Why Do People Say They Leave the Faith?

We’ve all seen the headlines about America becoming a majority non-Christian country someday. Though we are encouraged by recent waves of conversion, we all know people who have lost their faith. We read that “while most Catholics have remained within the religious fold, a significant number have left the Catholic faith: 15 percent of the U.S. population says they were raised Catholic but no longer identify as such.” Professor Ryan Burge notes that Catholics have the worst “retention gap,” compared to other faith groups in America, among Gen Z: “For people born in 2000, 45% of them were raised Catholic. But only 28% still identify as Catholic.”

Understanding the reasons people give may help us to save souls. The stated reason for falling away may not be the real one, but something can still be drawn from the offered answers. Looking at multiple surveys from different sources at different times and in different countries can give us insight into the loss of faith or decline in Mass attendance—because the same issues keep coming up.

As a threshold matter, we need to understand what we are losing Catholics to. Our people are turning to nothing—becoming “nones.” It is not Islam or Protestantism (except maybe in parts of Latin America) that is poaching the faithful. In surveying teens 20 years ago, Professor Christian Smith found that among the third that lost their faith: “There were small losses to Protestantism and other religions but the biggest loss was the 20% that went to nonreligious. More than twice as many were sucked into nonreligious than into Protestantism.” Smith conducted the National Study of Youth and Religion, surveying thousands of teens and following up with them, noting that respondents often gave “quite vague reasons for losing their religion.” Some teens reported skepticism/disbelief (32 percent) while others “just stopped attending services” (12 percent) or had life disruption (10 percent).

In a 2016 survey, the Public Religion Research Institute identified several causes for disaffiliation from religion: 

The reasons Americans leave their childhood religion are varied, but a lack of belief in teaching of religion was the most commonly cited reason for disaffiliation. Among the reasons Americans identified as important motivations in leaving their childhood religion are: they stopped believing in the religion’s teachings (60%), their family was never that religious when they were growing up (32%), and their experience of negative religious teachings about or treatment of gay and lesbian people (29%). 

While LGBTQ+ issues are often singled out in these surveys, it really seems like a subset of not believing in a religion’s teaching. PRRI also broke this out for Catholics: 

Notably, those who were raised Catholic are more likely than those raised in any other religion to cite negative religious treatment of gay and lesbian people (39% vs. 29%, respectively) and the clergy sexual-abuse scandal (32% vs. 19%, respectively) as primary reasons they left the Church. 

The Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University conducted the National Poll of Young Catholics in 2020. The survey asked about their reasons for missing Mass pre-pandemic, with the option to select multiple reasons from a list. These included practical reasons (e.g., 57 percent cited a busy schedule) and theological (e.g., 43 percent said they were not very religious). Ten percent indicated they missed Mass because they were divorced or married outside of the Church. “Seventy-three percent of respondents agree ‘somewhat’ or ‘strongly’ that they can be a good Catholic without going to Mass every Sunday.” Clergy abuse is also mentioned among reasons for not being involved in parish life.

The Pillar’s more recent survey, and Brendan Hodge’s wise analysis, continues to pay dividends. The Pillar asked respondents: “If at some point you ceased to attend religious services regularly (for a year or longer) why did you do so?” The results “were a mix of theological issues and practical ones.” The top reason (20 percent) was moving away from their church, while others also mentioned moving away from family (17 percent). Of course, others listed theological reasons (attending church doesn’t matter at 19 percent, change in beliefs at 14 percent, etc.) and, again, behavior of religious leaders (11 percent), which must certainly include the abuse scandals. 

America is not the only country losing its religion. Western Europe has grown notoriously secular. In asking why people disaffiliated from their faith, the Pew Research Center notes that: 

Majorities also report disagreeing with religious positions on social issues, like homosexuality and abortion, as a reason they no longer identify with a religion. And at least half of respondents in several countries, especially in predominantly Catholic ones, cite church scandals. 

This includes 58 percent reporting that they did not agree with their religion’s position on social issues, 54 percent indicating they did not believe in the religion’s teachings, and 53 percent being unhappy with the scandals. Gradually shifting away from the religion, which seems to capture a number of concerns, was the top selection.

Pew flagged one country in Central Europe as particularly noteworthy: “The most dramatic shift in this regard has occurred in the Czech Republic, where the share of the public identifying as Catholic dropped from 44% in 1991 to 21% in the current survey.” The Czechs surveyed also “had an adequate sample size of people who say they were raised in a religious group and became unaffiliated as adults.” Again, “the most frequently cited reason for this shift is a gradual drifting away from religion (mentioned by 82% of Czechs who have shed their religious affiliation).” Also noteworthy was “loss of confidence in religious authorities (49%) and no longer believing in religious teachings (45%).”

Some things certainly ring true across surveys: 8 percent of Europeans indicated that marrying someone outside of their faith was a reason for leaving their religion, while 9 percent of Latin American Catholics surveyed by Pew reported the same reason for becoming a Protestant. Sometimes, though, the answers are different. The Latin American converts to Protestantism offered reasons you might expect—enjoying the new worship style (69 percent) or seeking a personal connection with God (81 percent)—but 60 percent wanted a “greater emphasis on morality.” In the United States and Europe, the Church loses people for advocating for traditional morality, but in Latin America the Church may be losing people for not advocating enough for morality.

With a few outliers, the same themes come up again and again in surveys and polls about loss of faith. I hope more qualified people will take action based on this data, but I have my own suggestions. We need better catechesis, which is obvious. We need to stop abuse scandals and remove that as a barrier to Church credibility. But we also need to address practical problems, like young people who stop attending Mass when they move away or go to college. Their former local parish could follow up with them after they move to provide encouragement to connect with the campus parish. As Catholics, we could also rethink the wisdom of sending kids away to college, particularly one without a strong Catholic identity or a vibrant campus ministry. When our own friends or family members discuss plans to move, we can ask them about the parish they plan to join. 

Ultimately, though, if our people do not understand why they should attend Mass, our encouragement will not succeed. Arguably, all of the issues identified above come back to catechesis. Professor Kenda Creasy Dean, a United Methodist Youth Pastor who worked with Professor Christian Smith on the extensive National Study of Youth and Religion, reviewed that data and concluded: “Exposing adolescents to faith, as it turns out, is no substitute for teaching it to them.”