On a Sunday morning in a church parking lot, you may have seen a scene like this: parents walking toward the sanctuary while their high school-aged child remains in the car, glued to their phone.

Eventually, the parents return to knock on the window, and the child gets out with a blank expression. I think this brief standoff is a microcosm of what's happening across the United States.

According to a survey released by Pew Research in 2025, 35% of American adults have left the religion they practiced as children. Meanwhile, 56% still identify with that religion.

What's interesting is the timing of these departures. Among those who changed or abandoned their faith, 85% did so before the age of thirty, and 46% reported that they had already distanced themselves during childhood or adolescence.

People often say, "They changed when they went to college." However, the numbers suggest that college is more of a confirmation stamp than a turning point.

A 2020 survey of 1,811 teenagers and their parents revealed more specific insights. While 43% of parents said religion is "very important," only 24% of the teenagers in the same households agreed.

Interestingly, attendance rates at religious services are similar for both groups. This means that children continue to attend even if their hearts are no longer in it.

When asked why they attend, 38% said it was "because their parents want them to," while 35% said they go of their own volition.

When asked if their beliefs align with their parents, there's a slight discrepancy. 48% of teenagers said they are "completely aligned" with their parents, while 53% of parents believed that to be true.

One concerning statistic stands out: 34% of teenagers who reported differing beliefs from their parents said, "My parents don't know that."

This suggests that many families are not free of conflict; rather, the conflict has yet to be discovered. It quietly fades away when children move into college dorms or become independent.

This issue feels particularly heavy in Korean American families for a reason: the church has not just been a place of faith.

According to a 2023 Pew Research survey of 7,006 Asian Americans, 59% of Korean respondents identified as Christians, which is relatively high among Asian Americans.

For first-generation immigrants, the church was a place for document translation, job information, and sharing meals. Faith was intertwined with daily life.

The problem is that children who speak English as their first language find none of those additional functions necessary. What remains is the faith itself, which cannot simply be passed down like an object.

Thus, conflicts in these families often start as doctrinal debates but quickly escalate into identity issues. Parents may intend to convey the importance of faith, but children hear it as, "Aren't you one of us?"

The reasons given by those who have left are not dramatic. In the 2025 survey, 46% said they no longer believe the teachings.

38% stated that it wasn't very important in their lives, and another 38% said they simply drifted away over time.

This indicates that there are far more cases of quiet drifting away than of turning away due to major events. Honestly, I found this aspect the most chilling.

Conversely, the conditions for those who remain are also revealed in the same survey. Among those who reported positive religious experiences in childhood, 84% remained with that faith.

Only 24% of those who reported negative experiences stayed. That's a difference of more than three times.

The religious atmosphere in the home also plays a role. Among those raised in highly religious households, 82% remained, while only 47% of those from less religious homes did.

Ultimately, this suggests that the power to retain faith lies not in pressure but in experience. It's not about the time spent forced to sit in a pew, but rather the genuinely positive memories created within that time that keep people connected.

The same applies to sports. Activities that parents pushed their children into often end when they graduate high school, while those that children found joy in continue well into their forties.

I believe traditions are worth preserving. However, when the method of preservation becomes coercive, it's not about maintaining tradition but rather about depleting it.

Faith is ultimately something each person must carry for themselves, and that choice comes with responsibility. Just because a child arrives at a different answer doesn't mean the parent has failed.

Returning to that parking lot scene, what's more important than knocking on the window is what kind of conversation happens after the car door opens. That part is much more challenging than the technique of opening the door.