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In Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers (New York: Oxford University Press, c. 2005), Christian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton provide an amply documented and academically persuasive portrait of America's youth. Smith is a professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina and the principal investigator of the National Study of Youth and Religion—a well funded, methodologically clear endeavor that relies upon both extensive surveys and personal interviews. Denton is the study's project manager. "To our knowledge," they say, "this project has been the largest, most comprehensive and detailed study of American teenage religion and spirituality conducted to date" (p. 7).

America's teenagers are remarkably religious; 40 percent attend "religious services once a week or more, and 19 percent report attending one to three times per month" (p. 37). Only 18 percent have no religious involvement. Amazingly enough, "teens as a group profess to want to attend religious services not less, but actually more than they currently do" (p. 38). They praise their congregations as "warm and welcoming" (p. 61) and find adults therein reliable and trustworthy. Their parents, more than anyone else, influence them, and they reveal little hostility toward them. Such youngsters have little interest in fringe or "alternative" religions and seem to be quite conventional in almost every way. "The vast majority of U.S. teenagers identify themselves as Christians" and "regularly practice religious faith" (p. 68). The mantra of avant garde folks like Michael Lerner—"spiritual but not religious"—hardly registers with typical teenagers.

One interviewee, incidentally, was attending a Nazarene church and spoke highly of it. He liked Wednesday and Sunday night services, the youth group and Sunday school. What he found attractive in the church was this: "It's good people, you know. And not only that, I also actually learn," something important to him because he wanted to know how to "be a God-fearing person and go to heaven or whatever, you know?" (p. 100).

The more devout among them are thereby advantaged in "a host of ways," making a positive difference in: "risk behaviors, quality of family and adult relationships, moral reasoning and behavior, community participation, media consumption, sexual activity, and emotional well-being" (p. 219). Whether one considers drugs and alcohol or school attendance or getting along with parents, the religious teenagers do much better. They watch less TV, fewer R rated movies, less pornography, and play fewer video games. In some categories—such as pornographic movies, where the "devoted" teens watched 0.5 a year while the "disengaged" saw 2.5—the statistics reveal dramatic differences. "Nearly all Devoted teens believe in waiting for marriage to have sex, compared to less than one-quarter of the Disengaged who believe the same" (p. 223). Devoted teens are far happier than the Disengaged and feel more closely connected with others. They craft positive plans for the future and seriously ponder "the meaning of life" (p. 226). The statistical tables delineating these differences, found on pp. 220-227, are most impressive in demonstrating the authors' conviction that religion helps teens.

The positive news regarding the role of religion in teenagers' lives must be balanced, however, by information regarding its doctrinally deficient nature. Our youngsters have little knowledge of any content to the Christian faith! They take a thoroughly individualistic approach to questions regarding God, man, and salvation—though they are generally quite inarticulate when asked to explain much of anything about their views. Indeed, the authors conclude: "In our in-depth interviews with U.S. teenagers, we also found the vast majority of them to be incredibly inarticulate about their faith, their religious beliefs and practices, and its meaning or place in their lives" (p. 131).

Their religion is best defined as "Moralistic Therapeutic Deism." They believe in a rather distant (unless needed to solve one's problems) God, who "wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions" (p. 162). "The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself," and "Good people go to heaven when they die" (p. 163). They believe God "designed the universe and establishes moral law and order. But this God is not Trinitarian, he did not speak through the Torah or the prophets of Israel, was never resurrected from the dead, and does not fill and transform people thorough his Spirit. This God is not demanding. He actually can't be, because his job is to solve our problems and make people feel good. In short, God is something like a combination Divine Butler and Cosmic Therapist: he is always on call, takes care of any problems that arise, professionally helps his people feel better about themselves, and does not become too personally involved in the process" (p. 165).

Today's teenagers also entertain a view of human nature quite at odds with the Christian tradition. Teens "tend to assume an instrumental view of religion. Most instinctively suppose that religion exists to help individuals be and do what they want, and not as an external tradition or authority or divinity that makes compelling claims and demeans on their lives, especially to change or grow in ways that may not immediately want to" (p. 148). While they freely acknowledge their sins, they apparently feel no condemnation as sinners! They share the broader culture's presumption that we are autonomous individuals, free to shape our future in accord with our own desires. Religion is viewed as an enjoyable activity, but it ought not particularly influence one's decisions. Autonomous individuals can hardly judge the behavior of others, and today's teens are radically non-judgmental. "The typical bywords, rather, are 'Who am I to judge?' 'If that's what they choose, whatever,' 'Each Person decides for himself,' and 'If it works for them, fine'" (p. 144).

"What we heard from most teens," Smith and Denton say, "is essentially that religion makes them feel good, that it helps them make good choices, that it helps resolve problems and troubles, that it serves their felt needs. What we hardly ever heard from teens was that religion is about significantly transforming people into, not what they feel like being, but what they are supposed to be, what God, or their ethical tradition wants them to be" (pp. 148-149). The youngsters interviewed rarely expressed interest in a religion that "summons people to embrace an obedience to truth regardless of the personal consequences or rewards. Hardly any teens spoke directly about more difficult religious subjects like repentance, love of neighbor, social justice, unmerited grace, self-discipline, humility, the costs of discipleship, dying to self, the sovereignty of God, personal holiness, the struggles of sanctification" (p. 149), or any of the classical themes of Christian discipleship.

For those of us working with young people, this book is both encouraging and chastening. Kids are hungry for God and the churches are bringing them into religious fellowships. Unfortunately, they learn little about the great doctrines of the Church and rarely are challenged to live out the sterner stuff of the scriptures.