October 10, 2025
Dear Church,
Last week, I attended a Springtide presentation at the Carondelet Center. Springtide Research Institute is a national organization that focuses on 13 to 25 year olds – or Gen Z. They are nonpartisan and a non-profit, and are well respected in their field. The presentation I attended was specifically on Gen Z’s religious and spiritual beliefs and mental health.
A few things stuck out to me, that I thought would be good to share with our community as we continue to support our youth and form intergenerational relationships. The data is a couple years old, but from other people in the room who have done these surveys more recently, it’s an accurate snapshot.
First, 71% of Gen Z consider themselves religious, and 78% consider themselves spiritual. For many in the room, this was a surprisingly high number, especially because 64% of youth in that age range do not regularly attend any religious services. One reason for that difference is a values gap – there was a high percentage of youth reporting feeling a values gap between themselves and their religious communities.
Second, loneliness is really prevalent. One in three young people feel completely alone most of the time – and the date when this began was striking. Many people point to the early pandemic as a time when loneliness ramped up, but these statistics were from 2019 – the loneliness epidemic was already here, likely connected with an increase in social media use.
Third, one of the things that helped with feelings of loneliness, belonging, and care was having trusted adults in their life. For youth who reported zero trusted adults, 60-70% of them agreed with statements like “I feel completely alone” and “I feel left out”. For youth with 5 or more trusted adults in their life, the percentage dropped to 9-40% (40% still reporting “feeling stressed and overwhelmed”). That’s a huge impact.
So how do we as church respond to these learnings? By listening to our youth, knowing their names, remembering what they’ve shared, asking curious questions, and including them in community. By supporting them and caring for them. By being a space of belonging and welcome. Because belonging is one of our core needs – no matter our age.
In Christ,
Pastor Reed
Every Friday, we send an email to the congregation and any others who would like to learn more about the Grace community. The last four Friday emails are posted below.