by John Schmalzbauer<\/a>, Missouri State University<\/p>\n Conservatives have long extolled the virtues of the American working class. In an oft-repeated statement, William F. Buckley<\/a> said he would rather \u201centrust the government of the United States to the first 400 people listed in the Boston telephone directory than to the faculty of Harvard University.\u201d The author of God and Man at Yale<\/em><\/a>, Buckley saw higher education as a threat to religious faith. Forced to choose between Harvard Yard and South Boston, he chose Southie.<\/p>\n Had Buckley lived long enough to read Charles Murray\u2019s Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010<\/em><\/a>, he might have reconsidered his choice.\u00a0 More than any other conservative tome, it challenges the myth of proletarian piety. Chronicling the decline of marriage, work, and church attendance among blue collar whites, it presents an American working class that looks more like Jay and Silent Bob<\/a> than Ralph Kramden<\/a> (Jay and Silent Bob are recurring characters in the films of director Kevin Smith<\/a>, including a 1994 feature<\/a> set in a New Jersey convenience store. Despite Buckley\u2019s support for drug legalization<\/a>, it\u2019s hard to imagine him patronizing the Quick Stop<\/a>).<\/p>\n Throughout the book, Murray compares fictional lower class neighborhoods (what he calls \u201cFishtown\u201d) with their upper class counterparts (\u201cBelmont\u201d in Murray\u2019s lexicon) using real datasets (including the General Social Survey). Tracking \u201cdisengagement from religion<\/a>,\u201d he finds that \u201cthe drift from religiosity was far greater in Fishtown than in Belmont<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Murray is not the first to report such news. Recent studies of religion and higher education<\/a> have found that college-educated Americans are less likely to drop out of church. In a 2007 article for Social Forces<\/em><\/a>, Patheos Blogger Mark Regnerus<\/a> and his colleagues reported that \u201cemerging adults that avoid college exhibit the most extensive patterns of religious decline, undermining conventional wisdom about the secularizing effect of higher education.\u201d<\/p>\n Other Patheos contributors have commented on the secularization of the American working class. In a review of Murray\u2019s book, historian Thomas Kidd notes that blue collar Americans are \u201cnot clinging to religion.<\/a>\u201d Along the same lines, Black, White, & Gray blogger Jerry Park sees \u201ca growing drift away from the institutions of marriage and religion<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Life is different on campus. Challenging the stereotype of the secular university, many college students cling to their study Bibles and iPhone religion apps.<\/p>\n At William F. Buckley\u2019s alma mater, a $70 million Catholic campus center<\/a> sponsors a full program of liturgies, lectures, and social events. Comprising 28 percent of the student body<\/a>, Catholics are now the largest single religious group at Yale.<\/p>\n Across the United States, evangelical parachurch groups have enjoyed steady growth. According to sociologist Michael Lindsay<\/a>, about one-tenth of the Princeton student body belongs to an evangelical campus ministry. Nationally, the number of students involved in Campus Crusade has tripled, rising from 20,000 in 1995-1996<\/a> to 63,000 in 2008-09<\/a>. According to a recent survey<\/a>, one-fifth of college students identify as born again Christians.<\/p>\n In an era when the first 400 names in the Ohio State University phone book are more religious than the residents of Murray\u2019s Fishtown, what is to be done?<\/p>\n For starters, religious leaders should focus more on the plight of the American working class. From Murray\u2019s perspective, this means analyzing changing lifestyles. Though this is a valuable exercise, they should not stop there.<\/p>\n Those who take the time to read Coming Apart<\/em> should also pick up William Julius Wilson\u2019s When Work Disappears<\/em><\/a> <\/em>(1996), a study of the \u201cnew urban poor.\u201d While Murray places the blame squarely on changing mores, Wilson traces the shifts in inner city family life to the loss of working class jobs and the disintegration of neighborhood social organization. In a review of Coming Apart<\/em><\/a>, economist Paul Krugman echoes Wilson\u2019s argument, noting a precipitous drop in the wages of male high school graduates after 1973. In the absence of good jobs, blue collar men have been less likely to marry<\/a>. Other sociologists<\/a> have pursued a similar line of inquiry, exploring the cultural side of poverty without blaming the victim<\/a>.<\/p>\n Last but not least, church officials should make an effort to understand the religious struggles of the white working class. This is especially important for American Catholics. In Boston (Buckley\u2019s holy city), only one out of five Catholics goes to church<\/a>.<\/p>\n In the judgment of Fordham University\u2019s James T. Fisher<\/a>, the characters in Kevin Smith\u2019s movies are part of a \u201cCatholic lost generation<\/a>\u201d that bears the wounds of the church\u2019s past (including the recent sex abuse crisis). Currently immersed in a project that explores \u201chistoric Catholic violence\u2014especially in families<\/a>,\u201d Fisher is acutely aware of the struggles of fallen away Catholics.\u00a0 If the church wants them back, it will have to spend some time down at the Quick Stop<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by John Schmalzbauer, Missouri State University Conservatives have long extolled the virtues of the American working class. In an oft-repeated statement, William F. Buckley said he would rather \u201centrust the government of the United States to the first 400 people listed in the Boston telephone directory than to the faculty of Harvard University.\u201d The author […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":125,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[133],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1678","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-john-schmalzbauer"],"yoast_head":"\n