The young are godless

The Inductivist had a post up bemoaning the cultural liberalism and secularity of today's youth at the same time that I suggested that the culture wars will continue. My reasoning was that polarization still exists, and in fact is greater among the youth than the older cohorts. On the other hand readers observed that the trend is toward more liberalism. One of the major changes over the past generation which has gone under the radar of the media is that rapid rise of disaffiliation. After the 20th century seemed to disprove a strong form of the secularization hypothesis, some began talking about a religious revival. The power of the Christian Right and the prominence of evangelical Christianity in the United States give the public an outward sense that the faith is waxing. Reality is a bit more complicated. I decided to look at the trends across ages in the GSS. I limited this to the 18-75 age range (the N's get small above 75) and whites. The left of each chart are the younger cohorts, and the right the older ones.*