God is not dead. Despite the predictions of academics and liberal religious leaders, the world is becoming more faith-filled, not less. According to Rodney Stark, the co-director of the Institute for Studies of Religion at Baylor University, there has been no rise of the “nones”—no increase in the number of the world’s self-professed atheists and no triumph of reason over revelation.
One of Mr. Stark’s targets in “The Triumph of Faith” is certain modern polling firms, including the Pew Survey, that routinely announce a significant increase in the number of Americans claiming no religious affiliation. As Alan Cooperman, Pew’s director of religion, reported last year: “The country is becoming less religious as a whole.” Mr. Stark criticizes the methods of Pew and other firms by asserting that their response rates are too small to justify the broad claims they make.
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