but that churches just aren't that relevant any more.

It's not just religion that churches preached, and I'm not sure all that many people believe what they were told anyway, but churches were historically centers of the community, places where immigrant groups could find a welcome, a major social interaction every Sunday, providers of assistance...

They just don't fulfill those functions any more for so many of us-- we have more convenient alternatives for all of that now. Almost every church I've been in lately has completely greyed out, with few, if any, under 40 there and fewer, if any, kids in the nursery or Sunday School.

I do know a lot of people who admit they are, like me, wandering around looking for some spiritual path to follow, but few of today's churches have anything new, or all that interesting, to offer.

I'm talking about typically American Protestant churches here, and don't have much knowledge of others. However, my limited observation of Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, and even Roman Catholicism leads me to think they're heading down the same road with younger members just not keeping the traditions.

We all may keep some vestige of the beliefs instilled through childhood, but there just isn't any communal way to express what is left of them as we grow older in a world that has discovered a universe with exploding galaxies at unimaginable distances and that just can't all be the hand of some anthropomorphic god who lives right around the corner.

I may believe in some sort of God, but I no longer have any idea who or what that God may be, and organized religion has been of little help.

but not necessarily their religion or spirituality, like yourself.

The growth of U/U congregations has also been documented and young people are looking for new kinds of spiritual/religious communities.

Part of what is happening is truly interfaith, including non-faith. I have read a number of articles about these kinds of organizations on college campuses. They are focused on building coalitions to achieve shared goals. That's very good news, imo.

Welcome to the new Interfaith group, Treasonous Bastard. I look forward to getting to know you better.

it happened in our evolution, but we seem to be the only creatures that look at a tree, the Moon, a rock or anything else and ask how and why.

We of all creatures seem to have the "wonder" gene and we wonder about everything, searching for answers to feed that wonder.

Science is now answering so many of those questions that the "god of the gaps" discussion has been going on for a while-- religion simply fills in the holes we haven't filled with science. It always did, to a great extent but we just didn't have the tools to understand celestial mechanics, chemistry...

Eventually, religion might evolve into something more spiritual and become a non-clinical healing process, social mechanism, or whatever. At times it has, but too often devolved into the whacky like the spiritualist movement, Scientology, cults, and other unsavory things.

Expanding UUs, Quakers, Ethical Culturalists (I think they're OK) and other groups may be the answer and bring the more traditional into the fold.

and the successful ones do function as community centers, as you said.

We were looking for a church that had a good music program for children for our five-year old daughter. We found one; the church we have been married in. We left that church in 2005 after an internal war almost killed the place. Under new management, with a gifted choir master and new rector, the place is now booming, with multiple childrens choirs and about 100 kids involved in them. There is also an excellent adult choir, and the great Episcopal music tradition.

Families with young children drive church growth, and create community, as young parents volunteer for many things.

We are still part-time at our old church, where the relatively new rector, there for 6 years, has killed a thriving church with his bone-headed mistakes and lack of leadership. Now it has turned into a grey-haired church with about a 40% loss of parishioners.

much of it is parents looking for help and guidance in giving their kids safe socialization and some direction in life.

The fundie churches have latched on to this as a marketing tool, and the more traditional churches should understand how it works. It's not just Sunday School, but a wide range of activities for the kids. Scouts, for instance, have gotten a deservedly bad rap lately for some of the stuff they're pulling, but I remember as a kid the scouts were a huge part of our young lives.

Still others resent the government getting involved in the process, as happens in Germany.

In Germany, you have to declare your religious affiliation (which can be "none" if you like) to the government, and the government deducts your "tithe" and hands it right to the religious institution! They aren't the only country that has this scheme, but they're the one I've heard the most about (I have a German friend who told me all about it!): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_tax#Germany

Makes it harder to cheat on one's taxes!!

Speaking of intermediaries, that's the basis of Islam--that there is no need for an intermediary. Some say that Islam is straying from the principal focus of the faith because in some areas, the emphasis has shifted from personal supplications to a deity five times a day, to an emphasis on "leaders" who tell the flock what Allah ostensibly wants, and grand buildings.

and I'm paraphrasing here, a lot of organized religions appears to be someone saying 'hey, I can hook you up with god, just give me money.' God doesn't need money, lol.

Seems that would drive many more people into the "none" category, doesn't it?

I think the growth in this country has more to do with religious institutions being so slow to change. I think many people still want the community, but they need more flexibility and don't think the church really speaks to them.

I found it rather odd, and like you, I was shocked when my German friend told me about it. It was news to him, too--he left Germany as a very young man right after The War and has only been back to visit.

