Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
Source: Axios
Why it matters: It's the first time in the eight decades that Gallup has tracked the trend that a majority of Americans do not belong to a church.
The trend has dovetailed with an increasing number of people who say they are not religiously affiliated.
Membership at places of worship was 73% when Gallup first measured it in 1937. It stayed near that range for six decades before starting to dip in the 21st century.
Read more: https://www.axios.com/church-membership-gallup-26cc020b-5405-417a-a786-e10c286a30db.html
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sinkingfeeling
(57,782 posts)
joshdawg
(2,961 posts)
NurseJackie
(42,862 posts)
DownriverDem
(7,011 posts)say they believe in God, but are unaffiliated with a religion. Or they are religious, but not in an organized way. Look at the rightie religions. They are a big turn off. There is a Christian Left that is very unlike repub Christians.
LiberalLovinLug
(14,677 posts)Why doesn't the MSM news ever interview those Christians?
https://www.redletterchristians.org/
Like the Red Letter Christians....ie.. they want to focus on the red letters in the bible. The ones that Jesus actually said. Makes sense since they use one of his names in the name of their religion.
Things like "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you", and "turn the other cheek" and "love your enemies", and "love one another". As well supporting distributing food to those that need it, loaves and fishes for all. Helping the poor. Not stigmatizing sex trade workers, as Jesus did with the harlot at the well. Chasing the money changers out of the temple. I always think of the mega church pastors living luxury lives.
Making the bold statement that it is easier for a camel to get through the eye of a needle than a rich man getting into heaven. And with the caveat that a good first start would be to sell all they own and give it to the poor. Many stories in the New Testament that reflect left wing values. In fact, its a sham that the right managed to corner that market, simply on a few hot button issues that Republicans milk hard. When the general just of Jesus's teachings reflecting compassion, empathy, help for the poor, all people are equal etc...reflect the left's platform.
Beartracks
(14,568 posts)
samsingh
(18,416 posts)
Escurumbele
(4,083 posts)
Roland99
(53,345 posts)Mary in S. Carolina
(1,364 posts)
Diamond_Dog
(40,494 posts)Hard core “traditional” religions seem to be increasingly out of touch with modern life.
HUAJIAO
(2,730 posts)ThatJustHappened
(78 posts)... delusion is relative, and there are many varying degrees
humans are still an extremely primitive species ... the best and brightest are still only a few thousand years out of loincloth, a few hundred years out of illiteracy, and a few decades out of witch burning and slave lynching ... and that's only among those who are not still practicing any of the above or any of the following
-- god delusion
-- devil delusion
-- angels delusion
-- daemons delusion
-- ghosts delusion
-- spirits delusion
-- fairies delusion
-- elves delusion
-- gobblins delusion
-- leprechauns delusion
-- afterlife delusion
-- reincarnation delusion
Maraya1969
(23,494 posts)when I think of church I think of the one I grew up in and the one I went to in college - and that is a big fat NO now. But we are called a lay church and we have ministers. Then again we are very small too.
I think they call it a church because there are no monks or nuns. Otherwise it would be a Temple I believe.
maxsolomon
(38,656 posts)You attend regular events in an organized religion.
nycbos
(6,711 posts)The non-religious number is actually much higher if you include the people who say they are "affiliated with a religious institution" but rarely attend. I.E the Christians who only go to church on Christmas Eve and Easter, and the Jews who only go to synagogue on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
Sibelius Fan
(24,801 posts)most people face in their lives.
People need REAL solutions, not the racist BS dreamed up by ignorant goatherds centuries ago.
Ligyron
(8,006 posts)joshdawg
(2,961 posts)pandr32
(14,239 posts)
Baitball Blogger
(52,296 posts)I read the headline, "U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time."
His response, "Of course. They were all out assaulting the Capitol."
get the red out
(14,031 posts)Love his response!
calimary
(89,912 posts)
twodogsbarking
(18,673 posts)Really.
Baitball Blogger
(52,296 posts)
lagomorph777
(30,613 posts)SO true.
