Jesus is a None: 5 Things Christians Need to Know About the “Nones”

The first time I heard the phrase “Nones” was from my friend Jim Wallis, who wrote about the release of a Pew Forum study documenting the growing number of people who responded “none of the above” when asked about their religious affiliation. As I wrote in a response back then, “Calling people ‘Nones’ is a mistake.”

I’m even more convinced of this now — and I think it’s especially a mistake for Christians to adopt this moniker. Here’s why:

1. “Nones” are not non-believers. Because religion — and more specifically, Christianity — has been such a dominant force in the United States’ socio-cultural conversation for so long, many have presumed that being a Christian is more or less the “default identity” of the U.S. citizen. To be something else is the exception rather than the rule. So the moniker “Nones” suggests that those who are religiously unaffiliated or independent are beyond the social norm or somehow lacking something everyone else has.

More than two-thirds of so-called “Nones” claim to believe in God or some form of supreme being. The title speaks more to the wording of the surveys given to respondents about their religious identity than it does to anything about their beliefs.

And to presume that being part of a church and/or religion is necessarily part of what it means to be Christ-like is misguided — and is evidence of the lingering effects of Christian hegemony. Which brings me to my second point . . .

This is an exclusive I wrote for OnFaith. Read the full article HERE.