Believing in "Nothing in Particular": Religious Nones, Despair, and the Closing of the Immanent Frame

The most recent survey by the PEW Research Center (2024) on religion found that for the first time the “religiously unaffiliated” or “religious nones” constituted the largest cohort (28%) of American adults, edging out Catholics (23%) and Evangelical Protestants (23%). Although it may appear as if this group shares some sympathies with certain Kierkegaardian attitudes in regard to Christendom, the institutional church, and normative culture in general, a closer look reveals that these Religious Nones, particularly the ones who describe their religion as “nothing in particular” (63%), are animated not so much by “inwardness” but by the evasion of commitments, either to the divine or to one’s community. Unable to articulate the conditions of belief or even a rich picture of human fullness, the lived spiritualities of Religious Nones reflects a detached perspective within an immanent frame that is closer to Kierkegaardian despair than to a genuine life of spirit.