The Unchurched in the Southeast, 1980

Southeastern Geographer Vol. 25, No. 1, May 1985, pp. 1-15 THE UNCHURCHED IN THE SOUTHEAST, 1980 Charles A. Heatwole During recent decades considerable attention has focused on the geography of church membership in the United States. This is manifested by studies of specific church groups, as well as by more ecumenically inclined references. (J) In light of the rather substantial literature , it is surprising that so little effort has been directed to the other side of the ecclesiastical coin—that is, to the geography of the unchurched. Indeed, the geographic literature on the unchurched largely consists of a few brief passages from Zelinsky's landmark study of church membership in 1952, and from Shortridge's study of religious patterns in 1971. (2) This lack of attention is made all the more peculiar by persistent estimates that have placed the unchurched population of the United States at around 40 percent of the total. (3) This paper describes and analyses the geography of the unchurced in the Southeast, specifically the nine-state region consisting of Alabama , Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. The purposes are to increase understanding of a significant though largely overlooked segment of the region 's social fabric and, more generally, to shed light on a portion of American society that geographers have tended to ignore. WHO ARE THE UNCHURCHED? This report will make repeated reference to "the unchurched" and, of necessity, "the churched." These terms are used seldomly by the general public but have become prevalent among students of religion. A thorough explanation of these terms and their popularity is beyond the scope of this project. (4) Suffice it to say "the churched" refers to the church members plus others who exhibit some level of participation in or association with the ongoing life of a religious institution. To be unchurched, then, is to exhibit nonmembership or non-involvement with respect to religious institutions. If these definitions have a problem, it is that they are difficult to operationalize for analytical purposes. How, for example, does one enumerate people who "exhibit some level of participation"? To alleviate Dr. Heatwole is Professor of Geography at Hunter College of the City University of New York, NY 10021. Southeastern Geographer this difficulty, denominational demographers have tended to regard the churched as people who are listed on any church role. Thus, the churched encompass members of religious organizations, plus others who are on an official list (e.g., a Sunday School roster) but lack, for reasons of youth or choice, the status of full membership. The unchurched may be operationally defined as people whose names do not appear on any church roll. Emphatically, to be unchurched does not necessarily imply a lack of religious faith or belief. Rather, the unchurched cover the theological spectrum. Atheists certainly qualify, but surveys suggest most of the unchurched believe in God. (5) Some profess to be religious—even very religious—and attend church with varying regularity. Whatever the reason, all have one thing in common: they are not listed on any church roll. ENUMERATION. Lack of appropriate data is probably the main reason why geographers have largely ignored the unchurched. Enumeration of the unchurched population at any level of geographic aggregation requires a mathematical exercise that is easy to state but difficult to effect; namely, take the total population and subtract the churched. The result is the unchurched population. Although the U.S. Census provides acceptable data on total population, data on the churched historically have lacked comprehensiveness and reliability. As a result, calculations of unchurched populations have been suspect. Reasons for the inadequacy of data about the churched are not hard to find. The federal government has not conducted a census of religion in fifty years, and is not likely to do so again. Private agencies, principally the National Council ofthe Churches ofChrist in the USA (NCCC) and the Glenmary Research Center (GRC), occasionally have attempted to take up the slack. (6) Among their more important products are the 1952 and 1971 surveys of church membership in the United States, which respectively formed the statistical bases for the studies by Zelinsky and Shortridge. (7) Although these surveys are valuable data sources...