As if we don’t have enough bad news–Putin making advances via war crimes in Ukraine, sexual perversion and abortion celebrated by our President and his administration, socialist economic policies driving stagflation, attacks on churches and pregnancy centers–lately we have also been hearing that atheism is booming and good religion is declining. People are dropping out of organized religion more than ever before, the so-called Nones.
But are they?
Baylor sociologist Byron Johnson says they are not. Surveys have reported massive religious decline because, per usual, they were not digging deep. Johnson and his team find that organized religion is actually up, and most of it is fairly traditional Christianity.
“Many [of the overlooked] are evangelical and Pentecostal churches, especially Latino and African-American congregations, as well as nondenominational churches and megachurches, many with multiple campuses. This means that instead of 344,894 congregations (based on the most recent U.S. Religious Census data), there may be as many as 500,000 houses of worship in the U.S. Omitted are not only thousands of small congregations but huge ones such as Lakewood Church in Houston (with weekly attendance of 45,000), Gateway Church in the Dallas area (100,000), North Point Community Church in Alpharetta, Ga. (40,000), Life Church in Edmund, Okla. (30,000), and Christ’s Church of the Valley in Phoenix (32,000).”
For the rest of this article at the Wall Street Journal, click here.
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