Image by tskdesign via Flickr

A recent poll by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, showed that 44 percent of Americans do not belong to their childhood faith; many had just switched affiliation, some had given up on organized religion altogether. However, the survey also found an interesting trend: 54 percent of children raised unaffiliated with a religion later choose one — three-fourths of them by age 24.

The NYTimes is profiling one such young man, a 13-year-old named Ryan, who one day a few months ago announced he wanted to start going to church. The story is really interesting, so I won’t spoil it here (link to it at bottom of this post), but one part was especially intriguing, especially in light of my prior posts on why people leave the Catholic Church. When young Ryan was asked why he thought his father – raised Catholic and at one time studying for priesthood – had stopped going to church, Ryan said:

‘He probably just one day was watching a Mets game, said ‘I don’t want to go to church’ and just stopped going.’” (more…)

First there was GodTube (which is now called Tangle.com, don’t ask me why) a Christian YouTube video sharing site that launched a couple years ago. But now for the folks of the Old Testament, there’s Yideotube, a site of all Jewish videos, which I found out about when whomever runs their Twitter site started following me. The featured video right now is of a young man – I’m assuming a young Jewish man – panning Puff the Magic Dragon as Puff the Kosher Dragon. He sings it Chipmunk style.

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

The story will sound familiar to any one in secular print media. One of the largest Catholic magazines is offering voluntary buyouts and looking to rethink its strategy. See the story about St. Anthony Messenger’s struggles here. I guess working for God doesn’t offer protection from the Internet.