According to a new study, about half of American adults have changed religious affiliation at least once during their lives.
Most people who change their religion leave their childhood faith before age 24, and many of those who change religion do so more than once. The survey, by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, is the first large-scale look at the reasons Americans switch religious affiliations.
From the executive summary:
-- The reasons people give for changing their religion - or leaving religion altogether - differ widely depending on the origin and destination of the convert.-- The group that has grown the most in recent years due to religious change is the "unaffiliated" population.
-- Two-thirds of former Catholics who have become unaffiliated and half of former Protestants who have become unaffiliated say they left their childhood faith because they stopped believing in its teachings, and roughly 4-in-10 say they became unaffiliated because they do not believe in God or the teachings of most religions.
-- Many people who left a religion to become unaffiliated say they did so in part because they think of religious people as hypocritical or judgmental, because religious organizations focus too much on rules or because religious leaders are too focused on power and money.
-- Far fewer say they became unaffiliated because they believe that modern science proves that religion is just superstition.
-- Catholicism has suffered the greatest net loss in the process of religious change. Many people who leave the Catholic Church do so for religious reasons; two-thirds of former Catholics who have become unaffiliated say they left the Catholic faith because they stopped believing in its teachings, as do half of former Catholics who are now Protestant. Fewer than 3-in-10 former Catholics, however, say the clergy sexual abuse scandal factored into their decision to leave Catholicism.
-- In contrast with other groups, those who switch from one Protestant denominational family to another (e.g., were raised Baptist and are now Methodist) tend to be more likely to do so in response to changed circumstances in their lives. Nearly 4-in-10 people who have changed religious affiliation within Protestantism say they left their childhood faith, in part, because they relocated to a new community, and nearly as many say they left their former faith because they married someone from a different religious background.
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