Choosing Our Religion: The Spiritual Lives of America's Nones
Elizabeth Drescher
Abstract
The growth of the so-called Nones—people unaffiliated with religious institutions—has captivated religious and political leaders concerned with the implications of a “decline of religion” in the United States. But most Nones are not non-believers, most were raised in religious households, and many have robust spiritual lives that intertwine with the lives of the religiously affiliated. Choosing Our Religion explores the spiritual lives of Nones based on more than 100 intensive interviews across the United States and a survey of more than 1,000 religiously affiliated and unaffiliated Americans. ... More
The growth of the so-called Nones—people unaffiliated with religious institutions—has captivated religious and political leaders concerned with the implications of a “decline of religion” in the United States. But most Nones are not non-believers, most were raised in religious households, and many have robust spiritual lives that intertwine with the lives of the religiously affiliated. Choosing Our Religion explores the spiritual lives of Nones based on more than 100 intensive interviews across the United States and a survey of more than 1,000 religiously affiliated and unaffiliated Americans. Exploring the spiritual practices of Atheists, Agnostics, the Spiritual-But-Not-Religious, Humanists, “just spiritual” Nones, and those who describe their spiritual identities as “nothing in particular,” the book moves beyond the demographic data to bring to life what is now the fastest growing religious demographic in the country. As Nones tell their stories of engaging the spiritual in everyday life through relationships with family, friends, and nature; through reimagined practices of prayer; through the mentors, teachers, and other resources that inform and inspire their spiritualities; through their ethical outlooks and moral values; and through their nurturing of extra-institutional spiritualities in their children, a newly emerging spirituality is revealed: one that is reshaping what it means to be religious in America today for the unaffiliated and affiliated alike.
Keywords:
unaffiliated,
Nones,
spirituality,
religion,
American,
prayer,
decline of religion
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2016 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780199341221 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: April 2016 |
DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199341221.001.0001 |
