A Generation Adrift

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PHOENIX (ChurchMilitant.com) - A new report is shedding light on the next generation of American adults.

A study published last month by Arizona Christian University is revealing some surprising and unnerving statistics about millennials.

"For us to fail to strategically respond would be to squander an opportunity to serve God and His people," the study's author, Dr. George Barna, wrote, addressing his study's more sobering findings.

"Anything short of fixing [millennials'] decision-making foundation will be little more than placing a Band-Aid on a gaping, gushing wound," he emphasized.

Although the report covers a plethora of topics, some of the most distressing data pertain to politics, sexuality and faith.

Politics

According to Barna's study, a majority of millennials lean to the political Left: 40% identify as liberal, while only 29% identify as conservative. A sizable 40% of millennials identify as liberal on social issues like abortion and homosexuality, 34% as liberal on fiscal issues and 33% as liberal on government size and reach. Conservative preferences scored lower in each of the same categories.

Beyond this, 48% of millennials attest they prefer socialism to capitalism. This is a 4% increase since 2017. If the same trend continues to hold true, socialism will be more popular than capitalism among millennials within the next two years.

When asked, only 41% of millennials responded they would be willing to die for the sake of their freedoms, and a mere 26% said they would give their lives for their country.

Sexuality

As far as gender and sexuality are concerned, 30% of millennials — including a shocking 39% of those age 18–24 — self-identify as LGBTQ. That's nearly three times as much as all adults who are older than them.

Less than half of millennials believe marriage is between a man and a woman.

Faith

The most disturbing statistics emerge when religion and faith are examined.

While 65% of millennials identify as Christian (21% Catholic), barely half said they're deeply committed to practicing their faith. Furthermore, a majority responded they rely on personal experiences and emotions for moral guidance, rather than Scripture or their churches.

Faith also achieved a low rank on the "What would you die for?" totem pole, rising to only 29%.

Nearly three-quarters (74%) of millennials espouse pantheistic ideology, according to the report, believing all religions are equally true or valuable.

As a likely result of this weak grasp of Christian tenets, millennials are also rejecting absolute moral truth. More than half (56%) reported they reject moral absolutism and embrace relativism, claiming "identifying moral truth is up to each individual; there are no moral absolutes that apply to everyone, all the time."

On a positive note, less than 10% of millennials holds a positive view of atheism.

Religious Instruction Lacking

Barna notes the importance of conducting and publishing this study lies in the potential to respond to it.

All of these realities converge into what could be summarized as defining elements of the millennial lifestyle. That pathway includes an apprehensive acceptance of materialism; a universal integration of technology; hypersensitivity to generational norms and attitudes; a knee-jerk rejection of the traditions of prior generations; and a novel fusion of ideas into new morals and values.

He notes "spiritual illiteracy virtually resigns them to a superficial worldview in which they grasp at ideas and practices that provide immediate comfort rather than lasting truth and peace. The moral chaos that characterizes the generation can likewise be traced to a dearth of coherent and pragmatic religious instruction ... ."

For Catholics, at least, that absence of moral and catechetical instruction can be traced directly to the bishops. Germany, for example, is currently hemorrhaging Catholics, with over 220,000 apostatizing last year alone. Why? Perhaps the pro-gay, pro-priestess German Synodale Weg will offer answers.

Bishops in the United States are also failing to pass on the faith of their fathers — instead, covering for gay clerics and hushing up sex abuse, promoting woke agendas, shilling for illegal immigration and refusing to protect the Body and Blood of Christ from sacrilege at the hands of pro-abortion fake Catholics.

When millennials do get involved in their faith, gravitating towards reverence and the Traditional Latin Mass, bishops often cut them off — especially in the wake of new restrictions tied to Pope Francis' document Traditionis Custodes.

The next generation of fathers, mothers, priests, teachers, congressmen, police officers, and journalists are left starving while the bishops abdicate their duties.

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