America Wants a God

New York Times

20-04-2025

Americans believe.
Most people are wary of the government, the future and even each other, but they still believe in astonishing possibilities. Almost all Americans — 92 percent of adults — say they have a spiritual belief, in a god, human souls or spirits, an afterlife or something 'beyond the natural world,' as we reported earlier this year.
The country seems to be acknowledging this widespread spiritual hunger. America's secularization is on pause, people have stopped leaving churches, and religion is taking a more prominent role in public life — in the White House, Silicon Valley, Hollywood and even at Harvard. It's a major, generational shift. But what does this actually look like in people's lives?
I have spent the past year reporting 'Believing,' a new project for The Times. This project is personal to me. I was raised a devout Mormon in Arkansas. I've left the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and I understand how wrestling with belief can define a life. I hoped to capture what that journey looked like for others, too — both inside and outside of religion. I interviewed hundreds of people, visited dozens of houses of worship and asked Times readers for their stories. More than 4,000 responded.
In my reporting, I found that there are many reasons for this shift in American life. Researchers say the pandemic and the country's limited social safety nets have inclined people to stick with (or even turn to) religion for support. But there is another reason, too: Many Americans are dissatisfied with the alternatives to religion. They feel an existential malaise, and they're looking for help. People want stronger communities, more meaningful rituals and spaces to express their spirituality. They're also longing to have richer, more nuanced conversations about belief.
Unsatisfying alternatives
Over the past few decades, around 40 million Americans left churches, and the number of people who say they have no religion grew to about 30 percent of the country.
Many people turned to their jobs, gym classes (yoga, CrossFit, SoulCycle) and mysticism (astrology apps and meditation) for answers on how to live well. Some stopped speaking about their past faith — it was unfashionable, in big cities and on college campuses, to do so.
Studies provide a sense of how that's going: 'There is overwhelming empirical support for the value of being at a house of worship on a regular basis on all kinds of metrics — mental health, physical health, having more friends, being less lonely,' said Ryan Burge, a former pastor and a leading researcher on religious trends.
People who practice a religion tend to be happier than those who don't, a study by the Pew Research Center found. They are also healthier: They are significantly less likely to be depressed or to die prematurely from suicide, alcoholism, cancer, cardiovascular illness or other causes, multiple studies from Harvard found.
This isn't true for everyone, of course. Many people have built happy, healthy lives outside of faith, and about a third of Americans who have left religion appear to be doing just fine, according to a new study from Burge.
But in aggregate, religion seems to help people by giving them what sociologists call the 'three B's' — belief in something, belonging in a community and behaviors to guide their lives.
Religion fills a psychological need, Michele Margolis, a political scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, told me. 'We want to feel connection,' she said. 'We want to feel like life makes sense.' Finding these things alone or creating them from scratch is 'really hard,' she added.
A new conversation
Now, something is shifting.
Most Americans identify as religious (around 70 percent of adults), and many are very committed to their faith (44 percent of Americans say they pray at least once a day). For the first time in decades, America's religiosity is remaining stable. This may change, of course, in the coming years, especially as young people age.
But for now, many 'nones' — people who have no religious affiliation — that I spoke to seem to have a dawning recognition that, in leaving faith, they threw 'the baby out with the baptismal water,' as my Opinion colleague Michelle Cottle said.
Some are even converting to a religion. Depressed and doomscrolling during the pandemic, Matt McDonough, a 39-year-old in Minnesota, said he found a 'profound' community in a men's Bible study. 'I got baptized as an adult. My mental and physical health improved dramatically.'
Most say they aren't going back to religion. But many people told me they want new spaces to discuss and explore their spirituality. 'My inner life is rich with spiritual reflection, and I sometimes yearn for a more open dialogue about it,' said Doris Andújar, 42, from Ponce, P.R.
Looking for belief
Conservatives seem to be better at naming this longing. They speak to 'civilizational' renewal and a restoration of moral values. They promise deliverance through politics. They use the infrastructure of evangelical Christianity to communicate their vision. It's working for them.
But is this the only way? Successful alternatives haven't emerged at scale, and many liberals have ignored American spirituality — this longing — at their party's peril.
This data reveals that finding a way forward may require acknowledging that Americans want to wrestle with hard questions about how to live. They're looking to heady concepts — confession, atonement, forgiveness and sacrifice — for answers.
In short, they're looking to believe in something.
Read more in my article, 'Americans Haven't Found a Satisfying Alternative to Religion.'
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