Journal Article
The normalization of non-religion: a reply to James Lewis
Publication details
Summary
James Lewis challenged the assertion that religious ‘nones’ are becoming more like the general population. The evidence he offers is insufficient to make his case, however: the generational dynamics of religious change are invisible if one takes a cross-sectional snapshot of the entire population, undifferentiated by age. In addition, write-in responses on census and survey forms do not provide a good basis for studying the characteristics of the very large and growing number of people who are non-religious.