{"id":81309,"date":"2016-10-17T12:00:22","date_gmt":"2016-10-17T11:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=81309"},"modified":"2016-10-15T14:19:07","modified_gmt":"2016-10-15T13:19:07","slug":"a-milestone-for-americas-culture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2016\/10\/a-milestone-for-americas-culture\/","title":{"rendered":"A Milestone for America\u2019s Culture"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"james-haught-pic-2\"<\/a>14 Oct 2016 – <\/em>Slowly, relentlessly, America\u2019s culture is undergoing profound change.\u00a0 But the transformation mostly is under the radar, hardly noticed.<\/p>\n

A new study by the Public Religion Research Institute and Religion News Service finds that the largest faith category in the United States now is people who say their religion is \u201cnone.\u201d Apparently, this marks the first time in U.S. history for the churchless to reach top status.<\/p>\n

Specifically, the PRRI-RNS report says the three chief groups among all ages in 2016 are: nones, 25 percent; Catholics, 21 percent; and white evangelicals, 16 percent.<\/p>\n

Among young adults under 30, the gap is enormous:\u00a0 Nones, nearly 40 percent; Catholics, 15 percent; white evangelicals, 9 percent; white mainline Protestants, 8 percent; black Protestants, 7 percent; other nonwhite Protestants, 11 percent; and non-Christian faiths, 7 percent.<\/p>\n

Many of the unaffiliated young adults say they simply don\u2019t believe church dogmas.<\/p>\n

As these younger Americans advance to middle age, the churchless segment is expected to increase. It surely will alter U.S. society.\u00a0 It has snowballed rapidly, unexpectedly.\u00a0 The report says:<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the most consequential shifts in American religion has been the rise of religiously unaffiliated Americans.\u00a0 This trend emerged in the early 1990s.\u00a0 In 1991, only 6 percent of Americans identified their religious affiliation as \u2018none.\u2019 \u2026 By the end of the 1990s, some 14 percent of the public claimed no religious affiliation.\u00a0 The rate of religious change accelerated further\u2026 reaching 20 percent by 2012.\u201d<\/p>\n

For senior West Virginians like me, who came of age after World War II, this secular tide is astounding.\u00a0 The world of our youth has been turned upside-down.<\/p>\n

When I was a young adult, the only Americans who mattered were WASPs (white Anglo-Saxon Protestants). They were the overwhelming majority.\u00a0 Their laws and customs dominated everything. But now, they\u2019ve dwindled to just 16 percent among those under 30, according to the PRRI-RNS figures. And they\u2019re destined to keep shrinking as nonwhite Americans rise, the Census Bureau projects.<\/p>\n

Politically, the situation is a mess.\u00a0 The \u201cnones\u201d strongly hold liberal, conmpassionate, progressive, Democratic values — but they tend to avoid voting.\u00a0 They shun politics as much as they shun church. The report says:<\/p>\n

\u201cBy the last presidential election in 2012, religiously unaffiliated Americans had grown to comprise 20 percent of the public, but\u2026 comprised 12 percent of voters. By way of comparison, in 2012 white evangelical Protestants also comprised 20 percent of the public, but they accounted for more than one in four (26 percent) voters.\u201d<\/p>\n

While other American groups are more committed to political action, about one-fourth of \u201cnones\u201d aren\u2019t even registered to vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the start of the 2016 general election season in early August,\u201d the study says, \u201creligiously unaffiliated voters expressed a strong preference for Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump (62 percent vs. 21 percent).\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite their low voting rate, \u201cnones\u201d have become the largest segment in the Democratic Party base.\u00a0 The report says:<\/p>\n

\u201cAmong Hillary Clinton\u2019s supporters, 7 percent are white evangelical Protestant, 12 percent are white mainline Protestant, 11 percent are white Catholic, 30 percent are religiously unaffiliated, and 15 percent are black Protestant.\u201d (That\u2019s only 75 percent of her backers.\u00a0 Perhaps the others are supporters whose religion isn\u2019t known.)<\/p>\n

It\u2019s fascinating to watch the culture evolve. It\u2019s tantalizing to wonder where America is heading.\u00a0 Keep reading the news and try to find clues about the transformation that is in progress.<\/p>\n

______________________________________<\/p>\n

James Haught, syndicated by <\/em>PeaceVoice<\/em><\/a>,<\/em> is editor emeritus of West Virginia\u2019s largest newspaper, The Charleston Gazette-Mail.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I was a young adult, the only Americans who mattered were WASPs (white Anglo-Saxon Protestants). They were the overwhelming majority. Their laws and customs dominated everything. But now, they\u2019ve dwindled to just 16 percent among those under 30. And they\u2019re destined to keep shrinking as nonwhite Americans rise, the Census Bureau projects.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81309","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anglo-america"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81309","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81309"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81309\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81309"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81309"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81309"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}