What Do You Believe? The Future of Religion in the World

 

I don’t know about you, but of late my news feed has been inundated with stories about religion of all varieties, but especially expansion of radical Islam (now being called “Islamic Imperialism”). Typically, my focus is on politics, economics, and history. Topics such as religion are a little outside of my usual bailiwick despite coming from a very long line of minsters, theologians, reformers, founders, crusaders, and so on. Nevertheless, with all the posts I've been receiving, it's made me curious about the trend of religion throughout the world. 

Since the end of World War II religion (particularly the militant kind) has increasingly with politics and affected global trade, war, climate change (when discussing oil and gas), population replacement, and what some are calling the “conquest with babies” of the West and Asia. What is the current state of organized religion in the world and in the United States, and what does the future look like?

In America’s post WWII “golden years”, the economy was booming. Suburbia  was booming. Everyone had a good paying job (and only dad had to work. Mom got to stay home and run things there. Housing, food, electricity, and medical care was affordable. If you lived downtown, as many Americans did, public transportation was plentiful and cheap.

If you lived out in one of the new sprawling suburbs, everyone had at least on car, although most had access to a bus line. It seems that nearly everyone could afford to take a vacation to some state or national park. And over half of every household attended religious services on a regular basis.

This was the American Dream that many of us remember or have heard stories about. We could still trust the news and government. Television was entertaining and never contained overt violence, sex, or foul language. Even cartoons were funny and didn't require parental supervision.

From the start of the 1950’s, church attendance accounted for 57% of the population and rose to 63.3% by 1960 (prior to WWII, just 37% of households attended church on a regular basis (as a disclaimer, when I discuss topics such as attending “church”, I am not specifically referencing Christianity. I am referring to any organized religious service be it Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, or other).

All that changed on a sunny afternoon in Dallas Texas on November 7, 1963, in a place named Daley Plaza at 12:30 PM. If there was a demarcation or transition point in society, that was it. It’s where our confidence and trust in the media and government was first called into question. It was the day “America’s Camelot” came to an end. It was the day when President John F. Kennedy was murdered and the coverup began.

November 7^, 1963 marked the beginning of the turbulent 1960s, with the mass protests,  some violent and some not. It marked the beginning of fundamental changes in society from the civil rights movement, the “Freedom Riders”, boycotts, desegregation,  the murders of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr and Bobby Kennedy, the Vietnam War, Women’s liberation, the decline of unions, and so much more. It also marked the beginning organized religion’s decline in America.

By the late 1960’s, weekly attendance had dropped from 63.3% in 1960 to 39% by the start of the 1970’s. It also saw the rise of so-called “alternative” religious and spiritual movements such as the "Moonies", Buddhism, yoga, Transcendental meditation blossomed along with  the "Flower Power" generation. There was a return to Native America spirituality and nature based religions of old. Today, roughly 40% of U.S. households attend services on a regular basis. 

So, what is the health of religion today? What does religion look like globally and in America? What faith is growing and what’s not, and what might it look like just a few decades down the road? To answer those questions, we need to look at how many people identify with some sort of religion.

According to most polls, roughly 84% of the world’s population claim to identify with one or more religion or faith. Of that 84%, approximately 77% self-identify as a Christian, Muslim, Hindu, or Buddhist. Out of that 77%, the largest organized religion in the world is Christianity (which includes Western with Protestantism and Catholicism as well as Eastern with denominations such as Orthodox and Coptic) represents 31% of the world’s religiously affiliated. As of 2020, there were roughly 2.3 billion Christians in the world, an increase of 121.6 million from 2010.

Christianity’s largest growth is now to be found in Sub Saharan Africa who has grown by 30.7% from 2010 to 2020. In Latin America, it has declined slightly, from 24.8% to 24.1% over the same period, and in Europe it’s dropped from 25.8% in 2010 to 22.3% ten years later. In Asia and the Pacific Rim, Christianity has remained the same with 11.8% while here at home in North America, its dropped from 12.4% to 10.5% as of 2020.

Islam, with its various sects, is the second largest with about 2 billion followers as of 2020, which represents an increase of 346.8 million since 2010, making it the fastest growing religion in the world and is nearly a quarter of the world’s population at 25%. It’s fastest growing areas are mainly in the Middle East.

Hindus are the next largest organized religion with 1.2 billion adherents, up 126.3 million from ten years earlier. That’s 15% of global population. Incidentally, India, the home of the majority of the world’s Hindus, also has the world’s largest population, having recently surpassing China.

Next on the list is Buddhism with 7% of world’s population. They make up just 0.3 million believers. Since 2010, their numbers have dropped18.6 million. Judaism comprises just 0.2% of the global population with about 14.8 million, an increase of 1 million since 2010.  Other religions such as Zoroastrianism, Taoism, Sikhs, Baha, and Shintoism comprise roughly 0.9 billion believers, which as grown 18.1 million over the previous decade.  So, is that it? Well, no, it isn’t.

