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Americans switching brands of faith Robin Russell, Mar 10, 2008
UMNS FILE PHOTO BY JOHN C. GOODWIN
Delegates to the 2004 General Conference in Pittsburgh join hands during worship. A new survey of American religious practice shows United Methodists are fairly homogenous and mostly older adults.
By Robin Russell Managing Editor
Nearly half of American adults no longer practice the faith they grew up with, a new survey shows. They’ve either switched allegiance or no longer identify with any religious affiliation at all.
Among Protestants, about six in 10 Baptists and Lutherans stay with the church they were raised in, compared with less than half of the Methodists, Presbyterians or Episcopalians. The Roman Catholic Church has lost more members than any faith tradition.
The fastest-growing group is the unaffiliated at 16.1 percent, more than twice the number who were raised that way. Nondenominational Protestants have also gained: Their share of the population has more than tripled.
The study released Feb. 25 by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life is unusual for it its massive sampling. Researchers interviewed more than 35,000 adults and report a diverse and ever-changing U.S. religious population.
The U.S. Religious Landscape Survey shows most Americans—nearly 80 percent—are Christian. But it appears Protestants will soon be in the minority. Of the 51 percent who are now Protestant, about 26 percent are evangelical Christians and 18 percent are mainline.
More than one-quarter of American adults have left the faith of their childhood for another religion or no religion at all, the survey found. If you add in switching denominations, the number rises to 44 percent.
Among Methodists, even more people made a change from their childhood faith tradition: of the 53 percent of former Methodists, 19 percent joined evangelical churches, 11 percent went to other mainline Protestant churches and 3 percent switched to historically black churches that are not Methodist. Another 12 percent say they no longer belong to any faith group; 8 percent ended up in a non-Protestant religion.
The study confirms what church-growth experts are saying, that mainline Protestant churches are in decline and that non-denominational churches are gaining. Yet American denomination-hopping means that each religious group is gaining and losing members at the same time.
“The American religious economy is like a marketplace—very dynamic, very competitive,” said Luis Lugo, director of the Pew Forum. “Everyone is losing, everyone is gaining. There are net winners and losers, but no one can stand still. Those groups that are losing significant numbers have to recoup them to stay vibrant.”
Methodists, for instance, lost some members who changed their church affiliation (4.4 percent), but also gained some people who became Methodist after being raised in another denomination (2.4 percent). Still, the overall net loss was 2 percent.
About 5.4 percent of respondents said they were mainline Methodists.
The survey, which breaks down the numbers by age distribution, hints at the future of religious affiliation in the U.S., where most of the general population is under 50.
More than six in 10 Americans age 70 and older are Protestant, compared with only about four in 10 for those ages 18-29. Meanwhile, nearly a fourth of young adults claim no affiliation with a religious institution, compared with just 8 percent of seniors age 70 and older.
United Methodists skew older in nearly every category. Only 11 percent of United Methodists are ages 18-29. Seventy-two percent do not have children under 18 living at home.
The survey also measures the impact of immigration. Among foreign-born adults, Catholics outnumber Protestants by nearly a two-to-one margin; among native-born Americans, Protestants outnumber Catholics by an even larger margin (55 to 21 percent).
Researchers only counted adults, so churches that include children as members may have numbers that don’t match the survey. Other survey highlights:
* Men are significantly more likely than women to claim no religious affiliation (nearly one in five men compared with about 13 percent of women).
* Mainline Protestants are among the most homogenous of religious groups, with 91 percent being white Americans. Among United Methodists, 93 percent are white, 2 percent black, 2 percent Latino and 1 percent Asian, with the rest being of other or mixed racial backgrounds.
* More than half of those raised without a religious affiliation ended up joining some tradition as an adult.
* More than a third of married couples say their spouses belong to a different religious tradition, including Protestants who are married to another Protestant from a different denomination, such as a Baptist married to a Methodist.
* The Midwest most closely resembles the religious makeup of the overall population. The South has the heaviest concentration of evangelical Protestants, the Northeast—Catholics, and the West—unaffiliated people, including the largest proportion of atheists and agnostics.
* Among the unaffiliated, nearly a third are under age 30; nearly three-fourths are under age 50.
“In the past, certain religions had a real holding power, where people from one generation to the next would stay,” said Penn State University sociologist Roger Finke, who consulted in the survey planning. “Right now, there is a dropping confidence in organized religion, especially in the traditional religious forms.”
“It does seem in keeping with the high tolerance among Americans for change,” Dr. Lugo said. “People move a lot, people change jobs a lot. It’s a very fluid society.”
The majority of the unaffiliated—12 percent of the overall population—describe their religion as “nothing in particular,” and about half of those say faith is at least somewhat important to them. Atheists or agnostics account for 4 percent of the total population.
Many Americans have vague denominational ties at best. People who call themselves “just a Protestant,” in fact, account for nearly 10 percent of all Protestants.
rrussell@umr.org A snapshot of the UMC United Methodist News Service
The Pew Forum’s newly released U.S. Religious Landscape Survey confirms the United Methodist Church’s previous data, says Scott Brewer, director of research for the United Methodist General Council on Finance and Administration, which collects statistics for the denomination.
But as a United Methodist, he is troubled by many of its findings.
“For whatever reason, a sizable population raised in the Methodist tradition is no longer Methodist. Maybe we haven’t done a good job of showing what is unique and special and important about being a United Methodist.”
The Rev. Lovett Weems, a researcher and professor of church leadership at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, puts it even stronger: The study should be a wake-up call for United Methodists.
“There is no future for the United Methodist Church in the United States unless we can reach more people, younger people and more diverse people,” Dr. Weems said.
When people are selecting a church today, he added, they don’t necessarily look at traditions and denominations. “The pattern today is belonging before believing. People have to feel like they belong first.
“A lot of people say denominations and traditions don’t matter any more, but I don’t think that’s the case. I think it’s just no longer the deciding point and often not the beginning point when people select a church,” he said.
Here’s a snapshot of United Methodism from the survey:
Marital status Married, 62 percent Widowed, 12 percent Never married, 12 percent Divorced or separated, 11 percent Living with partner, 4 percent
Number of children (under 18 living at home) No children, 72 percent Two children, 12 percent One child, 11 percent Three children, 4 percent Four or more children, 1 percent
Education High school graduate, 34 percent Some college, 23 percent College graduate, 21 percent Post-graduate, 14 percent Less than high school, 8 percent
Income Less than $30,000, 23 percent $100,000+, 22 percent $30,000-49,999, 21 percent $50,000-74,999, 19 percent $75,000-99,999, 16 percent
UMNS FILE PHOTO BY JOHN C. GOODWIN
