cover image Goodbye Religion: The Causes and Consequences of Secularization

Goodbye Religion: The Causes and Consequences of Secularization

Ryan T. Cragun and Jesse M. Smith. New York Univ, $35 (352p) ISBN 978-1-4798-2530-1

In this competent survey, sociologists Cragun and Smith (co-editors of Secularity and Nonreligion in North America) examine the wave of secularization that has been rising across America since the 1970s. Citing data collected by the National Opinion Research Center (particularly from 2010 to 2021), they paint a detailed portrait of those who leave their faith. For example, the average age of “exiters” is 44.7, they are most often white and male (though this is changing), and they come from all social classes and, increasingly, education levels (some studies show that higher levels of educational attainment “reduce orthodoxy of belief,” but don’t necessarily lead to decreased religious affiliation). Factors that “push” people out of religion include teachings that espouse sexual and gender inequality; those that “pull” former believers into the secular world include having “more enjoyable and fulfilling activities” to spend one’s time on. Interviews with ex-believers are interwoven throughout, adding immediacy to the somewhat workaday analysis and grounding salient points on changing perceptions of atheists, which can depend on race and gender—for “young, well-to-do, heterosexual, highly educated white men,” the authors write, rejecting religion is deemed “almost normative,” while women and Black people more frequently face social judgment. This informative if dry study will appeal mostly to scholars in the field. (Oct.)