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Correction: Since the 1940s "For the first time" is probably not true. This is since Gallup tracked this number. Post WWII church attendance really sky rockete
by hacknat 6y ago
Correction: Since the 1940s
"For the first time" is probably not true. This is since Gallup tracked this number. Post WWII church attendance really sky rocketed for reasons that are still not fully understood, but a lot of people think the emergence of the Evangelical movement bears a lot of the responsibility. It's much harder to track pre-WWII numbers, but according to the "Mapping America's Past" authors[1] church attendance was as low as 35% in the 19th century (sometimes).
[1] https://www.amazon.com/dp/0805049274/?coliid=I38DOW2LIAPT9J&colid=VD8KIOT3J87V&psc=1&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it https://www.amazon.com/dp/0805049274/?coliid=I38DOW2LIAPT9J&...
- hinkley 6y agoDo you suppose it has anything to do with all the infrastructure that had to be built out new for the baby boomers? All of a sudden you needed twice as many grade schools, then middle schools, etc. We don't do catholic boarding schools as much any more (too much bad PR of several flavors, for example) but they definitely did at the time. I wonder if the church-going came first or the religious schools did. I think a number of the traditionally religious immigrant waves arrived well before WWI, so that probably doesn't have anything much to do with it, unless those groups had far more children post WWII...
- captainredbeard 6y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Awakening https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Awakening
- perrylaj 6y agoIn mid-century US, religiosity/faith were also promoted by capitalists as counters to rising global popularity of Communism/Socialism. The 1954 addition of "Under God" to the USA's Pledge of Allegiance was marketed (in part) as a means of differentiating from the Godless Communists. I'd be surprised if this big push toward an obvious "Blessed Nation" wasn't a primary driver in the shift.