(RNS) — As an evangelical Christian, Philip Truscott is dismayed at the decline of religion in America, saying it is bad for the country’s soul.
As a social scientist, he says he has proof.
In a paper in the Journal of Sociology and Christianity, Truscott draws on data tracking crime on college campus and religious affiliation surveys to show that states with higher percentages of so-called “nones” — people who claim no religious affiliation in surveys — have higher rates of sexual assault on campus as well as higher suicide rates overall.
Truscott did most of the work on the study, entitled “Rape, Suicide, and the Rise of Religious Nones” while a professor of sociology at Southwest Baptist University in Missouri. He was inspired by previous research he had done that showed that the higher the percentage of nones in a state, the higher the suicide rate. That research, based on data from the 2014 Pew Religious Landscape report, also showed that the higher the percentage of evangelicals in a state, the lower the rate of sexual assaults on its college campuses.
Truscott followed up on those findings by examining similar data from the Public Religion Research Institute and reported the results in a paper in the Journal of Sociology and Christianity in October. Truscott argues that the decline in religion can be tied to a loss of self-control and correlates that with more suicides and assaults.
Philip Truscott. (Photo via Southwest Baptist University)
While he falls short of claiming that loss of religion causes more suicides and assaults, Truscott has subsequently argued that his findings prove the need for more state vouchers for private …