Politics in church may hurt religion, but it helps churches

Despite being seen by much of the world as a very religious country, religious affiliation in the US is in decline, with fewer Americans now likely to attend church. In new research, Andre P. Audette and Christopher L. Weaver write that some churches have attempted to address declining attendance by becoming more politically active in order to attract more people from the declining pool of the religious. Using survey data, they find that churches which engaged in more political activities tended to attract larger congregations, something they attribute to the greater likelihood that political partisans will ‘shop around’ when deciding which church to regularly attend. They warn that while such strategies may boost churches’ attendance in the short-term, the politicization of religion may turn more people off religion overall.