Religious Affiliation Shifts over the lifecourse (0.00 / 0)

One reason not to be too optimistic: religious affiliation shifts over the lifecourse. You're 20, you don't go to church. You're 30, you're more likely to be in a relationship with children, you're more likely to start going. There are also serious shifts in the age distribution of the population. See here: http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

This matters. More important than the question of the young is the question of the old. We will continue to become an "older" society as fewer people die of things other than old age. So social programs for retirees might be central to either party's political power.  

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by: ShamusKhan @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 07:57:14 AM CDT

Not necessarily (4.00 / 3)

The data do not show that people become more religious as they get older. Yes, older age brackets are more religious, but they grew up in a more religious country. Younger adults are less religious than their parents and grandparents, and there's no evidence to suggest that they are going to become more religious in the future.

The previous edition of the survey had a list of percentages of each religion that switched into or out of that particular group during their life. The non-religious have a very low rate of out-switching compared to other groups. In other words, once you go godless, you don't got back.

Conduct your own interview of Sarah Palin!

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by: fwiffo @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 08:26:09 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Longitudinal data (0.00 / 0)

We can't really impute much about lifecourse effects from cross-sectional data (people at different ages, all asked at questions at the same time). However, studies that look at longitudinal data (same people, following them through their lives) show significant lifecourse effects. These are often mixed. So Marriage, divorce, having children, cohabiting, etc. all influence religious participation. So does aging. Think of college for a moment. How many people in college attend religious services? Very few. But later in life the "return" to church. Now it's certainly the case that if you don't have a church to return to, you're less likely to. So I agree that there are likely to be cohort effects (different generations acting differently). But I would be very surprised if religious affiliation among the now 20-30 group did not increase significantly once they're in the 30-50 group.

As for switching out: again, this is cross-sectional, not longitudinal. So  if I'm 35 and NOW religious, I might not think that I ever "switched out," I just didn't go to church when I was in my 20s. Again, it's hard to impute this, and longitudinal data tells us something quite different than this story.

Of more interest to me is the hypothesis that the growth of evangelical Christianity has made religious expression by other Christians less desirable, leading them to leave the Church.  

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by: ShamusKhan @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 08:45:55 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Any studies? (0.00 / 0)

Do you have any examples of studies that show a tendency to become more religious as one gets older? I have not seen any, and the limited data the ARIS has on change in religious identification shows the opposite. My own personal experience sees more and more people falling out of religion as they get older, even as they have kids...

If you know of a longitudinal study that shows what you suggest, I'd be curious to see it.

Conduct your own interview of Sarah Palin!

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by: fwiffo @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 08:56:14 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

studies (0.00 / 0)

Two come to mind. But this isn't my area. One would be a working paper out of RAND (yes, that RAND): Religious Participation Over the Early Life Course: The Interaction of Age and Family Life Cycle Effects on Church Membership, by: Ross Stolzenberg, Mary Blair-Loy, Linda Waite.

The other would be "Returning to the Fold" by Wilson and Sherkat, in the journal The Scientific Study of Religion

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by: ShamusKhan @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 21:16:42 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Context is everything, though. (4.00 / 2)

Building a little more what fwiffo says, the current generation of young people are much less likely to have a church to return to.

Look at it this way: I was raised in a Christian household and though I've been a non-believer for a long, long time I still consider myself culturally a Christian simply because it's how I was brought up.  I also come from a long line of fire-and-brimstone preachers who were vociferous abolitionists back in the day, and that kind of thing is hugely important in understanding family heritage.  It's something my family is very proud of and trying to separate my ancestors' faith from their values would be doing them a tremendous disservice.

I have no kids now but definitely plan on it later.  I want my kids to know and understand Christianity the way I want them to know and understand Shakespeare; it's inseparable from Western/Anglo culture and everything else aside there are a lot of great stories in there.  But obviously, kids are free to make their own spiritual choices and I'm sure they will.

But what's missing in all this?  Worship and reverence.  My kids may or may not go to church, but most likely it's just not a place that's going to be on their radar of places to go for comfort and belonging.  People in their 30's and later who return to church do so because they went there with their parents and want their own children to experience things as they did.

But people who grow up understanding Christianity as an integral part of the American cultural fabric rather than an omnipotent god ready, willing, and eager to punish them for sin and disobedience are much less likely to see church as a place of solace and belonging.

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by: L Boom @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 09:25:48 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Another thought... (4.00 / 4)

As someone who does attend Church every Sunday, is under 40 and is very liberal/progressive, an assumption is being made here (at least it seems to be) that religious people have always been and will continue to be conservative and largely vote R.  This is certainly not the case and there is no way to know what will be emphasized in American religion in 20 or 40 years.  

