Losing Faith: Fewer Americans are Religious

[firstmode]

nbcchicago.com/news/us_world/NATLLosing-Faith-Fewer-Americans-are-Religious.html

Losing Faith: Fewer Americans are Religious More and more Americans say they have no religion at all.

AFP/Getty Images

Nationally, Catholics remain the largest religious group, with 57 million people saying they belong to the church. But its share of the population fell by about a percentage point to 25 percent.

A wide-ranging study on American religious life found that the Roman Catholic population has been shifting out of the Northeast to the Southwest, the percentage of Christians in the nation has declined and more people say they have no religion at all.

Fifteen percent of respondents said they had no religion, an increase from 14.2 percent in 2001 and 8.2 percent in 1990, according to the American Religious Identification Survey.

 

[peregrinus_WA]

Looks like the socialist anti-religious indoctrination that has been forced in the public school system he having an effect. Liberals cannot stand any ideology that stands in their way of making them the highest form of life

 

[Laurent_LUG]

Someone who’s religionless , but …
that person leaves the religious-one alone without bothers them ??

Salute & Cheers from a NON BELIEVER:
– Laurent LUG (.@…), March 9, 2009

 

[idrum677]

Nationally, Catholics remain the largest religious group, with 57 million people saying they

belong to the church. The tradition gained 11 million followers since 1990, but its share of the population fell by about a percentage point to 25 percent.

So how many of these self proclaimed “Catholics” actually participate in their faith and follow the Church’s teaching?

Researchers found that 18 percent of Catholics consider themselves born-again or evangelical…

18% of the 57 million Catholics??? That’s almost 10.3 million. So what now? It is Latin Rite, Eastern Rite, and “Born Again Rite?”

 

[Luvs2Learn]

Nationally, Catholics remain the largest religious group, with 57 million people saying they

So how many of these self proclaimed “Catholics” actually participate in their faith and follow the Church’s teaching?

18% of the 57 million Catholics??? That’s almost 10.3 million. So what now? It is Latin Rite, Eastern Rite, and “Born Again Rite?”

Yea, you know what I also found interesting about that comment, In the poll listed They didn’t even mention Eastern Orthodox. so does that mean they were clummped in with the Catholic Tally as part of the Eastern Rite, or the mainline Protastant Tally?

 

[manualman]

Hidden in the numbers are some stark realities. We haven’t seen a MIGRATION of people from the northeast to the south and southwest. We’ve actually had a severe hemorrage of catholics in the USA that has been hidden in the statistics by massive immigration from (nominally) catholic Central and South America.

We continue to do a lousy job of evangelizing and cathechizing our own membership in the catholic church today. Wake up call time - what am I doing to help spread the gospel??

 

[FK04US]

Hidden in the numbers are some stark realities. We haven’t seen a MIGRATION of people from the northeast to the south and southwest. We’ve actually had a severe hemorrage of catholics in the USA that has been hidden in the statistics by massive immigration from (nominally) catholic Central and South America.

Could you explain your statement, please? You are talking about millions of Catholics in that line, more than the whole USA population. Are they not real Catholics? Thanks.

 

[manualman]

I’d be glad to explain. The countries of Central and South America are nominally catholic countries (or were until recently in some cases). You must think I mean this in a derogatory way. Not so. “Nominal” simply means it is what they mostly call themselves. It says nothing about how sincere they are in the faith.

My point is that the maintenance of catholic numbers in the USA is misleading. We are only holding ground due to immigration of people who identify as catholics (since you object to the word nominal). Take that out and our numbers are plummeting.

 

[bellesjoy]

Anyone who call themselves Catholic and “born-again”, really doesn’t understand their faith at all.

 

[SteveGC]

Anyone who call themselves Catholic and “born-again”, really doesn’t understand their faith at all.

