Here’s why Gen Z may be least religious in U.S. history, according to 5 young Arizonans – The Arizona Republic

Sami Al-Asady met an atheist for the first time in eighth grade. That interaction, he said, “awakened the possibility that I don’t have to subscribe to a faith.”

Al-Asady’s parents are war refugees who experienced religious violence.

His father grew up in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and bore witness to conflict between Sunnis and Shias. His mother is from Bosnia, which saw the massacre of thousands of Muslims by Serbian troops in the 1990s.

“I think religion on a personal level can be very meaningful for people, but on a systemic level, when it’s intertwined in government and politics, it can yield disastrous outcomes,” he said.

Al-Asady said his parents continued practicing Islam after moving to the United States but described their current adherence as more cultural than spiritual, a blend of American values and those of their respective home countries. Al-Asady said he went to services at mosques growing up but that the prayers and ceremonies “felt like something distant for me.”

That interaction in eighth grade put him on a path toward secular activism. Al-Asady, now a freshman studying political science at Arizona State University, sits on the board of Secular Communities for Arizona, a role in which he informs the public on issues related to religious freedom and advocates for policy proposals that uphold the separation of church and state.

Though Al-Asady is concerned that social media has made some in his generation less active when it comes to in-person civic engagement, he also sees it as a “huge positive” in its ability to expose people to others of vastly different backgrounds and identities.

He sees that having implications years down the road when Generation Z takes the reins of religion, both because of the increase in its nonreligious members and the willingness of its religious members to question their own beliefs.

“When we have these positions, we’ll be more tolerant, more accepting, more open-minded, more willing to work across different lines that previously have divided us,” he said.

Al-Asady said he had to reckon with the differences between his and his parents’ views on religion, but that they have been able to respect each other and find common ground.

“That’s the most important part, I think,” he said. “Across the country we’re divided. We don’t respect each other. We see each other’s views as awful and dangerous instead of seeing each other as humans and people that have unique experiences.”

Generation Z is defined as people born in 1997 or later, making them up to 24 years old in 2021, according to the Pew Research Center, which has not yet set an end point for the generation.

Terry Shoemaker, a professor at Arizona State University, said seeing Generation Z’s attitudes toward faith unfold makes it a “fascinating time to be alive” as a religious scholar. He’s watched the “decline and decay” of some religious institutions and practices while seeing others, such as the idea of being “spiritual but not religious,” flourish.

A study published in 2020 by Springtide Research Institute reported 61% of Generation Z is religiously affiliated while 39% is unaffiliated.

Sixty percent of those in Generation Z who are religiously unaffiliated still describe themselves as “at least slightly spiritual,” according to the study.

Among those who are affiliated with a religious tradition, 52% have “little to no trust” in organized religion and 20% do not consider themselves a religious person, the study found.

Barna Group, a Christian research firm, described Generation Z in 2018 as the “first truly ‘post-Christian’ generation” and reported that the percentage of teenagers who identify as atheists was 13% — double that of the general population.

Shoemaker said his students have a “real thirst for” religion, but that it seems they’re more interested in learning about the people in the world around them than self-discovery. 

“I’m not teaching them about themselves; what I’m teaching them is something that is foreign to them generationally,” he said. “It’s really, really interesting but it’s not pertinent to them … they’re not attached to that in the same way previous generations were attached to it.”

He’s seen that trend come to light within his own classroom, saying students have remarked that taking his courses helped them understand their grandparents better. That included a young man who hadn’t grown up in the church and attended a Presbyterian service with his grandparents.

“He thought it was quite lovely – the organ, the liturgy, the processional, the rituals – and then he said at the end, ‘but why do I need this?'” Shoemaker said.

Those observations are echoed by Springtide Research Institute’s study, which found that nearly one-third of religiously affiliated members of Generation Z do not think it’s important to have a faith community and 33% attend religious services once per year or less.

“I wonder if some of the religious groups will honestly kind of fade out because those rituals and practices, as beautiful as they may be, just aren’t connecting with the new generation,” Shoemaker said.

Tabark Abdelhabib, 23, grew up in a Muslim household. She described her faith initially as “passive,” but said she became more active once she reached high school and wanted to gain a deeper understanding of her faith, both for herself and to counter inaccurate portrayals of and attitudes toward Islam.

“I felt like I needed to look deeper so if it ever comes up in conversation, I could speak about Islam in an authentic way,” she said.

Abdelhabib said she “fell in love” with her faith, particularly its focus on mindfulness and the “bigger sense of purpose” she said Islam provides.

She said she has seen others her age undergo the same process to better understand their faiths.

“It’s not necessarily questioning the religious beliefs, per se, it’s usually questioning how they were taught religion and how they experienced it growing up,” she said.

She said she thinks scholars and teachers may further change the way they approach teaching Islam in the years to come, adding that she’s already seen that happen with older generations questioning the way they were taught. 

“They were taught about fearing God versus loving God,” she said. “Now, I’m seeing a shift of scholars talk about Allah’s loving qualities.”

Shoemaker said social media has played a key role in young peoples’ deconstruction of faith, offering them a sense of community that in past generations was found in houses of worship. 

That was the case for Abdelhabib, who said Muslim scholars are more accessible than ever before through social media and create “really honest virtual spaces” where people are free to grapple with their faith.

“My generation likes more opportunities to ask questions and more opportunities to engage in religious literature and experience it themselves rather than being told, ‘here’s what you’re supposed to do,'” she said.

Manvi Harde, 17, has followed her family’s Jain tradition throughout her life but she told The Arizona Republic in June that she “never developed a deep love for the religion until I started exploring interfaith.”

