[The Editors' Verdict] Why Is Religion Declining?

The era of religion is passing. It is no longer the "supreme teaching." In the past, religion acted as a proxy for the heavens. The words of religious people were accepted as the will of heaven, and their authority reached the skies. The medieval era's symbolic event, the "Humiliation of Canossa," when even emperors knelt before the pope, exemplifies this. In our history, it is not difficult to find examples of religious figures like the monk Sindon or Bowoo who wielded immense influence over kings.

In modern times, religion, especially Protestantism and Catholicism, came along with the advent and flow of Western civilization. The first thing the inaugural National Assembly Speaker Syngman Rhee did in the assembly was to offer a "prayer to God." Civilization and the ruling class united through Christianity to expand their influence. Along with economic development, the populations of these two religions followed an upward trajectory. On the other hand, Buddhism positioned itself as the "guardian of national cultural heritage" and stood against this. Through industrialization and democratization, religion maintained social influence by either supporting power or sometimes opposing it.

Now the times have changed. Globalization and urbanization have rapidly progressed. Above all, the trend toward individualization is strong. The population is rapidly declining. Social development, the evolution of science and technology, and cultural changes have reduced religion's standing. On top of this, the COVID-19 pandemic has deepened the crisis for religion. A religious figure I met last week said, "Compared to before the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of worshippers attending religious facilities has almost halved." There was great concern that those who left have not returned even as the pandemic ends.

Survey results also show the decline of religion. The "2022 Religious Perception Survey," conducted by Korea Research on 1,000 adults nationwide and announced on December 7 last year, illustrates this. Compared to 2021, the favorability of the five major religions all decreased. It is not only the general public; even religious people themselves rated their favorability lower than the previous year. The response that religion influences their lives also dropped by 4 percentage points compared to a year earlier. The proportion of those answering "no religion" increased by 3 percentage points compared to four years ago. Especially, the proportion of non-religious people in their 20s and 30s increased significantly. In 2004, 45% of people in their 20s believed in religion, but by 2021, this plummeted to 22%. For those in their 30s, it decreased from 49% in 2004 to 30% in 2021.

The crisis of religion is not only due to social environmental changes or unexpected situations like COVID-19. Internal issues within religion are also significant. Religious people fail to inspire trust that they are superior to the general public in intellectual, cultural, and ethical aspects. A pastor who displayed the Japanese rising sun flag on March 1st, a priest who prayed for the president and his spouse to crash from an airplane, monks caught engaging in inappropriate behavior in inappropriate places... Cases of religious figures committing sexual crimes appear in the news whenever one might forget. In short, it can be summarized as "there is nothing to learn from them, they are culturally backward, not kind, and their ethics are questionable." The "crisis of trust" in religious people is the essence of the religious crisis.

If religion focuses only on relying on government subsidies, demanding tithes, and praying for blessings rather than winning the hearts of believers, it is not normal. It cannot avoid criticism that it venerates "material" over "spirit" and is merely "religion as a profession." If there are many such religious people, the future of religion cannot be bright. This is why religious reform is needed now.