Unless, they are properly identifying themselves as a new creation through valid baptism. Indeed, we are born-again. Some understand this correctly. Others limit their understanding of it to the evangelical “sinners prayer”, and do not connect it with their baptism. Nevertheless, all Catholics are “born again”. Further reading

 

[bellesjoy]

Unless, they are properly identifying themselves as a new creation through valid baptism. Indeed, we are born-again. Some understand this correctly. Others limit their understanding of it to the evangelical “sinners prayer”, and do not connect it with their baptism. Nevertheless, all Catholics are “born again”. Further reading

If one is already Catholic (per his baptism and therefore “born again”), and believes he can be born-again is perhaps a better statement explaining this issue. I know more than a few fallen away Catholics, who were baptised and part of the Body of Christ and then later on were inticed into a “born-again experience” by others and left the Church.

 

[FK04US]

I’d be glad to explain. The countries of Central and South America are nominally catholic countries (or were until recently in some cases). You must think I mean this in a derogatory way. Not so. “Nominal” simply means it is what they mostly call themselves. It says nothing about how sincere they are in the faith.

My point is that the maintenance of catholic numbers in the USA is misleading. We are only holding ground due to immigration of people who identify as catholics (since you object to the word nominal). Take that out and our numbers are plummeting.

Thanks for the clarification. I agree with it. And it is good to try to check the language, considering that the future of the USA Catholic Church will probably be in the hands of today’s Latino children of our parishes.

 

[Oren]

I have heard that this survey may in fact be very baised. Every other poll has pointed to the fact that a much higher percent of Americans are in fact religious, or not secular. This survey was headed by a person who has an agenda for the secularization of america. Just some food for thought.

 

[Badaliyyah]

I have heard that this survey may in fact be very baised. Every other poll has pointed to the fact that a much higher percent of Americans are in fact religious, or not secular. This survey was headed by a person who has an agenda for the secularization of america. Just some food for thought.

what we have seen so far compare well with the Pew Survey of Religious Affliliation (Catholic numbers are nearly identical for instance). The Pew data measures “non-affiliated” Americans. Another poll by Gallup found that only 62% of Americans said that religion was important in their lives, which was well below the world average (though fairly high in comparison to most European countries). So it seems like the numbers are in keeping with other prominent surveys.

We will know more when we see the full data. Comparison with the Pew data will be very interesting.

salaam.

 

[Soutane]

nbcchicago.com/news/us_world/NATLLosing-Faith-Fewer-Americans-are-Religious.html

Losing Faith: Fewer Americans are Religious More and more Americans say they have no religion at all.

AFP/Getty Images

Nationally, Catholics remain the largest religious group, with 57 million people saying they belong to the church. But its share of the population fell by about a percentage point to 25 percent.

A wide-ranging study on American religious life found that the Roman Catholic population has been shifting out of the Northeast to the Southwest, the percentage of Christians in the nation has declined and more people say they have no religion at all.

Fifteen percent of respondents said they had no religion, an increase from 14.2 percent in 2001 and 8.2 percent in 1990, according to the American Religious Identification Survey.

Was this apostasic falling away not predicted in an apparition by Mary?

 

[Nullasalus]

As another said, this data more or less lines up with the Pew poll data - which was generally regarded as good news for religious believers. So why is this being played up as bad news?

Simple. The articles talking about this poll are comparing 1990 to 2008. Pew compared 2001 to 2008. I’m not denying that the catholic church needs to do far more work, or that the culture hasn’t become more religion-hostile. But I will say that a good chunk of the talk about this survey is, in my view, manufactured. ‘Non-religious barely increased at all in number over past 7 years!’ doesn’t get anyone’s attention. ‘Large jumps in non-religious over the past 17 years!’ does.

The jump in ‘no religion’ from 1990 to 2001 was pretty large - 8.2% to 14.2%. From 2001 to 2008, very small - 14.2% to 15.0%. Agnostics went from 0.5 to 0.9 from 2001 to 2008. Atheists, 0.4 to 0.7 in the same period.

Other big overall moves: ‘Christian generic’ went from 10.8% to 14.2% in this period. Mainline Christian, from 17.2% to 12.9%.

Another interesting survey question: Regarding the existence of God, do you think . . . ?

