Reference for Image:
Sneads Ferry Original Freewill Baptist Church.(2022,May 4).updated their cover photo[Photo].Facebook. https://m.facebook.com/236138145651/phot os/a.10156182231315652/10166404257980652/?type=3&source=48&paipv=0&eav=AfYyd1FHa37mlJOMNfeKYIs278itfzZPYxkOEgYyqc0Duek8BeWsYfjDZ4P3bhx4xxA
Presentation Script:
Religion is an uncomfortable topic because it brings into question people’s ability to believe and have faith, as well as asking the big questions of life like what happens when we die? or what is our purpose? For me, religion is a messy part of my life, I had always believed in God, but as I grew up and went to college, that changed, and my ability to just believe without question got harder. I chose to research Secularization to see if what I was experiencing was a personal epiphany or if this was a trend in society. I did this by asking the question of how the Secularization of modern society is affecting local Christians?
A study by Gregory Smith revealed some statistics that showed I was not alone in this epiphany I was feeling. In the United States, three in ten adults identify as secularists. This is an increase of almost sixteen percent from 2007. Also, this transition mostly came from the Christianity belief, which had declined by fifteen percent from 2021; of the 63% of people who identify as Christians, only a quarter of them admit to attending religious service weekly, Revealing that the Christian faith is experiencing some a sharp decline in participation and belief.
I went on to research these ideas by conducting a real-world observation of a local community church and an Interview with a small-town Reverend to see just how impactful these trends were in local communities.
The Observation was of The Sneads Ferry Original Free-Will Baptist Church, a small church that had been around for over a hundred years. I entered and was greeted by elderly folk who were surprised to see a single youth entering the church. Inside the church, many more pews were available than people to fill them. As I examined the small congregation consisting of no more than fifty people, of which at least seventy percent were over sixty, and what little youth there was consisted of a few middle-aged families and a few small children. Although the elderly were the majority, and most of the service was in the traditional views of Christianity, I noticed two things the church did to incorporate youth; first was Sunday school for the small children, and the second was amidst the traditional hymns, there was a flare of non-contemporary Christian music. In the end, it seemed this church’s only purpose was to be there to survive its elderly congregation.
Following this bleak observation of what I would classify as a current representation of a Southern Baptist church, I sat down with the Pastor to get his thoughts on Secularization. He described that since his time as Pastor, he had seen a thirty percent drop in attendance, and when I asked about youth and questioned how the church was to survive without them. He believed his church consisting of mostly elderly people and so well established in the community, was too hesitant or stubborn to change drastically enough that would be necessary to encourage and indoctrinate the youth for future generations. His voice was disheartened as he said that some churches outlive their viability and must allow younger churches who are more flexible and adopting of new interpretations of the bible to prosper. He saw it more fit as the duty of the Reverend to fulfill their life requirements and allow the church to end so that the youth could be better suited and appreciated at churches with more diversity in worship.
The evidence of this small local community church provides support to the trends that have been attributed to the entire nation. Secularization is on the rise, and churches are seeing declining rates of attendance and participation. The long-term life of churches similar to the Sneads Ferry Original Free-Will Baptist Church is decreasing as the youth’s intolerance for tradition and inflexibility rises. Whether or not these effects are good or bad for a nation is not subject to the research I’ve conducted, but without question, the effects of Secularization on local Christians are devastating to the viability and support of these small congregations.
Explication of Research:
Preface:
Religion can be uneasy and anxious or tempting and euphoric, but regardless religion tends to be an uncomfortable topic because it brings into question people’s ability to believe and have faith, as well as asking the big questions of life like what happens when we die? or what is our purpose? For me, though religion is a messy part of my life, I was born and raised Southern Baptist and, until the age of about sixteen, I had always believed in God, but as I grew up and went to college, that changed, and my ability to just believe without question got harder and harder. Therefore, I chose to research Secularization to see if what I was experiencing was a personal epiphany or if this was a trend with the youth of society. I did this by asking the question of how the Secularization of modern society is affecting local Christians.
Background:
To begin the research, I started with context and background information on this idea of Secularization. The definition of Secularization itself is the act or process by which something becomes secular, which is the attitude of the act of having no religious basis. I found it helpful to think of society as either secular or religious for this project, but in reality, humanity lives on a spectrum of sacred and secular beliefs.
