###### Religious Preferences and Practices
* Goals
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# Community Engagement
#### Healthy churches engage with their congregation and exhibit an intimate sense of community.
### The Disconnect Between Believing in Jesus and Participating in His Church is Expanding Rapidly
Jesus asked his disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” He was pleased with Peter’s answer: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16:15-16). As Christians, we believe this may be the most important question there is. So what do Americans today believe about Jesus? Who do they say he is? Believing in Jesus and participating in His church is what we explore in this article based on this study’s findings.
The American Belief Study, conducted in both 2017 and 2021, showed a list of eleven statements about Jesus to a carefully-designed, representative sample of 15,000 Americans. It asked whether they agreed or disagreed with each statement on a five-point scale, with ‘No opinion’ in the middle. In this post we focus on the top two ratings for agreement.
**What the statements revealed**
Six of these 11 statements were consistent with historic Christian doctrine. The responses shed light on what Americans in general believe about Jesus as against what the Church teaches.
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Was Jesus both divine and human? Most Americans would say, “yes;” only 15% would say “no.” Did he rise from the dead? Half of the country would say, “yes;” only 20% would disagree. After those statements, the percentage agreeing drops, with only 38% agreeing that Jesus was the Messiah and the same percentage agreeing that he lived a sinless life while on earth.
The same American Belief Study has shown that 64.2% of Americans name Christianity as their religion. There is a gap between the number of people who say they are Christians and the number who agree with historic Christian teaching about Jesus.
**47 million American Christians don’t fully agree that Jesus rose from the dead.**
The diverse American religious landscape includes liberal churches that would not teach the physical, bodily resurrection of Christ, but the membership of these churches is not a strong percentage of the national Christian population, and their numbers are in decline. The membership of these churches is not large enough to account for the 47.1 million people we are considering here, not the mention the millions more who do not affirm the other statements in the list. This means there are millions of Americans from orthodox or relatively-traditional church background who do not believe, or maybe do not understand, basic Christian doctrine about Jesus Christ.
Figure 2.8 above also shows how American beliefs about Jesus are changing. For every statement in that list that appeared in both the 2017 and 2021 surveys, the percentage who agree is dropping. The percentage of Americans who agree with traditional Christian beliefs about Jesus is in decline.
**What the responses showed**
That level of decline is not nearly as dramatic as what was shown by the responses to two other statements from the study. The research did not just ask about theology – what people believe about Jesus – but also about the relationship between the Jesus of the Bible and the churches of today. Two questions addressed this, and responses to both saw a dramatic change in the past four years.
The first of these two questions asked whether participants agreed or disagreed with the statement, “People in the church do not behave as Jesus would behave.” In a way, this served as a hypocrisy meter. Christians seek to be like Jesus. We ask, “What would Jesus do?” and try to follow his way. In 2017, 32% of Americans indicated they believed church people fall short of Jesus’ example. In 2021, this ballooned to 61%, an increase of 29 percentage points in just four years. Americans’ opinion of church people’s faithfulness to the way of Jesus is in sharp decline.
The second question asked whether participants agreed or disagreed with the statement, “Belief in Jesus does not require participation in a church.” Nearly all churches would teach that Christian belief and attending a church go together. The New Testament strongly supports the idea of believers participating actively in communities of faith. In 2017, fully half the respondents (50%) agreed that faith in Jesus and participation in a church need not go together. In 2021, more than six in ten (63%) agreed with this idea, a dramatic increase of 13% in a short span of time.
**The percentage of Americans who think it’s OK to believe in Jesus but not go to church is high and growing rapidly.**
To summarize, the American Belief Study shows that the things Americans believe about Jesus are slowly separating from historic Christian tenets. Also, the traditional mindset that linked faith in Jesus with church attendance has eroded recently. This change is rapid. And finally, the share of Americans in 2021 who believe people in the church don’t behave as Jesus would have has, incredibly, nearly doubled to 61% in just four short years.
**Key Findings**:
1. A majority of Americans (55%) believe that Jesus was both divine and human. A smaller percentage (38%) believe Jesus was the Messiah or that he lived a perfect life.
2. Tens of millions of Americans who name their religion as Christianity do not agree with basic, historic beliefs about Jesus.
3. The percentage of Americans who do not think church people live according to Jesus’ teaching and example is high (61%), and growing rapidly.
4. The percentage of Americans who see no necessary connection between believing in Jesus and being part of a church is high (63%), and growing rapidly.
**Ideas for Your Church**:
1. Don’t neglect the teaching of basic Christian theology – especially about Jesus. Don’t assume your people know and understand the central doctrines of the faith.
2. When you teach theology, don’t just speak; listen. Find ways to ask your members what they believe. You might be surprised. It could then guide your teaching.
