Is the Decline in Religious Affiliation Slowing? Some Scholars Say Maybe

For more than a generation, the story of American religion has had one dominant plotline: the steady rise of the so-called nones, people who tell pollsters they have no religious affiliation. Now a small but vocal group of scholars is asking a contrarian question. What if that rise, after years of seemingly unstoppable growth, is beginning to slow?

The answer matters well beyond academia. The growth of the unaffiliated has reshaped politics, charity, family life and the basic assumptions of a country that once described itself as broadly churchgoing. If the trend is plateauing, it would force a rethink of forecasts that assumed secularization would simply continue indefinitely.

What the surveys actually show

Large national surveys over the past two decades have tracked a clear pattern. The share of adults claiming no religion climbed from a small minority in the early 1990s to roughly a quarter or more by the late 2010s, depending on how the question was asked. Religious switching, generational replacement and a growing comfort with saying you have no faith all fed the increase.

The debate now is about the shape of the curve. A few researchers point to recent survey years where the numbers appeared to flatten, or where the rate of increase shrank compared with earlier jumps. They caution that survey-to-survey wobble is normal, and that one or two years of slower growth is not the same as a reversal. Still, they argue it is worth watching.

The case that the decline is slowing

Scholars who suspect a plateau tend to lean on a handful of arguments:

• Much of the early growth came from cultural Christians, people loosely attached to a faith, finally admitting they had no real connection. That pool may be running low.
• The remaining religious population is, on average, more committed, making it less likely to drift away.
• Some recent survey waves show the unaffiliated share holding roughly steady rather than climbing.
• International comparisons suggest secularization can stall at levels well short of total.

In this reading, the dramatic phase of the shift was a one-time correction, as social pressure to claim a religion faded and people gave more honest answers. Once that correction works through the population, the thinking goes, growth naturally tapers.

The case that it is still rising

Other researchers are unconvinced. They note that the youngest adults remain far more likely than their elders to claim no religion, which means generational replacement alone should keep pushing the overall number up for years. As older, more religious cohorts pass on and are replaced by less religious young people, the unaffiliated share has a built-in tailwind.

This camp warns against reading too much into a flat year or two. They argue the long arc still points downward for organized religion, even if the slope is gentler than it once was. The honest position, several concede, is uncertainty: the data are noisy, and a few more survey cycles will be needed before anyone can say the trend has truly turned.

Why religious institutions are watching closely

For churches, the question is not academic. A plateau would offer a measure of relief and a reason to invest in holding the committed core rather than bracing for continual losses. A continued slide would intensify debates already roiling many denominations about how to stay relevant.

Those internal debates are sharp and often public. The Church of England has been arguing over whether conservative views on sexuality should remain part of an ongoing conversation, a fight that takes on added weight when every member counts. Catholic leaders have faced their own version, with a Vatican opening on sexuality that worried conservatives and cheered reformers, each side claiming its approach is the one that will keep people in the pews.

A trend still being written

The most defensible conclusion, for now, is modest. The explosive growth of the unaffiliated may be entering a calmer phase, but the evidence is too thin and too recent to call a turning point. Generational momentum still favors further decline; the exhaustion of the cultural-Christian pool may slow it. Both can be true at once.

What is clear is that the religious map of the United States is no longer simple, and that confident predictions in either direction tend to age badly. Our culture coverage follows these shifts as they happen, because the way a society believes, or stops believing, ripples through nearly everything else. The nones, whatever their final share, are now a permanent feature of the landscape, and the only real argument left is over how large that feature will grow.