LiberalFighter
(53,544 posts)BobTheSubgenius
(12,212 posts)Spontaneous quips are often the best humour.
Lovie777
(22,897 posts)have forgotten about "love thy neighbor".
apnu
(8,790 posts)They only remember his name. They are the primary reason why I reject religion wholly. But other religions don't help. The only religion I see in any positive light is Buddhism.
HUAJIAO
(2,730 posts)I understand exactly what he means... and agree..
Binkie The Clown
(7,911 posts)
BarbD
(1,418 posts)And, I met a lot of disgruntled Christians along the way.
mountain grammy
(29,005 posts)a good trend indeed!
Roc2020
(1,780 posts)is not even in the top 5 reasons how to worship God.
Voltaire2
(15,377 posts)Roc2020
(1,780 posts)faith to be an Atheist. Sorry
niyad
(132,179 posts)LiberalLovinLug
(14,677 posts)I was thinking when churches were first ordered not to have parishioners in many parts of the country, that it would have unintended detrimental effects on attendance when it opens up again. That a lot would be put into a position to see the forest for the trees. That it would break that dependency. Break the weekly endorsement of their beliefs, not being able to mingle and echo each others dogma.
At the very least the ones who were already on the verge of leaving the religion, will use the forced break from the fellowship with like-minded, to make a clean break from the building.
Ligyron
(8,006 posts)Why give an irrelevant, and increasingly political minority such privilege? The IRS needs to remove their tax exempt status when they start telling their sheep how to vote..
LiberalFighter
(53,544 posts)If there is a charity they participate in connected with the church then that should be allowed. But the charity should be kept separate from church operations.
Wounded Bear
(64,280 posts)flying_wahini
(8,274 posts)Jon King
(1,910 posts)Mom made us go to church each Sunday, sing in the choir, be acolytes to light the candles, etc. Once day it all hit me.
The passing of the offering plate, then hearing that the pastor had just returned from a trip to a warm place with a handful of connected church people. After church walking to the car I heard several of the people just in the church singing hymns talking nasty about others, then they all raced to the one exit from the parking lot, trying to get out of there as fast as possible, cutting each other off, beeping, a few fingers.
That day as a young boy I realized it was all a bunch of phony BS. Good people are good people, no matter what they believe or don't believe as far as religion goes. Same for bad people.
lagomorph777
(30,613 posts)I figured out the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, and God.
Doc Sportello
(7,964 posts)I just saw through it for about as long as I can remember. One, when I was about 12, a preacher was going door-to-door and I was home alone. He spent about a half hour haranguing me (despicable I realized when I was older) but I never gave in to his plea to come to his church. In college, reading Weber, I got the reasons why religion developed the way it did, and it had nothing to do with goodness. It's just, as you write, BS.
Orrex
(67,079 posts)And at no time in my memory did organized religion not seem self-evidently ridiculous to me.
Organized religion has one purpose and one goal only: to amass and maintain financial/political power.
Literally everything that organized religion does is in service of that goal.
I don't understand how anyone can fail to see this obvious and endlessly demonstrated fact.
johnthewoodworker
(694 posts)
NewHendoLib
(61,837 posts)lagomorph777
(30,613 posts)The massive increase in religious corruption is slowly becoming obvious to the general public.
TurboDem
(360 posts)brewens
(15,359 posts)grateful I wasn't indoctrinated as a little kid before I learned to think for myself. That's why they are so desperate to get forced prayer into schools.
Their superstition was made up by people that didn't even know to wash their hands after they took a shit. Now there are good lessons in their books, but even those were nothing new 2000 or so years ago. All of it was a system of controlling people already around for a few more thousand years. It was just a new package.
LiberalFighter
(53,544 posts)apnu
(8,790 posts)Because they associate "church" with some big building dedicated to worship of a major branch of Christianity, be it Protestant or Catholic.
But they go to a church what's in some basement or storefront or living room of some preacher and not organized in any way like, for example, the Methodists.
I don't think these small renegade "churches" would count as "places of worship" in a measurable way.
