Difficult Times And Church Going

Economics is a huge issue in the current race for the American presidency. Our debts need to be paid and our budget needs to be balanced. However, based on earlier American history, don't expect thousands to rush back to church to pray for wisdom and God's blessings. 

With millions of people out of work and millions others having lost their life savings, one might have predicted (as many at the time did) that there would have been a strong resurgence of the church during the period of the Great Depression in the 1930s. Indeed, after decades of declining church membership and what many perceived to be a general decline in religious piety throughout the country, many clergyman saw the Depression partly as a heavenly response to these developments. 

Moreover, many believed that the suffering masses would quickly rush back into the church, swelling membership rolls, and seeking forgiveness for their folly. Yet while most major denominations did see an average membership gain of about 5% during the thirties this gain fell far short of the clergy's collective hopes. Moreover, contemporary evidence indicates that religious piety among these church members may actually have been on the decline even during this period of crisis. At the same time that popular religion was experiencing a decline, the spread of radio allowed such people as Father Charles Coughlin to achieve nationwide fame.

The Lynds' famous study of "Middletown," the everyman of the small American city, indicated that little had changed in the years between 1925 and 1935, despite the intervening onset of Depression. Middletown is the title of the classic sociological study of a typical middle-American city published in 1929 by Helen and Robert Lynd. The study was based on field research done in Muncie, Indiana, in 1924-1925. A sequel published in 1937, entitled Middletown in Transition, was based on the Lynds' return to Muncie in 1935. Muncie was referred to as Middletown to convey the representativeness of the city and their findings there.

The Middletown studies were influential in identifying and popularizing the idea of America as a consumer culture. By observing the day-to-day life of the city's residents, the Lynds showed how traditional values and customs were changing under the influence of industrialization. They contrasted Middletown in the 1890s and 1920s, portraying the shift from an active, civic-oriented citizenry to one embracing materialistic values. Since work and community life in the 1920s provided fewer satisfactions to Middletowners, they turned to consumerism to fulfill their social needs. Middletown depicted the

dynamic conflict over this change, although most citizens believed it was inevitable and good. The Lynds implicitly criticized this emergent commercialism by successfully combining their moral critique with scientific analysis. The combination gave the study its power and originality.

Middletown in Transition focused on the power relationships in Muncie during the Great Depression. The Lynds showed how the residents were subordinate to both a powerful, local business elite and the national consumer culture. This domination rendered Middletown citizens somewhat impotent, unable to change their society. The solution, the Lynds concluded, was for professional managers to mold social institutions for the greater public good.

In religious matters, the Lynds found that the majority of churchgoers remained middle age women, with few people of either sex under the age of 30. One possible reason for this was the marked decline in piety among the younger generations who felt that religion did not occupy a significant place in their lives. While there was some resurgence of piety among the lower classes (which manifested itself in an increase in the strength of religious fundamentalism during this decade) most middle and upper class individuals remained unmoved even though they too may have suffered from the Depression.

Here is a cover from the New Yorker Magazine of October 13, 1934. This cover plainly represents how the uppper classes during the 1930's continued to pay little attention to religion during this decade. The tip of a hat by the dead rich gentleman being rushed up to heaven shows the only tacit attention which such individuals, often caught up in the business world, paid to matters of religion.

I suspect that the current economic crisis in the USA will have the same non-effect on church going.