3. Be alert to the reputation of your church and its members in the community. Ask, “What changes could we make that would cause people to see we are like Jesus?”
4. Recognize that many people today, as they move toward faith, are likely to come to Jesus first, and then, only later, to his church. Provide ways for them to meet Jesus outside the church – such as through home-group or small-group ministry.
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# Future Planning
#### Healthy churches have a mission and vision that shapes plans and strategies for longevity and reliability
### Millions of Christians are Inactive in Their Faith: A Challenge and an Opportunity
Every church has a mix of more-active and less-active members. There are many ways we try to describe this. We might talk about the “faithful” members vs. the “fringe” members; or “the people we see every week” vs. “the people we don’t see very often;” or the “more committed” vs. the “less committed.” Whatever words we put to it, it’s a reality.
The American Belief Study asked a carefully-designed, representative sample of 15,000 Americans about their religious faith, beliefs, and practices. Of the 9,504 participants who identified themselves as “Christian,” the study asked questions to sort out “Practicing Christians” vs. “Nominal Christians.” Two criteria were applied. If respondents said (1) they attended church (or a faith fellowship) at least once a month, and (2) their faith had “high” or “utmost” significance in their lives, they were counted as “Practicing.” If their responses did not meet one or both of those criteria, they were counted as “Nominal.”
In other words, for the purposes of this study, “Nominal Christians” are those who said they attend a fellowship less than once a month, or who said their faith was not that important to them, or both. They identify as Christians; faith is a part of their lives, just not a highly-important part of their lives.
Overall, the study found that 33.3% of self-identified Christians are Practicing and 66.7% are Nominal.
Two-thirds of Christians in America are Nominal. Only one-third are actively practicing their faith.
On the one hand, this is a ministry challenge. What is it about the American Christian community that allows so many to remain nominal in their faith? On the other hand, it’s a ministry opportunity. Here are millions of people—about 141 million Americans—who see themselves as Christians, and who could be encouraged to a deeper, more meaningful, and more active faith. Which is easier: to invite non-Christians to believe the gospel, or to invite Christians to grow deeper in the things of Christ?
The American Belief Study found clear differences between age cohorts on this question.
While nearly half of older Christians are Practicing and half Nominal, with younger Christians it’s closer to one-quarter Practicing and three-quarters Nominal. The series of four charts shows a steady progression between the four age cohorts. There are several possible explanations for this pattern. Maybe as Christians grow older, many of the Nominals become more active in their faith. Or maybe, over the course of life, Practicing Christians tend to stay true to their faith while many of the Nominals drop out and no longer consider themselves Christians—which would then change the ratio.
Other, related data leads to a more likely explanation: that these different age cohorts in American society, these different groups of people, tend to think differently about the place of faith in their lives. Older Christians tend to think of their faith as of greater importance in their lives, and tend to attend church more regularly. There are more younger Christians who need to be encouraged to deeper faith and greater commitment.
Another question in the study revealed that Practicing and Nominal Christians have very different opinions on matters of morality and society. Participants were given a list of 25 statements and were asked, “Please indicate your level of agreement or disagreement” on a five-point scale from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree.” Figure 4.7 shows the ten statements where there was widest disagreement between Practicing and Nominal Christians. The bars show the percent who agreed with the statements.
The graph sets the statements in order by how wide the gap is between what Practicing and Nominal Christians believe, with the largest gap at the top and the smallest gap at the bottom, ending with a negative gap for the final question. For the second-to-last statement, “America has a moral responsibility to be a force for good in the world.” 69% of Nominal Christians marked ‘Somewhat agree’ or ‘Strongly agree,’ while 80% of Practicing Christians marked the statement that way. That 11-percentage-point difference is significant—but then consider the two statements at the top. They each show a 35-percentage-point difference, which is extremely wide. The final question, on same-sex marriage, shows a negative gap because more Nominals agreed with the statement than Practicing.
These statements are not about trivial or unimportant matters. But about topics where feelings run strong, in our society and in our churches. Most of them relate to beliefs about personal and family matters. As one example, 70% of Practicing Christians believe “marriage is a relationship between one man and one woman only.” While only 35% of Nominal Christians believe that to be true. That’s a huge gap.
**Nominal Christians may find it very difficult to join in fellowship with Practicing Christians that they sharply disagree with.**
This is a great challenge, with no simple answers. Christians may stay on the fringe of their churches. Or may avoid attending, not because they don’t feel in harmony with Christ and his teachings, but because they don’t feel in harmony with the Practicing Christians. Moving from being Nominal to being Practicing may mean joining a ‘tribe’ they don’t feel they belong to.
1. Of every three Christians in America, two are Nominal—not fully active in, or committed to, their faith.
2. Forty-seven percent of Christians in the Silent generation are Practicing; only 28% of Millennial Christians are; GenX and Boomers are between those two.
