“On Thursday, Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) released startling new polling data showing just how much ground the religious right has lost. PRRI’s 2020 Census of American Religion, based on a survey of nearly half a million people, shows a precipitous decline in the share of the population identifying as white evangelical, from 23% in 2006 to 14.5% last year. In 2020, as in every year since 2013, the largest religious group in the United States was the religiously unaffiliated.”
Chattanooga Times Free Press
Organized religion is the enemy of science, enlightenment, women’s rights, human rights and it’s the biggest obstacle to achieving peace and harmony on a global scale.
Therefore, I am encouraged by the fact that the largest religious group in the United States is the religiously unaffiliated. These so-called “nones” who answer “none of the above” on religious identification surveys aren’t necessarily agnostic or atheist, they simply believe that you can be a spiritual being without belonging to any religious organization.
As Lord Acton famously expressed it, “power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Mega evangelical churches where the pastor has almost total control over his/her congregation are almost totally corrupt, and it’s almost impossible for a parishioner to be a loving Christian when all the church leaders are preaching a message of intolerance, racism and hatred.
Another piece of good news is that there are more white mainline Protestants than white evangelicals. Fundamentalists and evangelicals garner all the headlines because they have a penchant for railing against gays, immigrants and climate change, while mainline Protestants attend church on Sundays and behave like good law-abiding citizens the rest of the week.
White evangelicals are the oldest religious group in the United States, with a median age of 56. These Neanderthals are dying out, but they aren’t going quietly into the night, they are exiting the stage screaming and gnashing their teeth.
Don’t despair my friends, white evangelicals aren’t going to inherit the Earth, they and other organized religions are in the rear view mirror.