A Word to the Wise: The “Nones” Have Hit a Ceiling
"After seeing a slow and steady rise from 28% in 2020 to 31% in 2022 - the Pew data from 2023 indicates that the share of nones in the general population dropped to 28% or back to the levels that they recorded in 2020. This is three surveys that are all pointing to the same, very simple conclusion:
The rise of the nones may be largely over now. At least it won’t be increasing in the same way that it did in the prior thirty years.
Of course, the question is why? I don’t know if I have a bulletproof answer. I think the easiest explanation is that a lot of marginally attached people switched to “no religion” on surveys over the last decade or two. Eventually, there weren’t that many marginally attached folks anymore. All you had left were they very committed religious people who likely won’t become nones for any reason. The loose top soil has been scooped off and hauled away, leaving nothing but hard bedrock underneath.
But generational replacement is an impossible trend to stop. Older people will not live forever. Instead, they will be leaving this Earth and their replacements will be a whole lot of members of Gen Z who tend to be less religious than their grandparents. Although, the generational gap between those groups may be smaller now than many initially thought.
I don’t want to be too hyperbolic. But I am a preacher and it runs through my blood. This really may be the end of an era in American religious demography. The trend lines might have reached an inflection point, and we can demarcate religious history around this time period. Hopefully, before I wind up my career in a few decades I can make sense of all of this.
Soren Kierkegaard once wrote, “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” It’s exciting to be living in this moment right now."
Ryan Burge, 5.20.24, The Nones Have Hit a Ceiling: After Decades of Non-Stop Increases, Non-Religious Americans Have Plateaued
"After seeing a slow and steady rise from 28% in 2020 to 31% in 2022 - the Pew data from 2023 indicates that the share of nones in the general population dropped to 28% or back to the levels that they recorded in 2020. This is three surveys that are all pointing to the same, very simple conclusion:
The rise of the nones may be largely over now. At least it won’t be increasing in the same way that it did in the prior thirty years.
Of course, the question is why? I don’t know if I have a bulletproof answer. I think the easiest explanation is that a lot of marginally attached people switched to “no religion” on surveys over the last decade or two. Eventually, there weren’t that many marginally attached folks anymore. All you had left were they very committed religious people who likely won’t become nones for any reason. The loose top soil has been scooped off and hauled away, leaving nothing but hard bedrock underneath.
But generational replacement is an impossible trend to stop. Older people will not live forever. Instead, they will be leaving this Earth and their replacements will be a whole lot of members of Gen Z who tend to be less religious than their grandparents. Although, the generational gap between those groups may be smaller now than many initially thought.
I don’t want to be too hyperbolic. But I am a preacher and it runs through my blood. This really may be the end of an era in American religious demography. The trend lines might have reached an inflection point, and we can demarcate religious history around this time period. Hopefully, before I wind up my career in a few decades I can make sense of all of this.
Soren Kierkegaard once wrote, “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” It’s exciting to be living in this moment right now."
Ryan Burge, 5.20.24, The Nones Have Hit a Ceiling: After Decades of Non-Stop Increases, Non-Religious Americans Have Plateaued
Here are Four Things to Know this Week:
Please be in prayer for our upcoming SBCAL Annual Conference June 9-10, and our SBC Annual Meeting June 11-12 in Indianapolis.
Yours in Christ,
Ray
- Meet the Candidates for SBC President
- GCR Evaluation Task Force Recommendations
- Sex Abuse Task Force Releases Report, Recommendations
- Prayer and Evangelism Reinforce One Another
Please be in prayer for our upcoming SBCAL Annual Conference June 9-10, and our SBC Annual Meeting June 11-12 in Indianapolis.
Yours in Christ,
Ray
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