Gen-Y In A Bottle: Religionless?

A recent Pew study reported that by some considerable measures, Americans ages 18 to 29 (that’s us) are significantly less religious than older Americans. We are also less likely to claim church affiliation than our parents’ and grandparents’ generations were when they were young. According to Pew, one-in-four members of Generation Y are unaffiliated with any particular faith. This is significantly more unaffiliated than Generation Xers were at a comparable point in their life cycle and twice as unaffiliated as Baby Boomers were as young adults. So what’s with this shift?

There are many speculations as to what’s causing this decline. Some believe that Generation Y’s lack of religious affiliation can largely be understood as an extension of their negative view of, and tendency to challenge, authority institutions. Others believe this is just one more step in the long American process of privatizing and personalizing religion, something which has occurred constantly throughout American history.

Today we are able to customize our music, our communication, and our technology. Could it be that we are asking for and expecting the same with religion? If we don’t believe or follow something whole-heartedly is it difficult for us to fully get behind? Maybe being branded by religious affiliation makes us feel pigeonholed in who we are as individuals, being an extremely individualistic generation, we may feel that if we can’t relate to all, we can’t relate at all.

It’s true that generation Y thrives on one-on-one relationships. The key to pulling our generation back into the pews may not be through seminars and meetings, but rather a “Hey, it’s nice to meet you, what’s your name?” Church is structured to meet the needs of a different generation. Our needs in relation to how we communicate and learn are not the same as our parents’ or grandparents’. Instead of feeling uncomfortable in a setting that is not understood, many personalize their religion and some even classify themselves as spiritual versus religious. A nuanced American classification derived from our parents, the counterculture, in their attempt to defy authority.

When it comes down to it, our beliefs about life after death and the existence of heaven, hell and miracles closely resemble the beliefs of older people today. Even praying every day rivals the portion of young people who said the same in prior decades. And though belief in God is lower among us than among older adults, Gen Yers say they believe in God with absolute certainty at rates similar to those seen among Gen Xers a decade ago. We hold many of the same ideals we just communicate them differently.

Just as the workplace is changing to retain Generation Y, religious institutions will have to adapt a new approach in reaching and retaining. I think it’s also important to recognize that it is not religion that is the problem; it is a conflict of generational preferences, and a clashing between the old vs. the new. Religion is defined by Dictionary.com as “a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.” In this sense we are all members of a religion. Ours may just be more personalized than our parents.