Saying you were at church, fingers crossed behind your back
Shankar Vendantam has been reviewing the literature on how church attendance numbers are derived, and he has some relevant commentary.
First, there's the old do-you-believe-in-God style of research, which gets you the results of an opinion poll, but is not to be confused with pew-sitting. Beyond that, though, apparently you can either ask a person straight-up if they went to church on Sunday, or you could say, "Tell me what you did Sunday and for how long you did it and with whom," and allegedly you get a more honest answer.
The better studies ascertain whether people attend church, not what they feel in their hearts. It's possible that many Americans are deeply religious but don't attend church (even as they claim they do). But if the data raise serious questions about self-reported church attendance, they ought to raise red flags about all aspects of self-reported religiosity. Besides, self-reported church attendance has been held up as proof that America has somehow resisted the secularizing trends that have swept other industrialized nations. What if those numbers are spectacularly wrong?....
"If Americans are going to church at the rate they report, the churches would be full on Sunday mornings and denominations would be growing," wrote C. Kirk Hadaway, now director of research at the Episcopal Church. (Hadaway's research has included evangelical congregations, which reported sharp growth in recent decades.)
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In a more recent study, Hadaway estimated that if the number of Americans who told Gallup pollsters that they attended church in the last week were accurate, about 118 million Americans would be at houses of worship each week. By calculating the number of congregations (including non-Christian congregations) and their average attendance, Hadaway estimated that in reality about 21 percent of Americans attended religious services weekly—exactly half the number who told pollsters they did.
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I don't think religious intensity necessarily explains how religiosity becomes part of one's identity. Canada and the United States are quite different today in terms of their religious intensity and the importance they attach to the role of religion in public life, yet citizens in both countries greatly exaggerate their church attendance.
Vendantam offers some thoughts about why this is so, but seems equally interested in pointing out the simple fact of the incongruity between what we say we do and what we actually do. That seems valid enough, but assuming it's an argument with traction, where would it take us?
It strikes me that one place to go next is to an internal gut-check: Perhaps you could ask people who report church attendance what value they derive from the experience. Do honesty or truth-telling appear anywhere on the list of reported responses?
For me, this raises two questions:
1) Obviously those reporting that they have attended church but have in fact not attended have at least gone church at some point in their lives. How is the church inoculating people to the extent that while they know that they should attend church they choose not to?
2) If the statistics are accurate, perhaps the problem lies in our assumption that if one takes his or her faith seriously that person attends church. Have many of our churches gotten so spiritually shallow and/or out of touch that those who truly wish to grow in their faith feel that they must look elsewhere for spiritual nourishment and exercise?
Just food for thought.
Posted by Tom Sramek Jr![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/nav-commenters.gif)
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December 26, 2010 3:11 PM
"...the incongruity between what we say we do and what we actually do." I think this statement also describes the disconnect between what Christians say they believe and what they actually do in their lives. So, no surprise that people inflate their church going. Jesus' teachings have been lost in the duelism that characterizes our lives. The disconnect is so common that it has become the norm, no longer questioned by most. What Christians say and what they actually do are not congruent. If they were congruent, more people would have jobs, fewer people would need to shop at food pantries and all people would have access to health care. The real question is why is there such a big disconnect?
Posted by Jane Kniffin![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/nav-commenters.gif)
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December 26, 2010 5:37 PM
To me, it suggests that the god so many Americans say they believe in, values only human appearances.
A year ago, I saw Avatar at a Sunday movie matinee w/ some friends (half-price, but only at the earliest AM show. We all have limited $ means). Had I been polled that week, it never would have occurred to me to NOT say "I didn't attend church last Sunday." My God simply isn't, well, a jerk like that in the attendence-taking department!
JC Fisher
Posted by tgflux![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/nav-commenters.gif)
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December 26, 2010 5:41 PM
I suppose we should raise an issue of what we mean by "in the last week." A parallel question has been raised about using average Sunday attendance as the measure of participation. I have in mind a person who attends my midweek Eucharist as her primary weekly service. She would attend in a parish on Sunday, and I have encouraged it; but she doesn't drive, and where we live there's no public transportation on Sunday; and she hasn't much support from her family. If once we can get her there, I'm hopeful a member of the parish will be willing to help. Until then, she doesn't get counted on Sunday.
On the other hand, there continues to be an expectation, at least among those who acknowledge being Christians, of weekly attendance. I often have patients say to me, looking sheepish, that they "don't attend as often as I should." My initial reaction is that so few folks attend regularly that if I wanted to scold folks for lack of attendance, I wouldn't have time to talk to them about anything else.
Marshall Scott
Posted by Execute![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/nav-commenters.gif)
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December 26, 2010 10:53 PM