In January 2018, a Pew Research study showed that the number of American converts to Islam is almost equal to the number of those who abandoned the faith. There is virtually no growth in the number of Muslims. This study also concluded that about 25 percent of adult Muslims raised in the United States no longer identified as Muslims.

Many in the West are concerned with the rise of Islamism and radical Islamic terrorism. The concern is legitimate, as Islamic extremism is often loud and consequential on the world stage. However, there is an aspect of Islam about which we rarely talk. It isn’t an exaggeration to say that the Muslim community currently is experiencing a crisis of apostasy. In many places, the abandonment of faith among Muslims is reaching avalanche levels, and Muslim clerics are worried.

In an important article on the status of Islam in Iran, a senior Shiite scholar warned that the religion is weakening in his country, stating that “around 50,000 of Iran’s 75,000 mosques are closed, showing the declining numbers of Iranians attending.”

Is this cleric’s view significant? Yes, without a doubt. Not only is Iran the most important Shiite country in the Muslim world, but this cleric is the liaison between the Iranian Islamic president and the country’s Islamic seminaries. In fact, he is “a member of the Assembly of Experts—a deliberative body empowered to appoint the Supreme Leader,” the article reports. Thus, one of the elite Shiite leaders in the most prestigious Shiite country is worried about the status of Islam in Iran.

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