churches, do not realize that they are worshipping as part of larger organized bodies. Mega-churches, such as Rick Warren's 20,000 member Saddleback Church in California, do not advertise their denominational flavor — which may help them attract the religiously uninitiated. Saddleback, for instance, is connected to the Southern Baptist church, but does not broadcast this affiliation.
The Baylor survey found that only about one in ten Americans is not religiously affiliated, a statistic similar to past decades (and less than the 14 percent claimed in other recent surveys). This difference may not sound large, but it represents 10 million Americans.
Many of those 10 million Americans who had inaccurately been counted as non-religious belong to evangelical Christianity, which now accounts for one third of the American population, and is the nation's largest religious demographic. Mainline Protestants and Roman Catholics account for a little over one fifth each. Members of black Protestant churches account for 5 percent and Jews for 2.5 percent. Frustratingly, the Baylor survey lumped together all other categories — Eastern Orthodox Christians, Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, Muslims, Buddhists, and Hindus — which together account for less than 5 percent.
Some results are expected. Easterners are likelier to be Catholics. Southerners are the most likely to be evangelicals. Westerners are the most likely to have no affiliation. Young adults are three times as likely to lack a religious affiliation as older Americans.
Even among that 10 percent who are firmly nonaffiliated, 60 percent believe in God or a higher power, and one third pray regularly. Ten percent of the unaffiliated are attending church regularly. Ten percent of the religiously unaffiliated believe that Jesus is the Son of God.
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