While the survey looked at those who were religiously affiliated, it also examined a new and growing trend. Snuggled in between Islam and Hinduism is another group, those who fall outside of established norms. This group doesn’t identify with any particular faith or follow some deity. It’s the “unaffiliated” and according to the survey, there’s 1.9 billion of them and they’ve seen the second largest growth---270.1 million---of any group.

Who are the “unaffiliated”? They are individuals who’ve chosen different paths away from organized religion. Many say they are “spiritual”. They may dabble at being Wiccans, pantheists, or pagans. They may explore traditional paths such as shamanism (such as the Asian “Tengrism”), ethno-centric such as Celtic, Slavic, Norse, as well as African based (like Afro-Caribbean Voodoo and Hoodoo), or Native American type spirituality. They may have created their own paths such as through meditation and/or yoga (bear in mind that often these “unaffiliated” individuals are sometimes grouped into a “other” category as well just as Independents are sometimes mislabeled as "leaning" Democrat or Republican).

However, the largest segment of “unaffiliated” are simply those with no religious attachments (often saying they're “nothing in particular”). They may be agnostics or even atheist. Regardless of how they describe themselves, they aren't buying what organized religion is selling no matter how many times they change the packaging. Nevertheless, whatever path they’ve chosen to follow, they are the third largest group in numbers and the second fastest growing group. Keep them in mind, we’ll come back to them shortly.

So, let’s dig a little deeper into the unaffiliated. As pointed out above, the majority say they don’t belong to any specific religion. The largest number of unaffiliated are those who have left Christianity for some reason. Some may claim some form of spirituality, while most claim to be agnostic or atheist. China has the largest number of unaffiliated with 1.3 billion so self-identifying though they have their own private beliefs. This is roughly 90% of China’s population. The large number could be due to China’s long policy of discrediting religion since the Communist came to power under Mao in 1949.

The United States, which doesn’t have any similar policy, has the second largest number of unaffiliated---101 million---with the largest number coming from Christianity (due to the fact that Christianity is the nation’s largest religion).  Various projections show that by the year 2070, the U.S. could have 46% to 41% majority Christian to unaffiliated or a reverse of 48% to 39% unaffiliated to Christian ratio while other religions (most notably Islam)  reaches 12% of the population, mostly in large cities and among minorities.

 Aside from the United States, people moving from Christianity to unaffiliated is happening worldwide. As of 2020, they are no longer the majority in the UK (49%), Australia (47%), France (46%), or Uruguay (44%). Note too that both France and Uruguay were once heavily Catholic. In addition, Uruguay now has a majority unaffiliated population (52%). 

Netherlands now has an unaffiliated majority of 54%. In New Zealand, 51% identify as unaffiliated. Other countries with an unaffiliated majority (aside from China), include North Korea and Vietnam (which have a similar “no religion” policy), the Czech Republic, Macao, and Japan with the fastest growing number of individuals adopting the “none of the above”, which I find both interesting and a bit sad given its long history of Shintoism and devotion to ancestors. In countries where Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, or Judaism were the majority, there were no changes in their majority positions.

So, globally speaking, what does this mean? The short answer is that Christianity is losing numbers to those who seek answers outside of the religious Status Quo. They no longer want inner guidance from those with a vested interest in the answer, especially without historical proof. Religious intermediaries no longer need apply. 

 While Islam is growing (particularly outside the U.S.) the number of “none of the above” are growing rapidly everywhere around the world while Islam is growing only in certain areas. Islam will not be able to keep pace. It will, of course, try to enforce adherence, especially through intimidation and violence as it historically has done, but as long as they are unable to control what people think or feel, they’re facing a losing battle. I will add that, in my opinion, any system, secular or religious, which demands absolute obedience through fear and intimidation cannot be divinely inspired and therefore acts out of moral weakness.

Hinduism may face a similar fate as Christianity in that it will find itself confronted with the very same science based rational used by the much of the unaffiliated that it has embraced to save its economy.  This is more so when you consider that people will turn more and more to AI for their social, political, economic, and perhaps ultimately, spiritual answers.

Buddhism, as a religion, is losing numbers. That trend is likely to continue, however, Buddhism is unique in that it can be applied as either a religion or as a philosophy, and it is in the latter that it may find its own redemption since it can be applied unilaterally to the religious, spiritual, or unaffiliated akin to the teachings of Chinese philosopher, Lao Tzu or that of Confucius. Meanwhile, the growth of other non-traditional belief systems will also likely continue to grow as people turn from outside sources to more internal way of spiritual growth.

 

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The Four Largest Religions

How the Global Religious Landscape Changed From 2010 to 2020

How U.S. Religious Composition Has Changed in Recent Decades

Projecting U.S. religious groups’ population shares by 2070

Modeling the Future of Religion in America

 

Church Attendance Has Declined in Most U.S. Religious Groups