A survey I would like to see is the political views of the under-40 Church goers compared to those of the over-60 crowd.  I think this would be enlightening and show the young Christians are not nearly as conservative as the older generation.  My guess is that whatever the under-40 crowd believes is what will be emphasized in 20-40 years.  If white southern Baptists are a dying breed as the latest report suggests, then (thankfully) we should see an end to the culture issues be pushed.  

An anecdote to support fwiffo's position: My parents went to Church (Catholic) their whole lives until my sister and I were adults and moved out of the house.  My sister and I both changed to Methodist and both still go regularly (with our children and spouses).  My parents stopped going and haven't gone in many years.  My Father is now an avowed atheist.  

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by: HalLew @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 09:46:51 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Beware -- (0.00 / 0)

there is a religion gene (and it's probably carried on the X chromosome). I say this because my sons are cheerful atheists, like their father, but my daughter writes valentines to God. Little construction paper hearts, littered all over the floor, with "I love you God" written inside. We did not teach her this.

I also have a friend who, as a child, used to sneak off to the Catholic bookstore behind her parents' backs (they were Presbyterian), and do the rosary under the covers at night.

Don't be surprised if your ancestors' passionate religious natures decide to manifest themselves in your own offspring. At least you will be on hand to shape those natures into something more fire and less brimstone?

Montani semper liberi

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by: Sadie Baker @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 10:15:28 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

No, there isn't (0.00 / 0)

There may be a genetic tendency toward increased/decreased religiosity, but it's not that strong, and there's almost certainly not a "religion gene". If there was, there wouldn't be such shifts in religious identity over time, and you'd see much stronger correlations between religion and ethnicity and less strong correlations with things like geography, income and education level.

And while the non-religious skew male in the US, the correlation isn't strong enough to imply a sex-linked religion gene (cultural effects are more likely).

Conduct your own interview of Sarah Palin!

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by: fwiffo @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 11:08:25 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

I was speaking metaphorically. (0.00 / 0)

Montani semper liberi

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by: Sadie Baker @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 11:23:51 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Not just metaphorically (4.00 / 1)

but humorously, as well.

That image of a little girl hiding under the bedcovers to pray the rosary and sneaking into catholic bookstores is gonna be making me chuckle for the rest of the day.

"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."

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by: SpitBall @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 11:34:31 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Haha, nah (4.00 / 1)

I'm really not anti-religion and that probably came across as a lot more humorless than was intended.

Basically, I look at religion, drugs, and alcohol all in the same lens, as I kind of hinted at.  Healthy in moderation, but dangerous taken to extremes.

That, and the most important rule my father gave me in high school ("Do what you want.  But if the cops call, I've never heard of you.") have served as pretty good rules of thumb so far.

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by: L Boom @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 14:37:15 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Thanks for extracting the headline more competently than the MSM (0.00 / 0)

It also jumped out at me that the 10% drop in Christian identification (entirely within the "non-Catholic" population: yet my local media is fixated on a regional decline in Catholicism, which is holding steady!), and the correlated increase in non-religious answers, was virtually ENTIRELY confined to the 1990-2001 interval, with virtually NO additional movement in the 2001-2008 interval.

And yet every headline is crying that there's a newly-shown decrease in religiosity.  The real news, as you say, is that the decline observed 1990-2001 basically ceased.

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by: tdub @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 14:08:23 PM CDT

It's the intensity that matters (0.00 / 0)

I haven't seen recent data on religious affiliation in Britain. I'm certain that the number of people who identify as Christian is over 50%, it's quite possibly above 70%.

Nevertheless, Britain has a fundamentally different attitude towards religion than does America. We don't have strong fundamentalist churches outside a few scattered areas (Ulster, some bits of Scotland, the black community and a few inner-city Catholic parishes). We certainly have very little religious influence on voting - the Church of England was once described as 'the Conservative Party at prayer' but nowadays it has as many members (including its archbishops) who are liberal humanitarians with views much like their atheist and agnostic brethren.

One of our party leaders is an atheist. Another likes to talk about his religious beliefs but finds little attention is paid to them. Blair's strong religious convictions were just one of the reasons he'd begun to be regarded as 'too American' by around 2003 or 2004.

All that said, Christianity doesn't necessarily have to be correlated with right-wing views. The Welsh valleys and Scottish cities are some of Labour's strongest areas, yet both have strong religious traditions, whilst England is largely secular (or at least non-observant) but is nevertheless a basically Conservative region.

American fundamentalist Christianity is certainly a conservative force. Other strands of Christianity may in fact be more conducive to left-wing views than agnosticism or atheism.

Forgotten Countries - a foreign policy-focused blog

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by: Englishlefty @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 16:08:14 PM CDT