Young Catholic America: Emerging Adults In, Out of, and Gone from the Church
Christian Smith, Kyle Longest, Jonathan Hill, and Kari Christoffersen
Abstract
This book provides an in-depth description and analysis of American Catholics (and ex-Catholics) ages 18–23. The main focus is on their religious and spiritual lives but also includes an examination of how their religious faith and practice do and do not affect other life outcomes. Based on nationally representative survey and interview (longitudinal/panel) data of the highest quality, the National Study of Youth and Religion (NSYR—first and third waves). It describes the distribution of religious beliefs and practices among them, how they cluster into different types of young adults religious ... More
This book provides an in-depth description and analysis of American Catholics (and ex-Catholics) ages 18–23. The main focus is on their religious and spiritual lives but also includes an examination of how their religious faith and practice do and do not affect other life outcomes. Based on nationally representative survey and interview (longitudinal/panel) data of the highest quality, the National Study of Youth and Religion (NSYR—first and third waves). It describes the distribution of religious beliefs and practices among them, how they cluster into different types of young adults religiously, shows the kind of changes that have happened in the lives of this group of (ex-)Catholic emerging adults, and which factors from their teenage years tend to produce higher levels of religiousness five years later. It also contains the most careful and sophisticated methodological discussion of how to conceptualize and measure who in the U.S. should even count as “Catholic” in social-science studies. It contributes both to our scholarly knowledge about religious change and stability in the U.S., especially among emerging adults, and to our understanding of how and why the Catholic Church is undergoing changes over time, particularly with its younger members. All of the findings are also set into big-picture historical context with a chapter that shows how sweeping changes in the twentieth century set up the Catholic Church for what it is confronting today.
Keywords:
Catholic,
emerging adults,
young adults,
religion,
National Study of Youth and Religion (NSYR)
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2014 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780199341078 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: April 2014 |
DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199341078.001.0001 |
Authors
Affiliations are at time of print publication.
Christian Smith, author
University of Notre Dame
Kyle Longest, author
Furman University
Jonathan Hill, author
Calvin College
Kari Christoffersen, author
University of Notre Dame
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