Michael Wear
speaker
229 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard Mar 2026
last heard 31 Mar
Michael Wear’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Mar 2026 with 1.
Appearances
Hi, so good to be with you.
Glad to have this conversation.
Yeah, so, you know, it's a big story.
Faith plays a really important role in this country, in our history, in our present, in our future, and in a lot of different ways.
As you know, as you've traveled the country, traveled Kentucky, there are just so many different permutations of religion and religious experience in this country.
I'd say maybe a few things.
One, America remains...
exceptional when it comes to religion, comparative to a lot of other places in the world.
And religion is the source of so many Americans' sense of self, sense of their place in the world, sense of community.
That's really important to understand about America.
Large number, around 40 percent, depending on the poll of Americans, say that their religion informs their daily decision making.
The vast majority of Americans are religious.
It's actually hard to think of another meaningful marker, another meaningful marker.
characteristic that binds Americans together than religion.
Now, not all Americans are religious, but there are more Americans who are religious than are male or female or who are Democrat or Republican.
And so that's really important.
That being said, we've seen over the last 20, 30 years, though there's some data to suggest it's plateauing, but we've seen a rise in religious disaffiliation, a decline in church attendance and regular participation in religious life compared to where America was 30 years ago.
Mm-hmm.
I think a lot of people thought that that would mean that religion became less important, less salient in American life.
But I actually think that pressure on religion has actually increased the conflict and salience that we see in the religious and political landscape in such a way that religion in some ways hasn't declined in importance, but actually has increased in importance.
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