What Does 'I'm Spiritual but Not Religious' Really Mean?

Gallup notes that "the most religious era" of the past 80-plus years in America was from the mid-1950s into the early 1960s, when about half of us attended religious services weekly.

My family's churchly practices fit neatly into that pious period. Every Sunday — religiously — mom, dad and five kids piled into the old Chevy station wagon for the short trip to our church where we joined dozens of other similar families for Sunday Mass. The kids all went to the local Catholic grade school — attending Mass every weekday as well, perhaps skewing those "weekly attendance" statistics a tad.

My, how the times have changed. Today, an ever-dwindling number of Americans attend church services regularly while a growing percentage don't consider themselves "religious" at all. Yet they still seek meaning in life. They're part of a booming demographic dubbed SBNR — "Spiritual But Not Religious."

Back in the day, the church you joined — and the majority of us did join a church — was the one that your parents embraced, the one where you spent all of those Sunday mornings. Your faith was, more or less, a hereditary thing. Like your brown eyes and dimples.

But after the uber-pious '50s and '60s, church attendance began to drop. According to NORC (the National Opinion Research Center), the share of Americans attending church at least monthly declined from 49% in 1972 to 26% in 2022. One indicator of this trend is the number of houses of worship that are shuttered each year — one estimate is that between 6,000 and 10,000 are closed annually.

Perhaps even more revealing is what Americans say about their faith affiliations — whether or not they "identify" with a particular religious faith. NORC has been tracking this trend since 1972. That year, only 5% of Americans said they had no religious affiliation. Fifty years later that figure was 29%. The research from Pew is similar: since just 2007, the percentage of adults who say they are atheist, agnostic or "nothing in particular" has grown from 16% to 29%. Indeed, under one set of assumptions, Pew forecasts that the "nones" will be the majority in America by 2070.

Elizabeth Drescher, a professor of religious studies at Santa Clara University and author of "Choosing Our Religion: The Spiritual Lives of America's Nones," puts this flight of the faithful in context. "Decreases in religious affiliation and identification began in the U.S. in the late 1960s, in the heat of anti-war, civil rights, feminist and other social movements," she explains. It was a period of upheaval for young people, a time when they were urged to "question authority."

They did, and they continue to do so. Father James Martin, a Jesuit priest and the author of a number of best-selling books on spirituality — like "The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything" —says that "conflicts with various church teachings — on women, on sexuality, on LGBTQ people and so on— mean that some people don't agree with their religious community and so they decide to opt out." He also freely admits that "scandals like the sex abuse scandals and financial scandals in many churches — including my own — turn people off to organized religion."

Another important factor, according to Martin, is that we live in an increasingly secularized society. "Many have not grown up in any faith tradition and so have no connection to religion at all. They've never 'fallen away.' Rather, they were never introduced to it," he says.

Just because Americans left traditional religious institutions doesn't mean that they stopped searching for spiritual meaning in their lives. Indeed a sizable majority of Americans still identify as "spiritual" — 70% according to the Pew Research Center.

The bottom line here? We are an increasingly less traditionally religious country — far fewer of us piling into station wagons for Sunday church services — yet we still overwhelmingly consider ourselves to be spiritual individuals.

It's this confluence of factors that has resulted in the rise of the SBNR demographic. Pew puts the number of SBNRs currently at 22%. Gallop estimates 33% of the country falls within this cohort.

Drescher notes that the phenomenon has its roots back in the '70s, calling SBNR "a boomer label" and gives this succinct definition: "It highlights the rejection of institutional forms of religion and the cultivation of personal forms of enrichment that may or may not reference a divine spirit." This definition dovetails nicely with the "question authority" theme.

"By the late 1990s, the move away from institutional religion began to accelerate," says Drescher. One observation is that the term SBNR took off in the early 2000s, when online dating first became popular and you had to indicate your religious affiliation. One box was "Spiritual But Not Religious."

Unlike boomers and GenXers, who "even as they left traditional institutional forms of religion behind had frameworks for practice that they could adapt in new ways," many millennials and GenZers have no religious backgrounds, and often little context for their searches, says Drescher.

