Churches losing membership four times faster than they are gaining it

[Mister Agenda]

My own in-depth research (in the UK/ England & Wales) actually puts this massive drop in attendance here to way back in the 60s and last generation's revolt against the religious conservatism of their parents.

Then let the cohort effect take hold and you have a situation where children today are even less likely to espouse a religion than their parents.

The globalisation of knowledge has put religious claims under more scrutiny than ever. In the marketplace of ideas, at least in Western and Northern Europe, those ideas are - Edit - I initially said losing, but actually it would be more accurate to say they are found unconvincing when compared to the alternatives.

There's a common wisdom that the USA tends to run about 50 years behind Western Europe in cultural trends.

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A lot of our Christian visitors seem blissfully unaware of this trend. It's not unusual for them to point out that we are barely hanging on, or to offer 'advice' on how to increase our numbers, since we're clearly doing it wrong.