Aug. 15, 2024

By Rev. Rick King

If you have been following research on religious and social attitudes and behaviors, as I have—and if you read this column regularly, you have, too—you might find the title of this week’s column rather shocking.

I subscribe to a Substack newsletter called American Storylines, and in a report on this trend, Daniel Cox and Kelsey Eyre Hammond of the Survey Center for American Life, part of the American Enterprise Institute, related the reversal of a historical pattern.

In past generations like the Baby Boomers, men’s levels of religious engagement have always been lower than women’s. But with Gen Z, those born after 1996, 54 percent of Gen Z women left the religion they grew up in, but only 46 percent of the men.

Why is this happening, and are there implications for progressive Christian churches like us? I’m looking for a silver lining here, in part because two demographers from the American Enterprise Institute are wringing their hands over the impact on traditional, conservative Christian churches. And that’s not us.

Why it’s happening

Gender roles: 61 percent of Gen Z women identify as feminist, a higher percentage than in previous generations—so they have greater concern about how those who identify as female are treated in society compared with those who identify as male. They’re also a lot more alarmed by the way conservative churches uphold traditional gender roles, and 65 percent believe that churches systematically discriminate on the basis of gender.

LGBTQIA+ identity: Three in 10 women under the age of 30 now identify as something other than straight, and a Public Religion Research Institute study earlier this year that surveyed young people who left the religion of their childhood found that for 60 percent, a major reason was negative treatment of gay and lesbian people.

Church and culture dissonance: Gen Z has grown up in a culture that’s become more diverse and accepting of people regardless of identities of all kinds. Most young women who are straight-identified have a close friend who is not; while only about 5 percent of Americans identify as atheist, most young people have at least one friend who is.

What’s the impact on churches like ours?

This trend presents a unique challenge, since women historically have contributed a lot more of their time and effort toward building community and organizing volunteers within congregations. And traditionally mothers have been the primary faith-nurturers in all kinds of families, responding to kids’ questions about God and faith, getting them involved in children, youth and family activities at a local church, and so on. We see this in who volunteers to lead children’s faith formation and intergenerational programs here at FHC.

Yet, there’s opportunity here, if we can create a space to nurture spirituality and relationships among Gen Z adults. Our church’s spirituality is more open and less like the faith some Gen Z women have left.

What are you hearing and seeing among your Gen Z kids and grandkids? Where do you see opportunities for a new congregation if New Life Presbyterian and Falcon Heights merge? How should we budget and staff with this in mind?