The Decline Of American Christianity Might Have Stalled. Will It Reverse?
In 1897, the famous author Mark Twain, in response to an article reporting he was on his deathbed, wrote to the paper: “The report of my death was an exaggeration.” The young reporter who erroneously declared Twain’s demise confused Twain with an ill cousin, jumping to a conclusion before thoroughly checking out the facts.
Twain’s words came to mind as I read about the recent Pew Research Center Religious Landscape survey showing the decline of American Christianity has stabilized. Pew finds that the percentage of American adults identifying as Christian remained at 62 to 63 percent (with an 0.8 percentage point of error) over the past couple of years.
In many ways, those who have been reporting on the demise of American Christianity have been doing the same thing as the young reporter who hastened the news of Twain’s demise. In their eagerness to conclude American Christianity is dying, they have missed what may be happening.
Instead, the number of Americans who identify as Christians has stabilized after years of decline and hopefully has turned a corner and will return to being a vital part of our national tapestry. Still, it is also important to note that many who identify as Christians are not adhering to the core beliefs of the faith.
For them, their faith is still based on nostalgia rather than Christ’s revelation in the Bible. In fact, most of the decline of American Christianity is within mainline Protestant denominations that have become increasingly leftist in their beliefs. Those denominations that have abandoned biblical truth continue to shrivel and die, while the decline among evangelicals, who generally lean less to the left, is slower. (Read more from “The Decline Of American Christianity Might Have Stalled. Will It Reverse?” HERE)
