Initially, one faced with such statistics might deduce that we are losing "faith" as a society, but I would argue that no faith is being sacrificed. Faith, as I defined it in my first blog post, is "a belief that is not based on proof." Atheism requires such faith, as God has not been and cannot be proved or disproved. However, atheists share the nonreligious category with agnostics and those who simply have no religious ties, and this can be misleading. The percentage of atheists adults in America has actually risen by 4% the last seven years--just the amount that the nonreligious category rose within a similar time frame--and for this reason I would argue that we are not losing "faith."
We are rather losing one type of faith--religious faith. The number of self-identified "religious" people has dropped from 73% to 60% of Americans in the last seven years. And the percentage of people who seldom attend services but describe themselves as religious fell 10% in the last five years. This data suggests that adults are less religious now than their parents were, and perhaps that adults are becoming more honest about their degree of religiousness.
As common deductions from news of decreased religious faith in a country include moral decline and emotional stability, we must ask these questions: What are the implications of America's decline in religious faith? Are they measurable? To begin with, while America is home to a plethora of religions and religious convictions and each has a unique worldview, we can agree that "religion" generally implies a basic system of values that so-called "religious" people should adhere to. And because these values are typically seen as "good" and "moral" (except in the situation of fundamentalists), many would deduce that less religious faith means less morality. This view has been endorsed mainly by the religious/through religious means, from a Johnny Cash 1970's-1980's gospel song that reads "What I saw filled me with pity / poverty, crime, and misery / in this great big godless city / where they're struggling to survive" to Rick Santorum's comment that "Satan has his sights on the United States of America." However, moral decline is far from true for our country: Murder, infidelity, divorce, and teenage pregnancy, among other things, are at very low levels today, while the graduation rate is the highest of the last two decades. Is it possible that religion and society have slightly different moral compasses, or that much of society's moral compass is historically based on Christianity? Yes. But on a fundamental level, data shows that we are not an increasingly immoral society.
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| Gallup survey shows more church attendance equates to more positive emotions |
This is really interesting Tina! I'm quite religious myself too, but I never knew that there were so many different factors that were affected by religion. Starting with the fact that Atheism in a sense also requires faith. That is just really hard to wrap my head around. I guess it might also be something to do with the language (my area of expertise ;) at least what my blog is about). Perhaps, the connotations we have created for the word "faith" might also affect the way people answer questions.
ReplyDeleteDo you also think maybe its also the impact of the information/technology age that is making the country as a whole less religious? For example, we reduce the amount of time we spend outside of our cellphones and computers (so church almost seems like a waste of time) or maybe it's the fact that we are starting to do the impossible with Science so we feel as if we don't need God.
I agree with you that the connotations of "faith" are important to distinguish from one another. To most Americans, "faith" means either religiousness or religion. However, I ignored that completely in saying "one faced with such statistics might deduce that we are losing "faith" as a society, but I would argue that no faith is being sacrificed." In that sentence I refuted what faith should mean, but not clearly enough. If I had acknowledged the connotations that most Americans have with faith, then I would have said they were right that we are losing "faith."
ReplyDeleteI do think technology has an impact, among other things like being increasingly busy, stressed, etc. It's easier for people who aren't very religious or don't have strong bonds with the church to be convinced not to go because of having work to do, errands to run, a child's soccer game to go to, or wanting to catch up on sleep. When prioritizing, I feel that many moderately-religious people may not consider church to be absolutely necessary; personally, I think a large factor in this is participation in the church. There are those churches that don't offer many ways for people of all ages to become involved in the church and the community, and then there are those people that simply don't get involved.
When I went to church services at the GCC last Sunday, the minister brought up other reasons that he believes many churches will have follower crises in the future: the slowness of many churches to adapt to a changing world, their insisted authority over the personal beliefs of each individual (in times where more people are encouraged to think for themselves), and their not doing enough to attract a youth following and provide opportunities for youth to serve the church or community.