Auggie
(33,124 posts)
keithbvadu2
(40,915 posts)CBR - Cash Based Religion is now a major part of organized religion.
Faith is secondary as a useful tool..
IronLionZion
(51,205 posts)considering how many people vote according to what their church tells them
CanonRay
(16,160 posts)I never belonged to a church since I was 7 years old, then joined UU in 2013. My first real church (or Fellowship or whatever you want to call it lol)
MyMission
(2,010 posts)And officially joined an independent Jewish congregation last August, during the pandemic!
I'd been attending their services for several years and love the people in that community, but I'm not a joiner. They went on zoom last March and I've been attending weekly services all year. I decided to join to show my commitment to the community and congregation, aware that membership numbers were dropping across the US.
Back in 2016, after the election, I decided to start attending services again and to stop working on Saturday so I could be more observant. That was my reaction to 45 and his racist agenda. The local synagogue my parents belonged to was theirs, didn't feel right for me even though I know most of the people. The one I joined is about 35-40 minutes away and feels like home. They have a very active social action committee.
Raised Catholic and joined a UU Congregation in 2010. It's interesting to be a confirmed agnostic and check off "yes" to a question about church membership!
KG
(28,795 posts)
Lonestarblue
(13,460 posts)The report says that 7 in 10 of us affiliate with an organized religion, even though fewer have actual church memberships. I do not believe we should be called a religious nation. We are a democracy, with a set of secular laws that govern how we operate as a country. Religion should have no role in government policy, especially when it claims that laws should be based on a particular religion, as white evangelicals do.
The decline in church membership is not surprising. Fewer people want to hear white evangelical pastors preaching white supremacy and racism, hatred for LGBTQ, demonization of women for having sex before marriage and for having abortions, hatred for immigrants (unless they’re white), or insisting that conservatives need to wage a civil war to get rid of all the liberal policies they don’t like.
The white evangelical support for Donald Trump was a mystery to most everyone, but they saw an opportunity to push their agenda for religious nationalism and their favorite victimization trope of their loss of religious freedom (i.e., the freedom to persecute immigrants, discriminate against women and people of color as well as all LGBTQ, pass laws criminalizing the behavior of LGBTQ and women who have abortions, etc.).
While the religious right complains that they are persecuted and blames liberals and Democrats for the decline in religious participation, they should first look in the mirror at their own behavior. It is their blatant hypocrisy in saying they believe in Christian principles but behaving in a manner that is hateful—and un-Christ like—toward women and minorities. The evangelical right traded their right to respect for political power when they chose to worship Donald Trump for what he could give them instead of following the Christian values they claim to hold but fail to demonstrate.
LittleGirl
(8,999 posts)This is no surprise. As you educate your citizens, the sense of believing in some invisible sky fairy lowers. Worked for me.
And growing up sort of Catholic, the priests abuse cases pilling up year over year recently convinced me to stop too. Shame!
Tax the Churches
Beastly Boy
(13,283 posts)Is this equally the case with Evangelicals, Catholics, Jews, Muslims, etc.?
My gut reaction would be to assume higher decline among Evangelicals. During Trump's reign, both their leaders and the most vocal rank and file have totally discredited themselves iby disregarding the basic principles of their faith in favor of a certain political agenda.
Grammy23
(6,121 posts)For sure in the south it was that way. “Where do you go to church” was a common question if you moved to a new community or met someone new. With a very mobile society (until Covid!) we are more mixed with folks from various places. As time as gone on, it has become less common to have a “church home”. People are more apt to spend a Sunday out doing family activities, or fishing or golfing, picnicing, mowing the lawn...etc.
It is nice to meet someone new and not have them assume you are religious or “belong” to a certain well known Big Box Church.
