The decline continues

[Wertbag]

The Pew Research centre updated their graphs of religious affiliation: https://www.pewforum.org/2021/12/14/about-three-in-ten-u-s-adults-are-now-religiously-unaffiliated/

 

In brief, the reduction in religious belief continues, with a 15% decrease in people claiming to be Christian since 2007. If the trend continues at the same pace then Christians would drop under 50% of the US population around 2035.

 

It is said the older generation are more religious, so that should guarantee that it continues at pace for quite some time. You also have less people promoting it, less churches, less funding and less political power, all of which should help it continue. There is a point where the trend will slow, but hopefully that's around 25-30%

[TABA]

The devout will always be with us but yes, I think a lot of people who are lukewarm believers or functionally agnostic will be more inclined to leave Christianity completely as non-belief and atheism become more socially acceptable.  
 

I’d be more inclined to celebrate this if I thought people were becoming more rational, but I fear large segments of any population will believe nonsense, whether religious, political, economic or social, at any given time.  Now if only everybody leaving religion did so as thoughtfully and as clear-headedly as my brethren in this community, I’d feel a lot better!

[alreadyGone]

sign of the End Times (tm) ?

[Joshpantera]

1 hour ago, TABA said:

The devout will always be with us but yes, I think a lot of people who are lukewarm believers or functionally agnostic will be more inclined to leave Christianity completely as non-belief and atheism become more socially acceptable.  
 

I’d be more inclined to celebrate this if I thought people were becoming more rational, but I fear large segments of any population will believe nonsense, whether religious, political, economic or social, at any given time.  Now if only everybody leaving religion did so as thoughtfully and as clear-headedly as my brethren in this community, I’d feel a lot better!

 

Yeah, there's no big indication of rational thinking on the fast rise. People will still be into nonsense, just not so much of the religious and christian non-sense. But I'll take it! And count that as some type of advancement. 

[Wertbag]

What I'd hope is if people aren't being fed supernatural nonsense from birth, that they will become more sceptical by default. If you aren't being told the supernatural is real, that miracles occur and prayer can work then you have less basis to believe other such claims. 

Hopefully you get more people understanding science, because they are not jumping on board young earth creation, intelligent design and the wrong claims from the bible. 

Can't guarantee that they won't jump on board other pseudo-science claims, but at least heading in the right direction. 

[♦ Fuego ♦]

Fewer numbers, but perhaps more dogmatic or at least more of a silo mentality. I watch a lot of YouTube prepper channels and such, and I keep running into the Jesus/'Murica/Guns people who are just itching to kill for Jesus or to "restore" America. Then there are the odd apocalyptic ones. One does allegedly Sci-Fi vids, but they are only ever dystopian, anti-vax (mark of the beast), and 99% of the comments are clearly religious, leading me to think the guy is known in those circles. All of the believers I know now (except 2 Pentecostals, and several of the social high-church kind) are very dogmatic. 

 

[freshstart]

https://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/sources-of-guidance-on-right-and-wrong/
Here is the real meat in this survey.  People may claim to have a religious affiliation, but what really matters is whether they determine right from wrong based on religious beliefs (or not).

 

It seems Hindus rely on science more than any other category of people, including the "religiously unaffiliated!"

 

[◊ Weezer ◊]

The virus has really brought a decline in the money in collection plates.