She called Jainism a “beautiful” tradition that celebrates nonviolence and the “multiplicity of viewpoints,” which goes hand in hand with her participation with interfaith movements.

“It just embraces so many different things,” she said. “It’s wonderful to follow such a unique tradition — it allows me to bring that unique perspective into the conversation.”

Harde said many in Gen Z may have developed negative connotations with religion, at least in the form they were taught, because it’s “never something that we get to build for ourselves.”

As part of her efforts to dig deeper into religion, she approached the Arizona Faith Network in 2018 to ask how she could get involved and began an internship with the organization soon after. 

Harde pitched the idea of starting an interfaith youth council, which came to fruition in 2020. The group would meet once a month and have “very open discussions” on everything from the pandemic to Black Lives Matter, with Harde adding that the council helped members approach issues of the day “through this really beautiful lens of faith.”

She said it’s “incredible” to have the youth council during “really pivotal points in our lives.”

“It’s like the sun is shining again,” she said. “I realize there are people in the same boat as me. It kind of brings me a lot of hope, (that) there are people who are pushing for more interfaith dialogue.”

Talking about religion and politics is often considered a breach of etiquette, but Harde said religion’s influence on people’s thoughts and actions makes it an important topic to discuss. A lack of communication and understanding among people of various faith backgrounds is “really setting us back,” she said.

“We’re not going to be able to completely move forward and address things holding us back … without talking about a core part of us,” she said.

Abby Caplan, 16, has attended North Scottsdale United Methodist Church her entire life and in June served as a youth representative to the denomination’s Desert Southwest Conference.

Caplan attended church council meetings in the lead up to the conference, during which she proposed that the church display banners commemorating LGBTQ Pride Month.

She told The Republic in June that she was “really nervous” and shaking as she gave her speech in support of the proposal over a Zoom council meeting. Caplan said she had “prepared for the worst” with counter-arguments in the event of pushback from the council. 

They weren’t necessary, though, as she received unanimous support. 

The banners were put on display by the start of June, and it was just over a week later they were stolen.

Caplan, who is gay, said church leadership is generally “very accepting” of the LGBTQ community but that there “are obviously some individuals (within the congregation) who are not accepting, or neutral, and that’s a little hard.”

She recalled having a gay Sunday school teacher when she was in junior high, saying there’s a “very accepting” culture among the church’s youth.

That, to Caplan, represents a shift in how her generation views faith compared to older, more traditional generations.

She’s asked friends at school what the odds are of them voluntarily going to church, telling The Republic the number is “pretty low.”

“The church has burnt people in the past and a lot of churches aren’t dealing with that, at least not in the way some of us would like to see,” she said.

The Pew Research Center has found that Generation Z’s social and political stances are similar to those of Millennials. Shoemaker said religious institutions are starting to reckon with that reality, with some denominations taking more progressive stances on certain issues.

“We’re already seeing signals of religious institutions debating internally how much they can adapt to the way the world is changing,” he said. “I think we’ll see much more of that as more religious institutions continue to lose members.”

Pope Francis last year, for example, became the first pontiff to endorse same-sex civil unions. Though the Vatican said earlier this year that the Catholic Church cannot bless those unions, Shoemaker said the fact that the Church is even talking about it is evidence of changing attitudes. 

“I just can’t even imagine two decades ago, any Catholic thinking a pope would be having those conversations,” he said.

Shoemaker said religions have been “very malleable over their existence,” adding that if religious traditions don’t evolve with changing attitudes they may risk forever losing Gen Z.

Though Caplan said she would likely return to the church on home visits from college,  she doesn’t see herself “going to communities of faith and seeking them out wherever I am,” adding that it’s “hard to tell if they would be accepting of people like me.”

“I’m kind of agnostic, maybe,” she said. “It hasn’t been an important part of my life the past few years. I’d like to find communities outside of faith I can be a part of.” 

Caplan said churches could be more successful at retaining young people by embracing their questions and activism, but acknowledged that that might not be something other congregants are interested in. 

“Older people want church to stay the same and young people want it to change — who are you going to follow?” she said.

As the segment of the population that is not religious at all grows, more young people are finding alternative ways to connect with each other.

Akash Satpathy, a 22-year-old senior at University of Arizona, spent time learning about others’ experiences and sharing his own at “Ask an Atheist” events held on campus prior to the pandemic. 

The events were hosted by Secular Students Alliance, an organization that Satpathy was involved with before it went on hiatus.

Satpathy participated in the events at least once a month, telling The Republic that passersby would ask him questions about atheism and secularism and he would inquire about their faiths. 

Though they brought different beliefs to the table, Satpathy said the conversations often led to finding more similarities than differences.

“Most people agreed upon the same things — the way we reached that conclusion was slightly different,” he said.

Satpathy was raised in a Hindu family and claimed a religious identity until he reached adulthood, at which point he spent several months reading Hindu religious books as well as parts of the Bible and Koran before coming to the conclusion that he didn’t believe in God. 

Though he said he was still expected to participate in Hindu religious ceremonies with his family, Satpathy said he’s “lucky” that they are generally accepting of his views.

He feels the same acceptance among his Generation Z peers, adding that it’s “no longer socially frowned upon if you are nonreligious.” He said even his religious friends don’t attend services regularly and are open to challenging their beliefs.

Like Al-Asady, Satpathy hopes that translates into more interest in secular activism, which he said is not at odds with a religious identity.

“I hope they realize they can still be secular and go to church every Sunday, go on missions, do everything they want to do and still believe that the church should stay separate,” he said.

Reach the reporter at bfrank@arizonarepublic.com or 602-444-8529.  Follow her on Twitter @brieannafrank. 

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