Things are changing in the US. Maybe it reflects more education. More willingness to put aside things that don’t matter any more or are not important in your life. They need to ask more questions when they survey /and maybe they do but don’t report in their short synopsis of the results. There are reasons for the change and churches would love to know how to entice people back. If it can be done ...... they’ve tried adding Family Life Centers, modern music and ENTERTAINMENT. I don’t know what they need but the hypocrisy of preaching one thing but doing another ain’t cutting it any more.
moreland01
(869 posts)Ammon Bundy has amassed an army of over 50,000 as he looks for his next battle in a religious war.
https://www.rawstory.com/ammon-bundy/
Like their white majority, Bundy and his ilk feel their religious dominance slipping away.
Javaman
(65,676 posts)covid is a hoax or that god will cure them?
reap what you sow and all that.
Maine Abu El Banat
(3,537 posts)
Joe Nation
(1,112 posts)Maybe if God wasn't such a misogynist?
maxsolomon
(38,656 posts)I think people are still answering this question untruthfully.
if I go to the Cathedral once a year for Easter or Xmas Services, I wouldn't say I "belong" to that church, or the RCC.
Voltaire2
(15,377 posts)and the responses are declining as indicated.
yellowwoodII
(616 posts)Many people continue to stay in a church because of family or societal pressure.
I remember when I actually withdrew my membership. Such a sense of freeing.
Never looked back.
RKP5637
(67,112 posts)OnlinePoker
(6,126 posts)All the polls I see say no religious affiliation, but in that, they include atheists, agnostics and people who believe Sky Daddy exists but don't follow any specific dogma.
Voltaire2
(15,377 posts)
Mysterian
(6,443 posts)as people abandon Bronze Age fairy tales.
modrepub
(4,092 posts)The whole crux of most organized religions is if you don't follow the rules the primary Deity will immediately strike you down as punishment. This should be an example that the sky did not fall when the majority of folks walk away or no longer believe.
Personally, I still hope there is some form of heaven. I'm pretty much convinced that if their is a higher power/being/God it doesn't seem to care much whether folks do right or wrong.
Major Nikon
(36,925 posts)
catbyte
(39,116 posts)
peppertree
(23,312 posts)It's probably no more than one third now.
DanieRains
(4,619 posts)And far too many churches are the GOTV machine for the Nazi / Klan Republicans.
Sorry, not interested.
NQAS
(10,749 posts)But this is not 1937.
The population a few years later (1940) was 132,164,569. So, at most, 96 million were churchgoers; take out children, and that number drops.
And religious observance at the time was, I think, fairly conventional, with "mass" religion events consisting of traveling tent revivals.
Also, while certain (so-called) religious leaders made their vile voices rise above the rest - the one that comes to mind is Charles Coughlin - those numbers were relatively small and the means of communication relatively limited.
The population today is 331,002,651. That translate to - again, at most -165,501,325; take out the children for more accurate numbers. (That data is out there, but I'm too lazy to search for it.)
Plus, communication and political influence are much changed from 1940.
All of that said, I think it's an interesting drop in percentages, and one would hope that that figure will be used to make some very valid points about the overly significant role that religion plays in our politics.
One more, maybe related, point. A few years ago I read that pure-bred (that's a joke) whites will become a minority around 2040. I think that's great, and 2040 is not all that far away.
Maxheader
(4,419 posts)Figured the thread to be about how corona has knocked down
church attendance. Which would be good since gatherings like
that used to be wrong..For a while the local newspaper had
a separate column for infections from church gatherings...
moose65
(3,453 posts)Or as Chevy Chase said in Christmas Vacation: "Hallelujah! Holy Shit!!"
CTyankee
(68,154 posts)Thank you, god!
oasis
(53,633 posts)Response to brooklynite (Original post)
ExTex This message was self-deleted by its author.
Dan
(5,151 posts)The pillow man says that Trump will be resurrected to the Presidency come August, so not sure if Trump is the Christ or he is Lazarus.
Buckeye_Democrat
(15,526 posts)Unless more people in this country accept Odin as their supreme god, we're no longer going to be a favored nation and he will punish all of us! Even believers like me!
We've already seen him use Thor to punish us with hurricanes and tornadoes!
That's why I must always convert others to the true way! We're all doomed otherwise! And I'm the victim!
(Sound familiar? Except for different religious beliefs espoused by Pat Robertson and the like?)