Christian America is
on the Decline
07 Sep 2017 Alison
Lesley World Religion News
Muslims and Mormons constitute the youngest
faith demographic
A report published by Public Religion Research
Institute (PRRI) says that white Christians have become a minority
in United States. In 20 U.S. states, the 'nones' have formed the
majority. Over 100,000 Americans were questioned during the survey.
Questioners were bilingual when they queried information. It is
clear, that future American is young and non-Christian.
Majority of the Christian denominations
increasingly exhibit diversity signs as white Christians, once
majority in both Catholic and Protestant denominations, are passing
the baton to younger members. The latter are found to belong a
number of different races. This change in U.S. religion has even
entered American evangelical territory. The latter are also rapidly
losing numbers. It is clear that a large number of Americans
continue to shift from any kind of organized religion. They
identify themselves as agnostics and atheists. There are also
people who are not affiliated with any specific group, and are
termed as “nones.” These make up about 24 percent or one quarter of
the population.
According to PRRI findings, white Christians
now constitute about 43 percent of the population. They were 80
percent during the end 1970s. This decline was because of
increasing numbers of non-white Christians, where the latter may
not hold identical social or political views as the white
evangelicals. If the age factor is considered, about 38 percent of
those respondents aged under 30 admitted to being
'unaffiliated.'
According to Robert P. Jones, the CEO of PRRI,
“This report provides solid evidence of a new, second wave of white
Christian decline that is occurring among white evangelical
Protestants just over the last decade in the U.S.” This decline has
been going on from 2006. Jones wrote the book The End of White
Christian America. He continued on to say, “Prior to 2008, white
evangelical Protestants seemed to be exempt from the waves of
demographic change and disaffiliation that were eroding the
membership bases of white mainline Protestants and white
Catholics.”
The important survey findings include a number
of facts like Lutherans constitute the highest percentage of
whites. The latter makes up 92 percent of this religious
population. The findings also threw up the information that white
Christians are rapidly aging. Approximately 10 percent of mainline
protestants, Catholics and evangelicals are below 30 years of age.
This can be compared to one-third of all the Buddhist and Hindu
populations. Youngest U.S. faith groups are the Mormons and the
Muslims.