I can't even begin to imagine the hue and cry if we ever had something like that in USA! `

They also have very different burial practices--to include re-using graves! They were having trouble doing this because the bodies were not decomposing as they should a while back:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/germany-s-tired-graveyards-a-rotten-way-to-go-a-527134.html

I agree about the concepts of flexibility and relevance, too--people are busy, and they don't have the time, never mind the patience to listen for an hour to get a lesson. As for the aspect of "community," a lot of people find their needs for that met on Facebook and social media sites like that. And people's days are so packed, with everyone having to work and no spare time to be found--sleeping in gets very attractive for some. I also think this is why the "self-help" industry has become so popular--some feel they can buy a book and do it themselves, on their own time! People do like a personalized experience, and if they can't relate, they'll stop attending. Of course, in countries where they take the money up front you'd probably want to be pretty sure you're committed to the experience....also, if people are broke, or need the money for necessities, I can see where that "bill" might become optional in their minds.

The self-help industry thrives, though I think it helps very few. When I look at the books, what I see is "I found my answer and it will work for you too!!", which it really does.

Although online communities are often substitutes for IRL communities, particulalry for people like me that are transient and like to stay home a lot, I have to admit that I miss the community I grew up in. The church provided me with a great deal as a child - friends, activities, safe spaces to explore who I was and a place to learn from others.

I explored a U/U church for awhile, but found it lacking in some way.

At any rate, it will be interesting to track what these "nones" do over time. I think new kinds of churches will develop and mainline churches will change. I also would predict continued growth in interfaith organizations, which include believers of all types and non-believers, much as we are seeing on many college campuses.

I have a cousin who belongs to a UU church, and really enjoys it.

The people who go to the church with her (met a bunch of them at a funeral-wake...sad occasion but a good party, too, if that makes any sense) were very neat--all ages, all walks of life, all sorts of differing experiences, looked like the UN-- and they seem to really dig on the diverse nature of the interactions.

Never a dull moment!

The more heterogenous a group, the more I like it, as long as people are treating each other with respect and civility.

it's a tax on church members, not the general population.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_tax

Aside from that, though, are historic subsidies for "official" churches, like the Church of England, that aren't a special tax, but do come from general tax revenues.

Kinda goes along with their idea of including the tip in the restaurant bill, VAT... and other ways to "hide" stuff you might not want to pay if given a choice.

The reusing burial plots thing comes from the Dark Ages when good farmland was expensive and the churches owned some of the best. Graveyards were kept small and when you were suitably decomposed, your bones were dug up and sent to the "boneyard" for eternal storage. Things like disease and constant warring kept the corpse supply growing far faster than the burial plot supply.

BTW, when I lived in Germany in the late 60's there were "downtown" cemeteries that had been there for ages. They became very pleasant parks where we would to hang out for lunch.

and deliver it to the church--they get between the parishioner and the church, so they know how much (at a minimum, anyway) the person has given.

I am a fan of cremation, myself--dust to dust!

I do think a lot of people stick with a less than optimal religious setting for precisely the reason you state--"community." No man (or woman) is an island, and all that...~!

the Roman church insisting it was the only way to salvation and its intervention was necessary. Of course, eventually many protestant churches became even more convinced that it's my way or the highway to hell. That's a human thing insisting you have the best, or only valid, idea, not a religious thing, and it gets in the way of a lot of things we do. Religion, having no scientific way of proving or disproving its claims, just happens to be particularly susceptible to our irrational urges.

I became a Quaker years ago because most Quakers refuse to define God, what happens after death, or anything else we have no direct experience of or way to know. There are atheist Quakers, which is kinda odd when you think about it, but the point of Friends is the individual and personal worship of God-- whatever or whoever God may be.

predates the era of American exceptionalism!!!

It's our nature to form into teams, or tribes, or clusters, and root for our side and disparage the rest!

The Quakers have a good idea there...!

What? Even their own study shows a decline in belief. Polls have show a little less than 40% of unaffiliated describe themselves as atheist/agnostic, the unaffiliated make up 1/3 of people under 30. Assuming proportions stay the same you don't have to be a mathematical genius to see what this will do to religious belief over time.

one is affiliated with. While it continues to include non-believers, it is the rise of those who say they are still religious/spiritual but no longer affiliated that has caused the major increase in the numbers. I think it indicates a shift in attitude but not necessarily a decrease in religiosity.

Last edited Sun Mar 17, 2013, 06:08 PM - Edit history (1)

When you look at the declining absolute belief in god of millennials and the proportion of non believers in the nones. The statement "not an indication of declining religious belief." doesn't make sense. Certainly some of the rise is from declining belief.

nones is not due primarily to that. They need to start surveying for more specific categories, I think. That would be helpful in understanding what is really going on.

We had a discussion about this recently in religion group and some thought the increase was due to decreasing prejudice, increasing organization and a subsequent willingness to identify oneself as atheist. That would be a good sign, imo.