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Unpacking religious faith in America during COVID

Parishioners at Santuario Nacional de Nuestra Señor de la Caridad in Miami practice social distancing at Mass.
Parishioners at Santuario Nacional de Nuestra Señor de la Caridad in Miami practice social distancing at Mass.

Recent studies from the General Social Survey, the Pew Research Center, and the Public Religion Research Institute have all found a decline in participation in organized religion over the past several years.

Between the ages of 15 and 29, 31 percent of Americans who were raised Christian become religiously unaffiliated. And the number of U.S. adults who identify as Christians has dropped by 15 percentage points, from 78 percent to 63 percent in the last 15 years.

However, there’s been significant growth among immigrant communities towards Evangelicalism, which is now the fastest-growing religious sect in the country. There are approximately 10 million Hispanic evangelicals nationwide and their churches have continued to grow in size over the course of the pandemic.

Gabriel Salguero is the president of the National Latino Evangelical Coalition.

“Latinos and the culture of Pentecostalism are committed to outreach,” he told 1A. “We’ve been able to outpace white and African-American churches, particularly through the Evangelical missionary work happening in Latin America.”

We assemble a panel of faith leaders to discuss the changing dimensions of faith in America in 2022 and the impact of the pandemic on how we practice.

Copyright 2022 WAMU 88.5

Anna Casey, Chris Remington