The Decline In Religion And The Mental Health Crisis

The mental health of Americans, especially young Americans, has declined in lock step with the decline in religiosity:

https://www.aei.org/op-eds/to-address-the-mental-health-crisis-tackle-the-decline-in-religion/

To Address the Mental Health Crisis, Tackle the Decline in Religion
By Naomi Schaefer Riley | Michelle Shain
June 24, 2025

Americans are searching for an answer to the youth mental health crisis. While many experts rightfully scrutinize smartphones and social media as culprits, another profound shift deserves our attention: the dramatic retreat from religion in American life. As religious participation plummets, particularly among young people, we’re losing the profound social and psychological benefits once provided by religious communities. And our rapidly secularizing society has failed to offer compelling alternatives to replace religion’s protective effects on mental health.

Thousands of studies have shown that religious people are happier, more confident, more optimistic, and more satisfied with their lives. They are also less likely to suffer from anxiety or depression, commit suicide, or abuse alcohol or other drugs. While correlation doesn’t prove causation, longitudinal studies show that many people who become more religious subsequently show improved mental health. Yet the percent of Americans reporting no religious affiliation skyrocketed from just 5% in 1972 to almost 30% today, according to the Pew Research Center. Among the youngest U.S. adults, those ages 18-29, fully 44% are religiously unaffiliated.

Research identifies four distinct pathways through which religious involvement protects mental health — protection that many young Americans are now missing.

First, religion supports healthy families. Religious communities typically promote family stability, encourage parental involvement, and endorse values that strengthen family bonds. Practices such as attending worship services together create shared experiences and traditions that unite family members across generations. Rituals like Shabbat dinners for Jewish families or Family Home Evening for Latter-day Saints create sacred time for connection and conversation. The family structures and practices encouraged by religious participation create environments where children and adolescents are more likely to thrive emotionally and psychologically. As religious participation declines, we lose this institutional support for healthy family functioning.

Second, religion offers community and social support. Religious congregations provide connections that combat isolation and loneliness. Do not underestimate the power of studying together, singing together, and snacking together. The relationships formed during these activities provide a sense of belonging, as well as a place to give and receive help and advice.

Third, religion facilitates volunteerism and civic engagement. Religious institutions create structured opportunities for young people to contribute to their communities, develop empathy, and experience the psychological benefits of helping others. Religious teachings that emphasize service to others motivate prosocial behavior that benefits both the recipients and the volunteers themselves.

Fourth, religion helps people find meaning and purpose. Religious teachings address existential questions and help believers find purpose, direction, and an understanding of their place in the universe. In a world where social media teaches us to measure ourselves through views and likes, religion offers alternative metrics of value and worth. This sense of meaning serves as a powerful buffer against depression and helps youth develop resilience in the face of life’s challenges.

As religious participation declines, many young people are losing access to these protective factors. Regardless of how we feel about God and faith, neither triumphalism nor handwringing will solve the problem. Religious communities should continue reaching out to families with children, extolling the benefits of organized religion to parents in particular.

But we must also recognize that as one system of support fades, we need to develop alternatives intentionally.

We need programs that strengthen family bonds and teach parenting skills to replace religion’s family support function. Community organizations must create the social connections that religious congregations once offered. Schools and civic groups should expand service-learning and volunteerism programs to replace the structured helping opportunities religious institutions traditionally provided. And we need new frameworks that help young people find meaning and purpose in an increasingly secular world.

Restricting social media use and limiting screen time might help the teenage mental health crisis, but we need to do much more. We must build new structures that provide family support, community connection, opportunities for service, and pathways to meaning. We must fill the protective gap left by religion’s retreat.

This essay is adapted from a chapter in the edited volume Mind the Children: How to Think About the Youth Mental Health Collapse.