Researchers recently took second looks at the perennial question of whether evangelicals are losing younger generations.

Sociologist Brad Wright examined religious affiliation by age cohort via the General Social Survey. He did that millennials born in the 1980s have shown a steep drop in evangelical affiliation unlike Americans born in the 1940s and 1950s, who steadily increased in evangelical affiliation as they got older.

But he also found that millennials appear to be following a similar rebound trajectory to Americans born in the 1970s, who dropped steeply in evangelical affiliation as twentysomethings (from approximately 27% to 21%), but returned to almost the same starting level of affiliation by their 40s.

Notes Wright:

I wonder if this initial drop downwards contributes to the hyperbole regarding the young–that Evangelical Christianity is facing an imminent collapse. We see higher-than-usual rates of them leaving in their late teens and early twenties, and we project this trend into ...

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