BY PHIL ZUCKERMAN

Jens is in his late sixties. He lives in a cozy house on a quiet street in a mid-sized city on the east coast of Jutland, Denmark. He’s many things: a widower, a lover of art and music, a retired radio journalist and social worker, a father, and an atheist.

As for that last part of his identity—the utter lack of any belief in a God—it isn’t all that important to him. Being secular in contemporary Denmark, one of the least pious nations in the world, is simply no big deal. But when I came to his house one sunny, cold morning to interview him for my research, he took the time to actively ponder his lack of religiosity and reflect about how distinct his naturalistic worldview is from that of his forbearers. As he explained, his four grandparents were all “real believers.” What about his parents? Yes, they were religious, too, “but less so.” And as for Jens’s siblings: “my younger brother is a very hard atheist, and my sister and my elder brother are more agnostics.”

In short: Jens’ grandparents were deeply faithful, his folks were religious—but much less so than the grandparents—and today, he and his three siblings are all non-believers. This generational decline of religiosity in Jens’ family is nothing remarkable in Scandinavia today.1 It is, in fact, the norm. Every single indicator of religion in Denmark has plummeted over the course of the last century, from church attendance, baptisms, and confirmations to belief in God, belief in heaven and hell, and belief in the literal truth of the Bible.

This historical process, whereby religion weakens and fades in society, is known as secularization.

Secularization

The early founders of sociology—Europeans such as Auguste Comte, Emile Durkheim, and Max Weber— could sense religion’s impending demise, at least within their own corner of the world. They spoke of a growing “disenchantment” within modern society and the dying away of old gods. However, they didn’t have much in the way of data to support their predictions. Today, we have data aplenty, and what they reveal is unambiguous, and in some instances quite precipitous, decline of religion throughout not only Europe, but much of the wider world.

To measure and illustrate religious decline, you need two things: (1) clear indicators of religiosity that can be measured, and (2) longitudinal data that reveal trends over time. In my latest book, Beyond Doubt: The Secularization of Society, co-authored with Dr. Isabella Kasselstrand and Dr. Ryan Cragun, both are provided. For measures of religious decline, we focus on the “three Bs:” belief, behavior, and belonging. That is: belief in supernatural entities (God, for example); behavior in terms of religious activities such as praying, going to church, baptizing, etc.; and belonging in terms of basic self-identification, that is, seeing oneself as a Catholic, Lutheran, Muslim, and so forth, or just simply being a member of a religious congregation or community. For longitudinal data, we draw on numerous national and international surveys going back many decades, which allow us to chart observable trends over time. Nearly all of them point in the same direction—downwards.