There is no such thing 2.3%
There is no way to know 4.3%
I’m not sure 5.7%
There is a higher power but no personal God 12.1%
There is definitely a personal God 69.5%
Refused 6.1%

The full report is here: b27.cc.trincoll.edu/weblogs/AmericanReligionSurvey-ARIS/reports/ARIS_Report_2008.pdf

Either way, my own reaction is this: It highlights that a lot of work needs to be done. And instead of leaving that as a vague declaration, I’ll explain what I mean.

• Understanding why people, particularly younger ones, become skeptical of religion in general and christianity/catholicism in particular. I think the overwhelming reason for this is apathy (Why look into religion? If I live a good life that’s all that matters anyway. Never mind that defining a ‘good life’ is problematic), confusion (‘Science shows God doesn’t exist, right?’ or ‘I know some so-called ‘christians’ and they’re hypocrites or weird’) and questioning (What reason does anyone have to believe in God? Why is there so much evil in the world if God exists?)
• Not just understanding, but being more aggressive in giving answers to those questions. Giving positive reasons to believe in God across the board (philosophical and moral primarily, along with stressing God’s relation to science and nature - I lean heavily thomistic in that vein), and pointing out the problems with worldviews that are atheistic or even apatheist. I think this matters even for people who identify as believers - we really need better, more fundamental ways to present the Catholic/christian case on every subject from God’s existence, to abortion, to stem cells, to otherwise.
• Reaching out in every way. Not just local and in one’s own community, but particularly on the internet. More and more people spend quite a lot of time online and insulate themselves from a lot of what happens in their communities. They’re hard to reach as a result, but it’s something that must be faced.
• Paying rapt attention to culture - what happens in one’s neighborhood, on TV, what games children play on consoles/computers, etc. We need to somehow present an identifiably Catholic culture for this modern era - and that’s a tall order. Comics, TV shows, movies, video games, books, magazines, newspapers - all are usually either apatheist or even hostile to Catholic views.

So there’s my thoughts on this matter.

 

[Milanomayor]

You and many more quotes hit the nail on the head. I believe this poll to be off somewhat but apathy has a bunch to do with our young people not attending Mass and getting involved in the Church. My son graduated College abut 2 years ago but before attending College he was a fervent Catholic, but he was also a Catholic who could not defend his religion ( unfortunately a lot of Catholic cannot defend there faith young and old). My point being that while he was in class a lot of the professors would single out Christians and particularly Catholics and degrade them regularly then these professors would have there own minions in class who would pile on also literally inundating him. They would say such things like Hitler was Catholic and such. So for now he is not attending Mass but I think he is on a path back, his aunt tells me as she talks to him about it regularly. I and my wife have to watch ourselves because it is real easy to get mad and that is not going to help. It is really a crying shame that our high schools and Colleges are being used in this way. By the way the College is Oklahoma State University in Stillwater,OK. Home of the largest Gay and Lesbian organization in the state.!!!

 

[BobCatholic]

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[Methodi]

Hidden in the numbers are some stark realities. We haven’t seen a MIGRATION of people from the northeast to the south and southwest. We’ve actually had a severe hemorrage of catholics in the USA that has been hidden in the statistics by massive immigration from (nominally) catholic Central and South America.

We continue to do a lousy job of evangelizing and cathechizing our own membership in the catholic church today. Wake up call time - what am I doing to help spread the gospel??

When You talk about religion outside of the Church, Like work etc, no body wants to hear it, they look at you like U have two heads. Mother Angelica made a comment on one of her programs, she said , if U want to clear a room out fast, start talking religion. Our Pastor in one of his homilies talked about how The Jehovah witnesses evangelize, & we catholics do nothing to evangelize

 

[Micholos]

The faithful will, through examples show others what it means to love Love. If we aspire to be the Saints we were meant to be, maybe then atheists and others will see. If not, religion will lose face and rightfully so.

They hate our hypocrites and I can’t blame them because they can’t possibly know any better. If we become who we are, who we were designed to be, then possibly, they will see God’s hand at work.