Spiritual Quote of the Day (Camilla Cavendish, on Faith, ‘An Even Greater Force in the Coming Decades’)

“Faith is set to become an even greater force in the coming decades because the fastest-growing nations, where birth rates are highest, are among the most devout. Sub-Saharan Africa saw the most dramatic expansion of Christianity in the world since the European Middle Ages during the 20^th century. Its Christian population is expected to double between now and 2050, to 1.1bn. Meanwhile Islam is the fastest-growing religion in the world, having made inroads in north Africa. By mid-century there may be almost as many Muslims as Christians. Hindus and Jews are also expected to increase their numbers — though Buddhists will not.”—British journalist Camilla Cavendish, “Secularists Must Remember That Religion Is on the Rise,” The Financial Times, Jan. 4-5, 2025

In some ways, I was delighted to read Ms. Cavendish’s headline, along with her speculation that “the hold of aggressive atheism may be weakening.” After all, I read her piece in the same week as philosopher Firmin DeBrabander’s far more devastating itemization, in the Fall 2024 issue of The Hedgehog Review, on “dechurching”— “a process involving entire populations, not just intellectuals, radicals, or other members of the so-called secular elite.”

What troubles me, I suppose, is that Ms. Cavendish’s argument boils down to demography being destiny. It’s the same kind of claim that Democratic strategists have made for a coming, decisive realignment for their party over the last two decades, and we now see what has happened to those hopes.

The basis for such hopes lies in the belief that current trends will continue unabated, but so often that does not happen in lives affected by social cataclysms.

How many demographers, for instance, would have predicted three decades ago that the 2007-09 global financial crisis and NAFTA would have combined to corrode Democrats’ one-time “blue wall” in the Rust Belt states, or that the sex abuse scandal would deliver the most devastating blow to Roman Catholicism since the Reformation?

True, Professor DeBrander cites demographic data similar to Ms. Cavendish’s in holding that obituaries for Christianity are premature. But I would like the data to be supplemented by counter evangelizing for the kind of belief promoted by Pope Francis, in a Church that fosters what he calls “theological hope” and “a change that promotes the dignity of individuals.”

I guess I am looking for the modern equivalent of Saints Francis, Dominic, and Ignatius Loyola—figures who rose, when the Church seemed overwhelmed by challenges to its moral authority, to offer reminders of the power of humility and community in teaching, by word and deed, the original core values of the Gospels.

(The image accompanying this post, the official portrait of Baroness Cavendish of Little Venice, was taken Apr. 23, 2024, by Roger Harris.)