The impact of spirituality on religious competition in the USA marketplace of religion

Abstract

Purpose

The USA has long been known to provide a competitive environment in which religions compete for believers. The data clearly show winners and losers in this marketplace. Major Christian denominations are generally experiencing a decline in membership while religious “nones” are growing in number. Of note, the recent Pew studies of the US Religious Landscape (2008 and 2015a) indicate that measures of spirituality are rising in this environment. This paper empirically investigates how the demand for spirituality in religion may better understand these trends.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper applies ordinary least squares to survey data from the 2015 Pew study to empirically investigate how belonging to a major Christian faith and attending religious services impacts feeling of spirituality, while conditioning on a host of other demographic variables, in order to better understand these trends.

Findings

The author finds that being a member of a Christian denomination generally reduces the measure of spirituality relative to religious “nones.” However, this effect is almost always offset by a measure of attendance at religious services suggesting spirituality is positively associated with social interaction.

Originality/value

The results have implications for religious leaders concerned about maintaining and growing the church's membership. The results suggest that Church leaders may benefit from de-emphasizing hierarchical top-down rules and emphasizing community.

Peer review

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-05-2022-0342

Citation

von der Ruhr, M. (2023), "The impact of spirituality on religious competition in the USA marketplace of religion", International Journal of Social Economics, Vol. 50 No. 9, pp. 1274-1284. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSE-05-2022-0342