3. Practicing Christians and Nominal Christians don’t hold the same beliefs on important moral and social issues, and the gap is sometimes extreme.
1. Find ways to open lines of communication with Nominal Christians. Find ways to reach out to them that they welcome and feel comfortable with.
2. For your members who don’t attend often, it’s not likely that a strategy of laying on guilt will prove fruitful. It’s more likely that a positive strategy, demonstrating how a closer relationship with Christ and his church leads to a life of love, joy, and peace, will lead to change.
3. On the one hand, you have to stand firm with what you know to be true from the Bible and right doctrine. On the other hand, you can set an atmosphere of love and acceptance that allows believers with differing opinions to worship together in harmony.
4. Learn about Millennials, how they think about faith, and what patterns of Christian life and fellowship they find most meaningful. Consider what there is about your church that might particularly attract or repel them.
# Leadership Development
#### Healthy churches have strong leaders that develop strong leaders.
### People Avoid Church out of Discomfort with the People, the Leadership, the Organization, and the ‘Religion’
Almost one-third of Americans say they are active in a church or other religious congregation (33.2%). That means two out of three Americans stay at home or do something else on Sunday morning. Ten years ago, the percentage who were active in a religious congregation was much higher at 43.5%. The level of participation has dropped by 10.3%, or 34 million people using the current U.S. population.
**Over the past ten years, 34 million Americans have dropped out from active involvement in a church or religious congregation.**
This finding is from the ****, which asked a carefully-designed, representative sample of 15,000 Americans if they were currently active in a religious congregation or other religious community. It also asked if they were active ten years ago.
Why the big exodus? Why did these tens of millions of people leave?
In the survey, those who said they were not currently active in a church or religious community answered a question about their reasons for not participating. They rated 25 different inhibiting reasons on how much each deterred their involvement, on a five-point scale, from ‘Not at all’ to ‘Very much.’ Their responses revealed which factors were – and were not – the main reasons for not engaging.
First, consider what showed up on the bottom of the list. These are the items the smallest share of participants identified as driving their non-involvement in a church or other religious congregation.
These answers tell us it’s not a change in worship style or music that’s keeping people from church life. It’s not a lack of connection in friendship with other members, a dearth of volunteer opportunities, or too few good children’s programs. Nor are people staying away because of life obligations like childcare. Only five percent said they hadn’t been invited.
**The Factors**
So what are the factors keeping people away, if not these?
Consider what showed up at the top of the list. These are the items that the largest share of respondents said were a factor driving their non-involvement in congregational life.
People choose not to participate in a church or religious community because they don’t feel good about religious people, organizations, leaders, and beliefs. It’s about their perceptions of the people, about the institutions, and about religious faith itself. More than a third feel religious people are judgmental. Many are disillusioned with religion, but even more distrust its leaders and its organizations. One in four don’t feel faith communities are relevant to their lives, and even more feel as if religious congregations are too focused on money.
**The top reason why Americans shy away from religious life is that they see the members as judgmental instead of accepting.**
This one is especially painful for Christians. Jesus said, “Judge not, that you be not judged” (Matthew 7:1). He also said, “By this all people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). Love drives out judgmentalism. Jesus set the example through his loving acceptance of people on the margins, outsiders, and people rejected by the community or by the religious leaders of his day. It is sad to learn that such a large percentage of Americans today do not see church people, and members of other religious congregations, as accepting and loving.
It can be easy for those of us who are Christians to feel defensive when we see these responses. We’re not so judgmental! We don’t focus too much on money! The gospel is absolutely relevant! Our leaders are good! … and so on. But that isn’t helpful. Whether these perceptions are fair or not, they are real. This study is just reporting what uninvolved people actually think and say. Debating may help cement a negative bias and come across as condescending.
What will help is to live, speak, and think in ways that shift these perceptions. It’s not necessary to defend Christians or churches in general. We only need to show the people around us that *our* church, *our* family of believers, is loving, accepting, good, worthy of trust, and sharing a message that is not only relevant but beautiful, wonderful, and powerful.
**Key Findings:**
1. The share of Americans who participate in a faith community has dropped from 43.5% ten years ago to 33.2% today.
2. Generally, people aren’t shying away from church because of a lack of good programs for children or youth, not being invited, nowhere to give back through volunteerism, or lack of friendship potential.
3. For the most part, those who are not active in a church or religious congregation are staying away because of things like perceived judgmentalism of members, distrust of organized religion, perceived over-emphasis on money, and distrust of religious leaders.
4. One in four Americans (25%) say they are “disillusioned with religion.” About the same proportion (26%) say religion “is not relevant” to their lives.
Drop inaccurate ideas about why people stay away from church.
Don’t assume that programs, service opportunities, or better music will attract people to active church membership. These are all good, but they are not the key factors.