Strengthening the religious teens requires basic commitment, intent, and adults taking interests in their lives, says Dr. Christian Smith of the University of Notre Dame.
Smith, a professor of Sociology at Notre Dame and Principal Investigator of the National Study of Youth and Religion, was the main speaker at the Fourth Annual Lecture of the Marjorie Pay Hinckley Endowed Chair in Social Work and the Social Sciences held on February 7th in the JSB auditorium on BYU campus.
Smith drew from past and current national studies he was conducting to speak on Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers. His main message was that young people care more about religion than the current media stereotype advertises.
"The stereotype of teenagers being different is false," Smith said. "The turbulent storm that is much lauded is wrong. Fundamentally, teenagers are bought into mainstream values, beliefs, and ideas. Fundamentally like the adult world, and only superficially not like the adult world."
Among the findings Smith shared was that the widely accepted stereotype of the typical U.S. teen being a religious rebel, alienated from or disgruntled with the churches in which he or she is being raised, is false. Teenagers compile a list of attitudes and observations concerning religion based on a number of factors set forth by their parents and other influencing adults around them. Many adults express religious apathy today, and so religious faith and practice does not actually mean much to the teens of these same adults, or even really connect to the rest of these teens' lives.
Smith's study included a national telephone and in-person survey of teens, ages 14-25 and spans the course of selected teens early high school to college years.
"According to our findings, one third of teens are regularly religiously involved, one third are sporadically involved, and one third are not involved at all in religion," Smith said.
Religious intensity among teens also varies greatly according to religious tradition, with LDS teens statistically rating as most involved or most religious.
"Turns out that 5:30 am seminary really makes a difference in LDS youths lives." Smith suggested.
Smith said that in the ecology of American teens lives, religious faith operates in a social-structurally weak position. Religion often competes for time, energy, and attention against other more dominant demands and commitments, particularly school, sports, romance, television, and other media, and often looses.
"Youth today have adopted a kind of religious apathy," Smith said. "American youth tend to assume an instrumental view of religion, with individual desire or wish being what drives 'what's going to be done with religion.'"
Smith said that such views often include ideas like it being okay to be religious, but it also important not to be 'too religious,' and the concept that religion can help people to live morally, but is not necessary.
The biggest idea floating around in the background of the minds of teens today is the concept of not wanting to offend anyone, Smith said.
"Nearly all American teens seem to have adopted a default posture of civility and a careful and ambiguous inclusiveness and tolerance when discussing religion with possible 'others.'" He said. "Our culture is knocking itself out to avoid conflict with others. We just avoid a whole lot of subjects. What that does is tell teenagers that they need to be completely generic.
"Be completely vanilla, and keep it to yourself," Smith said.
Smith added that teenagers get whatever they do mostly from adults, and that everything said in his lecture could also be attributed to adults.
Smith said most American teens are eminently teachable. The best rule to abide by in raising children is that parents have to keep in mind that they will raise up what they are. Parents lead by example and powerfully shape their kids through conduct, speech, attitudes, and habits, for better or for worse.
"Youth are good barometers, mirrors, and indicators of the larger adult culture they live in," Smith said.
Among those in attendance were Elder Richard G. Scott of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and his granddaughter, BYU President Cecil O. Samuleson, and David Magleby, the Dean of the College of Family, Home, and Social Sciences. Several relatives of the late President Hinckley were also present.