American Religion: Complicated, Not Dead
The Atlantic’s Emma Green reports on the Pew Research Center’s Religious Landscape Study. The study finds that Americans are increasingly detached from organized religion—especially, it seems, from some Christian denominations—but Green argues that these results are more complex than they look. “Culture-war rhetoric often implies an epic battle between Christian conservatives and the creep of secularity; in general, that narrative is an oversimplification of American religion,” she writes. “But what these numbers do suggest is that Americans are claiming more latitude how they practice their faiths.”