(ANALYSIS) There’s this well-worn phrase you hear in Christian circles: “Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian any more than standing in a garage makes you a car.” It’s often used by pastors to remind people that simply showing up on Sunday isn’t enough to be a faithful Christian. The point is that authentic faith is more than just checking a box once a week.
Read More(ANALYSIS) The most important piece of data analysis in that post came from the Nationscape survey — a weekly study conducted between 2019 and early 2021. The total sample size was over 477,000 respondents, which means there were nearly five thousand Latter-day Saints in the dataset.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Boy, do I have a treat for you all today! Do you ever wonder how the partisanship of people who work for religious organizations varies compared to folks who work in other industries?
Read More(ANALYSIS) Has there been a noticeable decline in the share of 18–22-year-olds who identify as transgender over the last couple of years? The answer is unequivocal: Yes.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Here’s what I love about my “job” now — people actually go out of their way to send me updated denominational statistics. I used to have to hunt for them across all kinds of websites and online resources.
Read More(ANALYSIS) (ANALYSIS) So, there’s this verse you sometimes hear in an evangelical worship service. It’s from 2 Thessalonians 3:10: “For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.”
Read More(ANALYSIS) One of the most important cyclical events in my life as a data analyst of American religion is the semi-regular release of the General Social Survey.
Read More(ANALYSIS) I can pretty much pinpoint the moment I got the inspiration for this post. I was riding my spin bike in the basement, watching a series on my phone called “Band of Brothers.” I know, I know — I should have watched it multiple times by now.
Read More(ANALYSIS) I keep a little list in the notes app on my phone — just a running log of potential ideas for the newsletter. Most of them are only a few words, just enough to remind me to poke around in the data when I get back to my computer. If I’m being honest, about 75% of those ideas go nowhere. Either the data doesn’t tell a compelling story, or that “great dataset” someone mentioned turns out to be nothing like they described.
Read More(ANALYSIS) One of the most important questions we are trying to answer in The Nones Project is: Do non-religious people have feelings of self-worth and satisfaction that are similar to traditionally religious Americans? In many ways, this may be the most important issue to address when talking about the rising share of nones in the United States.
Read More(ANALYSIS) During the Renaissance, it was a common motif in paintings. There would be a skull in the background or possibly an hourglass.
Read More(ANALYSIS) A majority of mainline Protestant Christians voted for Donald Trump in 2024. They also supported him in 2020 and 2016. In fact, even during Barack Obama’s landslide election in 2008, the mainline was evenly divided at the ballot box.
Read More(ANALYSIS) OK, so there’s this response option to a single survey question that has intrigued me for a very long time. It’s about religious attendance. Across different surveys, the number of response options can vary. The standard is typically six increments, but others — like the General Social Survey — use eight.
Read More(ANALYSIS) My assumption was that religious folks — especially those from more conservative backgrounds — wouldn’t feel very positively about tattoos. But it’s also clear that the overall stigma around tattoos has faded tremendously over the last couple of decades.
Read More(ANALYSIS) I’m not exaggerating when I say this — there is no other long-term, cross-sectional survey of the adult U.S. population that asks about religion in such a useful way. It’s the tree trunk of empirical social science in this space, and it’s cited everywhere. The phrase “General Social Survey” appeared in more than 4,400 articles published in 2024, according to Google Scholar.
Read More(ANALYSIS) There’s a certain kind of conversation that happens among pastors and denominational leaders, usually in almost hushed tones: “Did you hear about how [insert church name] added a thousand new attendees last year?” Someone will inevitably chime in with another example of a church experiencing rapid growth. Before long, the discussion circles back to the same question: “How in the world do they do that?”
Read More(ANALYSIS) I’ve always found survey questions about prayer in public schools somewhat difficult to interpret because the context matters so much. For example, what if a local school district simply offers a quiet time for students to meditate or read? Students could choose to pray during this period, but it wouldn’t be mandatory. Or what if the teacher guides the class in a moment of self-reflection, encouraging students to set their intentions for the day?
Read More(ANALYSIS) One of my main goals as a professor is to get students excited about the material. In a philosophy of youth ministry class our instructor wrote in big letters on the board, “It’s a sin to bore people with the Gospel.” I’ve taken that to heart and expanded it — it’s a sin to bore people at all.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Way back in the early days of this newsletter, I wasn’t very good at titling my posts. I know it seems like something an academic shouldn’t think about, but it really does matter. Here’s an example.
Read More(ANALYSIS) The more I think about what religion means, the more that I think that there are just two camps of people in the United States.
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