Barna: Americans Growing Cool on Christianity?

The study showed residents of the Northeast and West were much more likely to assert that Christianity has lost its place as the first faith option people consider.

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Religious Intelligencer) - A new survey has revealed that Americans are less likely to view Christianity as their default religion.

The findings come from the Barna Group, which revealed that although most Americans say their beliefs are becoming more important in giving them moral guidance, they are more likely to pick and choose what they believe, rather than signing up to the creeds of any particular religion.

Overall, 50 per cent of the adults interviewed in the nationwide survey agreed that Christianity is no longer the faith that Americans automatically accept as their personal faith, while just 44 per cent disagreed and six per cent were not sure.

Two-thirds of evangelical Christians (64 per cent) and three out of every five Hispanics (60 per cent) embraced that position, making them the groups most convinced of the shift in America's default faith. The study also showed that residents of the Northeast and West were much more likely than those from the South and Midwest to assert that Christianity has lost its place as the first faith option people consider.

People who said they are politically conservative, however, saw things differently than did the rest of the country: a slight majority of conservatives claimed that Christianity remains the natural choice of most Americans.

Almost three-quarters -- 74 per cent to 23 per cent --- adults agreed that their religious faith was becoming even more important to them than it used to be as a source of objective and reliable moral guidance.

This perspective was championed by born again Christians: 91 per cent concurred with the survey statement. In contrast, just two-thirds of the people who consider themselves to be Christian but are not born again (67 per cent) embraced this view, and only four out of every ten Americans (39 per cent) who do not affiliate with Christianity also said their faith has increasing influence on their moral judgments.

By a three to one margin (71 per cent to 26 per cent) adults noted that they are personally more likely to develop their own set of religious beliefs than to accept a comprehensive set of beliefs taught by a particular church.

Although born again Christians were among the segments least likely to adopt the a la carte approach to beliefs, a considerable majority even of born again adults (61 per cent) has taken that route. Leading the charge in the move to customize one's package of beliefs are people under the age of 25, among whom more than four out of five (82 per cent) said they develop their own combination of beliefs rather than adopt a set proposed by a church.

Asked to describe what the research means for American society today, researcher George Barna offered several insights. "Growing numbers of people now serve as their own theologian-in-residence. One consequence is that Americans are embracing an unpredictable and contradictory body of beliefs," Barna pointed out, as examples, that millions of people who consider themselves to be Christian now believe that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the lessons it teaches at the same time that they believe Jesus Christ sinned. "Millions also contend that they will experience eternal salvation because they confessed their sins and accepted Christ as their saviour, but also believe that a person can do enough good works to earn eternal salvation.

"Faith, of whatever variety, is increasingly viral rather than pedagogical. With people spending less time reading the Bible, and becoming less engaged in activities that deepen their biblical literacy, faith views are more often adopted on the basis of dialogue, self-reflection, and observation than teaching. Feelings and emotions now play a significant role in the development of people's faith views - in many cases, much more significant than information-based exercises such as listening to preaching and participating in Bible study."

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This article first appeared in the Religious Intelligencer and is used with permission.