~around 650 words - 2 1/2 minutes of read time.
Why this is important: Every church I work with wants to reach “young families.” What they mean by young is always an interesting discussion. Additionally, the participants try to describe what people in that age group think and feel and how different it is from their own view. Maybe it isn’t.
Most feel “young families” means married couples with kids. So those tend to be a bit older than this survey sample. But the findings are interesting.
Every year The Harvard Institute of Politics conducts a poll of 18-29-year-olds. It is a representative, national sample, weighted poll with over 2000 participants. The focus is primarily POLITICS, as you can tell in the name of the poll.
The press releases always focus on how this age segment favors certain positions, remarkably consistent with a Harvard viewpoint.
But digging down into the results we find some great research beyond the RED/BLUE divide in the country. Here are some that could be useful for church leaders.
Finding: Are you currently enrolled in school? Top answer: 56% - not enrolled. Second place was 18% in a four-year college and university. Nine percent are still in high school. Combine all other types of schools with graduate education and you still just get 21%.
Commentary: Most church leaders tend to think of this age range as “college years,” but most in that age range are not. If one combines all the types of schools you still only get 48%. So half are not in school.
When your ministry to young adults focuses just on college thinking, you are missing half the market.
Finding: On politics – Do you consider yourself politically to be: (in order of greatest percentages) – 31% Liberal; 27% Moderate; 23% Conservative; 9% Moderate – lean liberal; 8% Moderate – lean conservative.
A similar question was – Do you consider yourself politically active? A resounding 68% said NO.
Photo: State Library of Queensland - Looks like a group having a good time.
Commentary: That is a much more even distribution than one usually associates with younger generations. When Scott Thumma, Warren Bird, and I led surveys of megachurches in past years, we found the majority of churches were not politically active as well.
Just a few weeks ago a planning group at a church told me: “We aren’t going to reach those under 30 because they are too liberal.” Another myth busted. The overwhelming percentage are not politically active.
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Story continues………..
Finding: What about “Cancel Culture?” The net numbers reflect varying degrees of comfort level – Comfortable – 22%; Uncomfortable – 55%. More than double. Also a lot of “don’t know.”
Commentary: Sure, there is a group that will be out to cancel you, your views, and your church’s positions, but among younger generations, more would be uncomfortable with those that try to silence your views. So go ahead, state your views clearly in a winsome manner.
Finding: Community Service is an honorable thing to do – Net 77% agreement with only net 5% disagreement. Hard to argue with the idea.
Commentary: This is one place to engage this generation. How well are you organized to do this?
Finding: As has been reported in several surveys, religion is fading. Here are the answers in order when asked about religious preference: No religious preference – 34%; Catholic – 18%; Evangelical/Fundamentalist – 13%; Protestant – 8%; Another religion – 7%, with the rest of the answers much smaller percentages.
If someone answered they had a preference – they were asked about religion’s importance to their life. Seventy-seven (77) percent said it was somewhat or very important to their life.
When someone answered they had a preference in religion – they were asked if they were a born-again Christian. Answers: 39% Yes, 49% No, 14% not sure.
Commentary: Lots of opportunities to reach this younger cohort.
Finding: Married or single or whatever: 81% Never married, 17% married, 1% widowed, 1% divorced, 1% separated.
Commentary: This is the big shift in the last 60 years with younger generations waiting to get married. This survey did not ask about cohabitation.
But this is also why many congregations filled with younger generations have regular teaching sessions and classes on getting married. This is an opportunity, not a reason for alarm.
But if the target is “young families,” we are talking about 30-40 year age ranges.
Ed. Note because this is a different data source – with something like 2.5M weddings this year ( a record for this era) – could be an opportunity.