Youth Truth
Soul Searching: The Religious and
Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers
by Christian Smith, with Melinda Lundquist
Denton
Oxford University Press, 2005
(368 pages, $25.00, hardcover)
reviewed by W. Bradford Wilcox
A probing and provocative look at the souls of American teenagers, Soul Searching will, at various turns, leave Christians satisfied and sobered. Smith, a professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, directs the National Study of Youth and Religion, from which the book’s data was taken. Denton, a doctoral candidate at the university, is its project manager.
Positive Religion
I was satisfied by the clear connections that Smith makes between cult, community, and character. Teenagers in the United States who express strong religious faith, who pray individually and corporately, and who are involved in a church youth group are significantly less likely to get into trouble and are significantly more likely to be a force for good in their local community. Clearly, religion is a source of moral order for many American adolescents.
The statistics tell part of the story. Take honesty. Smith finds that four percent of “devoted” students report lying “fairly or very often” to their parents, compared to sixteen percent of the religiously “disengaged.” Or school performance. One percent of devoted students report being suspended or expelled from school on numerous occasions, compared to nine percent of religiously disengaged students.
Or helping the poor. In the book, twenty percent of devoted teens report helping needy people “a lot,” compared to four percent of disengaged students. Smith finds that the positive associations between religious devotion and virtue, and the negative associations between religious devotion and vice, repeat themselves on a range of social indicators—from charitable donations to cheating in school.
Smith is also honest enough to admit that religious faith may not be the only factor driving this positive correlation between religion and good behavior. He acknowledges, for instance, that teens with particular types of personalities—a desire for risk, for instance—appear to be less inclined to religion and more susceptible to vice. He also acknowledges that teenagers who fall into trouble may disassociate themselves from religious congregations and youth groups in an effort to “reduce their cognitive and emotional dissonance” with church norms.
Nevertheless, the consistent character and size of the association between religion and good behavior in this and other studies of adolescents strongly suggest that religion does play an important role in fostering virtue among adolescents. Indeed, Smith outlines a range of factors—from the moral directives aimed at adolescents by American religions to the congregational social networks that link a large minority of American teens to adults who care about their spiritual, moral, and emotional welfare—that may help to explain precisely why religion fosters good behavior among adolescents. Indeed, his chapter on adolescent outcomes offers the most thorough account of the potential mechanisms that link religion and virtuous behavior that I have ever read.
Unknown Religion
But Soul Searching also left me sobered by the portrait it painted of American teenagers’ spiritual lives. With the exception of many Mormon and conservative Protestant teens, most American teens appear altogether unfamiliar with the most basic religious and moral teachings of their own traditions.
A Journal of Mere Christianity—Delivered to Your Door
- Essays on theology, culture, and the Church
- Contributors from across the Christian traditions
Six print issues (one year) of Touchstone, plus full online access and PDF downloads for only $39.95.
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95.
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more from the online archives
24.4—July/August 2011
The Cultural Marxists’ Strategic Assault on Religion, Life & Family by Patrick F. Fagan
30.3—May/June 2017
Insider Attempts to Disorient the Orthodox by Alexander F. C. Webster
31.5—September/October 2018
The Secular State Without the Decalogue by James M. Kushiner
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
