2 of 3

Hadaway and Marler drew similar conclusions about church attendance after previous studies (in 1998 and 1993, the latter in which Chaves took part). While those studies were controversial, response to this latest study has been subdued.

"For sociologists, this is old hat," says Christian Smith, professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Smith says that for some time, sociologists have known that the Gallup figure is "greatly overestimated."

"I think the actual number is halfway between the Gallup figure and the Hadaway figure—around 27 to 30 percent." However, he adds, "If it came out that [Hadaway and Marler] were right and the actual figure was 20 percent, I would not be too surprised."

Robert Woodberry, a sociologist at the University of Texas, has been critical of Hadaway and Marler's work. He notes that "higher quality, face-to-face surveys" on religious life have consistently reported higher church attendance figures, usually "something lower than 40 percent and higher than 30 percent." He cautions against "making head counts the gold standard, when you have no idea how accurate they are." Woodberry notes that there's no way of second-checking attendance counts reported by churches, and no standard set of procedures for conducting attendance counts.

Some counts, he fears, come from attendance registers in the pews, which may reach "only 60 percent of the people there." And, he says, "You've got to make sure those counts include everyone in Sunday school and people who come in late."

Those reservations aside, Woodberry says that Hadaway and Marley have "done a great service" in demonstrating that church attendance is lower than previously thought.

"They have demonstrated that this is an issue," he says, "and that we as scholars have to pay attention to it."

Hadaway says that many church groups—especially larger ones such as Catholic, some mainline, and Southern Baptist—have developed standard procedures for counts, leading him to believe that the figures are accurate. Also, he says, when it comes to church attendance, he's more concerned that congregations are overestimating their attendance, not underestimating it.

In explaining the gap between his research and Gallup polls, Hadaway thinks that many people are answering with what they usually do, instead of what they did the last week. He also believes that people are more lenient with themselves when they miss church because of vacation or Sunday morning conflicts.

"As life has become more complicated in the last 30 years," Hadaway says, "perhaps people are inventing more excused absences than they used to."

The success of megachurches may be masking attendance struggles in smaller congregations. According to the NCS, only 10 percent of American congregations have more than 350 regular participants, yet those congregations compose nearly half of those attending religious services in the United States. Hadaway says smaller churches indeed are in decline, though the research didn't touch on that.

"You have Joel Osteen's church with 20,000 or 30,000 people worshipping on an average weekend, and it just seems like religion is going great guns," Hadaway says. "I think it is creating a false impression of what is happening in the church. There are more giant churches now than there used to be—but at the same time, the average church is quite small. The decline among these small congregations has led to the death of a lot of churches. They have declining numbers and rising costs—insurance rates, pastors' salaries, utilities—making it really tough for many churches across America."

next page... |  2 of 3

share this page

April 2006, Vol. 50, No. 4