Not Losing My Religion Because It Was Never Here to Begin With

The word “religion” has a few different definitions, but the one I tend to stick to is “a particular system of faith and worship” (thanks, Google).

If you were to ask me what my religious views are, I’d probably stumble a little, going “Well, I was born in Israel to a Jewish mother, so I’m Jewish, but, like, unorthodox? Also, I’m an Atheist, but not really… I like Paganism and Wicca, all that ‘worship the earth, Diana the moon goddess’ stuff, and true Satanism (which is actually about self-love!) is pretty cool. Uhh… Let’s go with ‘Non-Affiliated’.”

By the way, according to Facebook, I’m a devout Kurt Cobainist.

I'm not kidding.

After some research on the topic, apparently youth from the 1960’s shared (in general) pretty similar religious views to my own. They also often partook in Buddhism, Hinduism, and other tree-hugging belief systems that gave them an excuse to sit in grass while smoking a different type of grass, if you know what I mean.

Just in case you don't know what I mean.

Author Timothy Miller wrote in 1991 in his book Hippies and American Values about the spiritual views of youngins during that era, and basically it boils down to “Christianity isn’t doing it for us, let’s deconstruct it/find something from another continent/create something entirely new and use that instead”. Seeing as 1967 was the Summer of Love, I don’t blame hippies for their collective raspberry blowing towards the oft quoted homophobic and sexually repressive verses the Bible contains. It’s hard to be loving and accepting when the Christian society surrounding you is hell bent (ha!) on restricting your sexual habits and behaviours. There’s lots of things Christianity does do right, such as loving thy neighbour. However, it seems youth of the 60’s felt as if they could find those same positive values within other faiths without the accompanying negative undertones, hence the exploration into what Americans considered ‘foreign’ spiritual systems.

So what about the youth of today? Well, according to Google’s Ngram Viewer, we can observe the word’s rate of mention in books throughout the years.

Thanks again, Google.

It’s been a steady drop since the 1840’s, with a slow, mainly insignificant rise in the past decade and a half. If we believe in the statement “out of sight, out of mind”, then I think it’s safe to say that a lack of the word appearing in new literature means it has increasingly become irrelevant to modern culture. The number of people in the United States who identify as Atheist has been rising as well, contributing to a secular North America, similar to what was being accomplished fifty or so years ago. It’s nearly the same thing, considering people who label themselves Atheist often “feel a deep connection with nature and the Earth”. What a bunch of hippies.

Whatever people were smoking in the 60’s, it worked, because it’s being felt generations later with the general populace losing faith in faith, or at least the traditional White Person™ faith of North America, and opting for an alternative acceptance-driven way of thinking. There’s definitely still religious youth out there, but their numbers are dwindling. And who knows, maybe soon they won’t be the majority anymore.