Lights & Perfections · By the Numbers
Faith, well-being & retention among Latter-day Saint Millennials & Gen Z.
We name the decline plainly — then let the data reframe it. Every figure shows its source. No triumphalism, no spin. Pull the switch and watch the generations change.
The whole story is the rising generation measured against their elders.
By every measure
Against every other major U.S. faith tradition, Latter-day Saints lead on practice and transmission. Choose a measure.
Pew Religious Landscape Study (2024). Latter-day Saints shown in gold.
The shift, measured
On most measures the young practice a little less than their elders — real, but modest. On one, they reach higher.
Pew Religious Landscape Study (2024).
The young are higher
98.2%of Latter-day Saint Millennials & Gen Z believe people have a soul or spirit — slightly more than the 96.8% of earlier generations. Where the modern world erodes belief, the conviction of an inner, eternal self holds — and even rises.
Named honestly
Retention fell from 82% to 46% across four decades. It tracks a national drop that spared no faith. Here is the fall, beside what still stands.
General Social Survey, 1980s → 2010s+. A real decline, named plainly.
Identify and still attend. Only 12% of Latter-day Saints are “nominal” — others run near half. (Pew RLS 2024, fig. 17)
What protects, what pulls
The single strongest protective factor is not argument or activity — it is felt experience. A six-fold spread separates those who sense God daily from those who never do.
Family Foundations of Youth Development Study (2016–2024). A smartphone in adolescence roughly tripled the odds of leaving (13% vs 4.9%).
Of those who leave, most land in another faith or in “nothing in particular.” (SSS 2025)
Only about 10% reject religion entirely. The first two groups — 54% — still value faith, and roughly two in three stay open to returning.
Spiritual Seismology Survey, 2025.
LDS Millennials & Gen Z are the most likely group in America to say they are “very happy.”
of the “spiritual but not religious” young are very happy — the least of any group, vs 33% of older SBNR.
On student mental health, Latter-day Saints track their peers — while those of no faith are the highest-risk.
A closing gap
At 18, a 19-point gap separates young men and women in retention. By the seventies the lines meet near 63%. Read it as a snapshot by age — not the same people tracked over a lifetime.
Spiritual Seismology Survey (2025). A snapshot by age, not longitudinal tracking — the convergence is a pattern across ages, not a guaranteed path.
The full record
Every figure in this brief, searchable and sortable. Filter by topic, sort any column, or search a claim, population, or source.
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