“Attitudes toward homosexuality and sexual identity have been transformed, obviously, with far-reaching consequences for religious movements of all kinds. Religious groups have had to confront gay-related issues in their own ranks and also had to decide their attitudes to public policy.”

What are the most significant changes and megatrends that have occurred in the U.S. since the mid-1970s?

If you imagine someone time traveling between the eras, what would strike them? What was not tolerated then but is quite normal and accepted today? Conversely, what did people then do without comment that today could get you arrested or thrown out?

So many such impressions are subjective, but a few obvious broad themes do emerge. Together, they constitute a remarkable revolution in the most basic assumptions of life – of family and intimate relationships, of work and residence, of thinking and speaking, of getting and spending.

Often, these changes have been so significant as to constitute a revolution – change so vast that it is almost impossible for later generations even to imagine what the preceding “normality” actually was like.

Let me focus here on American religion. In no particular order, here are 12 such changes:

1. Gender revolutions.

Religions of all kinds have been shaken, revived or transformed beyond recognition by the rise of new sensibilities involving gender and sexual identity.

In the mid-1970s, ordaining women was a revolutionary and wildly controversial step for most denominations. Today, it is absolutely commonplace for many if not all traditions – Christian, Jewish and other.

That gender shift echoes through so many aspects of religious life and thought, including theology, liturgy and Bible translation.

2. Revolutions in sexual identity.

Attitudes toward homosexuality and sexual identity have been transformed, obviously, with far-reaching consequences for religious movements of all kinds. Religious groups have had to confront gay-related issues in their own ranks and also had to decide their attitudes to public policy.

Same-sex marriage has represented a core index of changing attitudes, which represents a massive generational divide within even conservative religious movements. They also threaten to place religious organizations on a collision course with secular laws.

3. Shifts in family structure.

This has many aspects, including a decline in marriage rates, a rise in people living alone, and a very steep decline in children living with both parents. All these affect the role of churches and their perceived functions, notably in defining the families they are trying to serve.

4. Abuse and authority.

It is difficult to imagine a time when child abuse issues were not a pressing concern for churches, but they were unheard of in the public sphere before the mid-1980s.

Rising concern with abuse had multiple roots, but a major source was the shifting gender attitudes noted earlier, and the resulting perceptions of sexual dangers.

We can only speculate how U.S. history might have been different if such scandals as the Roman Catholic Church faced had not erupted, but it is at least possible that an untainted church might have organized more effectively against social and political changes, including same-sex marriage.

Associated with the abuse issue has been the impact of new concepts of legal responsibility and the threat of litigation. Insurance and risk management have become critical forces driving the life of religious institutions.

5. The rise of the “nones.”

The proportion of those claiming no religious affiliation has certainly grown, but the jury remains out as to what those figures actually mean.

No religious affiliation certainly does not mean no religion, and many “nones” seem to hold pretty standard religious attitudes. Also, the number of actual atheists in the U.S. remains very steady and actually pretty much where it has been over the past century or so.

Part of the explanation is that people who a generation ago would have defined themselves as generically Christian or as Catholic now respond “none.”

Thus, I would be very careful about associating the rise of the “nones” with actual tendencies toward secularization.

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