First, we should probably determine what exactly "the void" means. For that discussion, it's useful to look at the purposes that organized religion has served historically. "At the most practical level, religious groups in every culture and in every period of history we can examine, have functioned as sources of social connection, identity and moral norming," explains Drescher. "They help to bond communities, and that communitarian bonding has helped people to deal with life transitions and difficulties."

Traditional religions used to offer all of this to the masses in a pre-packaged, one-stop-shopping, it's-all-here-in-this-book-for-you format. (Anyone who has memorized the Baltimore Catechism can vouch for this.)

Linda Mercadante, author of "Belief Without Borders: Inside the Minds of the Spiritual But Not Religious", interviewed dozens of SBNRs for her book. Many of those she interviewed were struggling with Life's Big Questions — "Why are we here?" "Why do we suffer?" "Is death the end?" "Most, however, had not been given tools adequate for the task," says Mercadante.

"These interviewees seem less concerned than people in earlier eras to find a common theological narrative that can be held by a whole society. Nevertheless, they did search for a comprehensible and comprehensive meaning in which to situate themselves," explains Mercadante.

According to the Pew Research Center, large majorities of both SBNRs and religious Americans believe there is something spiritual beyond the natural world, that unseen spiritual forces exist and that there are some things that science cannot explain.

But 73% of SBNRs say that, while they do believe in a higher power, they do not believe in the God of the Bible. And they are far more likely than their religious counterparts to say that religion causes division and intolerance and far less likely to believe that religion encourages people to "do the right thing."

This makes sense. By definition SBNRs do not have a playbook. They're spiritual beliefs are formed outside the confines of organized religion. "It all boils down to the transference of authority from 'out there' to 'in here,'" explains Mercadante.

Mercadante found two recurrent themes among the SBNRs she interviewed. First, they were, as Mercadante calls it, "doing theology —they were searching for and making meaning in their own lives." And, second, they often repudiated what they viewed as traditional religious dogma, including a wrathful God, exclusivism and oppressive authoritarianism.

Beyond those commonalities, the beliefs and practices of SBNRs are diverse — which makes sense; it's sort of a defining quality of SBNRs. And, like the individuals creating them, expressions of SBNRs' spirituality vary widely — sometimes wildly.

Pew found that SBNRs "spend time looking inward or centering themselves" (78%), spending time in nature (83%) and meditating (48%). The Pew authors also cite a variety of other possibilities, saying SBNRs may cobble together a mix of spiritual elements drawn from other traditions (Native American and Asian religions) as well as New Age beliefs (think astrology, tarot cards and crystals).

"Spiritual practices are hard to define now," says Mercadante. "One person's yoga as a spiritual practice is another person's exercise routine."

Because so many SBNRs reject organized religion, it follows that many have not found a "spiritual home." Pew's research indicates that 11% of SBNRs opt to join religious communities; 13% have found spiritual communities.

This concerns the experts. While "it is freeing to be able to choose your own spiritual practice," Mercadante cautions against going it alone completely. "I think that Lone Ranger spirituality is too limited. To rely only on one's own experience … is forsaking or ignoring the broad range of human and transcendent experiences."

"Spirituality," she concludes, "is best done in community."

Martin agrees. "Without a community to bump up against, you can also become isolated from others, not challenged in certain areas of your life, not encouraged to move beyond your comfort zone," he says.

Being SBNR is, by definition, not a one-size-fits-all pursuit. As they say, "your results may vary."

Still, Mercadante notes that "[f]or many people this movement has produced personal benefits, such as inner peace, happiness, self-knowledge and stress-reduction."

With fits and starts — searching, questioning and discerning — SBNRs are finding answers and practices to gird themselves in an increasingly confusing world.

It's messy and unpredictable and confusing and beautiful. Sort of like life, really.

Marie Sherlock practiced law for a decade before turning to writing and editing in her 30s — and never looked back. She's worked as the editor of several publications and is the author of a parenting book (Living Simply with Children; Three Rivers Press). She spends her empty-nest days writing about travel trends and destinations, simplicity, spirituality and social justice issues. Read More