A study by Gregory Smith published by the Pew Research Center revealed some statistics that shed some light on this epiphany I was feeling, revealing I was not alone. In the United States, three in ten U.S. adults identify as religious nones or people who describe themselves as atheists, agnostics, or nothing. This is an increase of almost one hundred percent from 2007. Also, this transition mostly came from the Christianity belief, which had declined by fifteen percent from 2007 to 2021; in 2021, of the 63% of people who identify as Christians, only a quarter of them admit to attending religious service weekly. Finally, a revealing statistic I found most impactful was in 2007, Christians could outnumber the religious none’s by five to one, but today that number is as low as two to one. Whether this is a good thing or bad is not the topic of this research, but this article does show that the Christian faith is experiencing a sharp decline in participation and belief.
Another article that further corroborates this social shift in society in the United States is an article by Voas and Chaves, who narrowed in the search for Secularization to understand the United States as experiencing a complex overturn of the novel idea that America is a religious country. They define the following two empirical reasons why the United States is a counterexample to Secularization, “First, American religiosity has, in fact, been declining for decades, and second, that decline has been produced by the same generational patterns that lie behind religious decline elsewhere in the West: each successive cohort is less religious than the preceding one” (Voas & Chaves, 2016, p. 1517). Each defining reasoning is a research question in itself, but for the purpose of this research, we focus on the final effect, which is that Secularization is a rising issue in the United States of America.
Observational and Analysis:
Being equipped with the background knowledge of existing trends and beliefs with Secularization and religious attitudes, I went to research these ideas by conducting a real-world observation of a local community church and an Interview with a small-town Reverend to see just how impactful these trends were in local communities of the United States.
The Observation was of The Sneads Ferry Free-Will Baptist Church, a small church that had been around for over a hundred years. I was greeted by elderly folk who were surprised to see a single youth break into the church. Inside the church, there were many more pews available than people to fill them, indicating to me that something must be wrong. As I examined the small congregation consisting of no more than 35 people, of which at least seventy percent were over fifty, and what little youth there was consisted of a few middle-aged families and a few small children. Although the elderly were the majority and most of the service was servicing the traditional views of Christianity, I noticed two things the church did to incorporate youth; first was Sunday school for the small children, and the second was amidst the traditional hymns, there was a flare of non-contemporary Christian music which most of the congregation never recognized. This church was small and quiet and old and really only served the purpose of being there to survive its elderly congregation, and in it was dying attempt to indoctrinate the youth was more of a dream than a reality that anyone there could recognize.
Following this bleak observation of what I would classify as a current representation of a southern Baptist church, I decided to sit down with the Pastor of the church to get his thoughts on Secularization. He described that since his time as Pastor, he had seen a thirty percent drop in attendance in the congregation, and most of the congregation that remains are elderly folk who grew up in Sneads Ferry. I probed about youth and questioned how the church was to survive without them. He said that he believed his church was elderly and established too in the community to change drastically enough that would be necessary to encourage and indoctrinate the youth; his voice was saddened and disheartened as he said some churches outlive their viability and must die to allow younger churches more flexible and more adopting to new interpretations of the bible to prosper. His view was that the church was so deeply embellished in tradition, and since the congregation was mostly elderly, he saw it more fit as the duty of the Reverend to fulfill their life requirements and worship with them to the beyond and allow the church to die so that the youth could be better suited and appreciated at churches with more diversity in worship.
Conclusion:
During my research, I had made the assumption beforehand that I may not be alone before researching the subject of Secularization, which may have obfuscated the results of observation and interview, As instead of accommodating my existing schemas to the new information, I may have been subject to the assimilation of the fitting the new information into my already existing schemas. Whether or not this affected my field notes and, thus, the conclusions drawn from those would be difficult to untangle, for the purpose of full disclosure, this bias was necessary to disclose as a potential covariate of the research.
As has been demonstrated, the research into this small local community church provides support to the trends that have been attributed to the entire nation. Secularization is on the rise, and churches are seeing declining rates of attendance and participation. The long-term life of churches similar to the Sneads Ferry Free-Will Baptist Church is decreasing, and these institutions that have been around for decades are dying as the youth’s intolerance for tradition and inflexibility rises. Whether or not these effects are good or bad for a nation is not subject to the research I’ve conducted, but without question, the effects of Secularization on local Christians are devastating to the viability and support of these small congregations.
References:
Smith, G. A. (2022). About three-in-ten U.S. adults are now religiously unaffiliated. Pew Research Center’s Religion & Public Life Project. Retrieved from https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2021/12/14/about-three-in-ten-u-s-adults-are-now-religiously-unaffiliated/
Voas D, Chaves M.(2016).Is the United States a counterexample to the secularization thesis?. American Journal of Sociology,121(5),1517–1556.doi:10.1086/684202
Featured Image:
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