February 2022
His Grace Magazine!
Why is prayer declining?
Page 17
Less than half of Christian Americans pray daily, and some say they just don't pray at all
M
ore and more Christians are not praying. This is another disturbing trend that is starting to raise its ugly head as some Christians seem to be moving further from God everyday. The latest survey reveals that less than half of adult Americans still pray daily as many church members are continuing to drop, as the unaffiliated religious churches are increasing, says Pew Research Centre, who published this study. The data from the National Public Opinion Reference Survey that was conducted by Pew Research Centre, found that 45% of United States adults had said they pray daily in contrast to 58% that prayed in 2007 and 55% of Christians that prayed in 2014. There are some Christians, 32% of them, that say they very seldom or never pray at all. This is very close to the 29% of United States adults that call themselves the
religious "nones." They are people that describe themselves as atheists, agnostics or people that don't believe in anything at all. These religious "nones" are actually now 6% higher than they were five years ago. This shows that it's a growing movement of secularism. Christians are still the largest group in the United States, but they now only make up a combined 63% of the adult population. When Pew Research Center started keeping track of religious groups back in 2007, Christians had outnumbered the
"nones" at a percentage of 78% to 16%. This study said that there's a steady reduction in the number of Christians in the United States; the numbers have fallen by 10% in the past decade and in the past five years it fell by 4%. There has been a drop in the Catholic Church as well. It fell between 2007 and 2014 by 21% of the adult population, but that number still is the same today. There were some Catholic churches that fell even further as just 35% attended on a monthly basis. Political scientists,
David E. Campbell and Geoffrey C. Layman, both of the University of Notre Dame and John C. Green, who is from the University of Akron, wrote a book this year called, Secular Surge: A New Fault Line in American Politics. It shows the joining of politics and religion, between conservatives that created a powerful religious right that had led some people to leave their Christian faith and join the secular ranks. But whatever the reasoning for not praying as much as Christians used to, this needs to change. Not only does God want us to pray to Him, but we need that connection with Him; it is our lifeline with Him. It is what helps us keep the loving relationship with Him going strong. So I plead with all Christians today to not only pick up you Bibles and read them, but to also start praying more, on your own and with your families; strengthen your prayer lives now, before it's too late.
