Church Is More Informal, Like Society, Study Finds

Religious institutions often see themselves as countercultural — outposts in an increasingly secular society that challenge the culture with views and practices that are no longer mainstream.

But inevitably, culture seeps in, affecting how clergy and laypeople dress and pray and behave toward one another.

A new study — the latest version of a regularly conducted survey of American congregations — finds that houses of worship, like the broader culture, are becoming increasingly informal, and increasingly open to gay men and lesbians. More and more Americans worship in congregations where drums are played, words or images are projected on screens, and praise is expressed via upstretched hands. And more and more congregations, although still a minority, allow gays to hold volunteer positions as leaders.

“Congregations are embedded in our culture and our society, and they are reflecting both the trends, but also the divisions and the conflicts,” said Mark Chaves, the director of the study and a professor of sociology, religion and divinity at Duke University.

The third National Congregations Study is based on data collected in 2012 from interviews with leaders of 1,331 congregations: Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu and others.

The informality of congregational worship has been growing steadily since the first National Congregations Study was conducted in 1998. Forty-six percent of Americans worship in congregations where drums are played, up from 25 percent in 1998, while 56 percent are in congregations where organs are played, down from 70 percent. Fifty-nine percent of worshipers now attend services in congregations where hands are raised as an expression of praise — up from 48 percent in 1998. Choir-singing and vestment-wearing are down, while the use of visual projection equipment and the practice of jumping, shouting or dancing by worshipers is up.

“Behaviors associated with evangelical worship style are ticking up, and there is a shift of people to large churches where this is more common,” Mr. Chaves said.

Fewer Choirs, More Voter Registration

Attitudes toward gay men and lesbians are shifting slowly, and unevenly, across the religious scene, as acceptance of homosexuality and same-sex marriage increases in the broader culture. In the new results, 48 percent of congregations allow openly gay people in committed relationships to be members, up from 37 percent since the second study in 2006, and 27 percent of congregations allow them to serve as volunteer leaders, up from 18 percent.

This easing was not uniform. Acceptance of gay men and lesbians in committed relationships declined in Roman Catholic churches from 2006 to 2012. One reason may be that the rise of same-sex marriage has prompted some Catholic institutions to fire employees who marry partners of the same gender.

The study also finds that although gay men and lesbians in committed relationships are increasingly admitted as members in evangelical Protestant churches, they are rarely allowed to serve as leaders — only 4 percent of white, conservative Protestant churches said they would allow gays in committed relationships to volunteer for leadership positions.

A few other notable trends in congregational life: Diversity is rising, as the number of all-white congregations goes down; average congregational size is falling, as more Americans leave smaller congregations for larger ones; and an increasing number of congregations (24 percent) are not affiliated with any religious denomination.