Is Christianity really in numerical decline in America?

Oct 26, 2019 by

By Michael Brown, Christian Post:

Do recent polls really tell the full story here in America? Is it true that Christianity is experiencing a serious, ongoing, numerical decline? Those polls could well be accurate, speaking of a major spiritual crisis in our nation. But there may be a different way to understand what is happening, one that points to separation and refining more than to backsliding and apostasy.

First, let’s look at the results of the most recent Pew Research Center poll.

As reported on October 19, “The religious landscape of the United States continues to change at a rapid clip. In Pew Research Center telephone surveys conducted in 2018 and 2019, 65% of American adults describe themselves as Christians when asked about their religion, down 12 percentage points over the past decade. Meanwhile, the religiously unaffiliated share of the population, consisting of people who describe their religious identity as atheist, agnostic or ‘nothing in particular,’ now stands at 26%, up from 17% in 2009.”

[…] Most significantly, “More than eight-in-ten members of the Silent Generation (those born between 1928 and 1945) describe themselves as Christians (84%), as do three-quarters of Baby Boomers (76%). In stark contrast, only half of Millennials (49%) describe themselves as Christians; four-in-ten are religious ‘nones,’ and one-in-ten Millennials identify with non-Christian faiths.”

What are we to make of this? And do these figures truly indicate that Christianity is in numerical decline in America?

Read here

Related Posts

Tags

Share This