There’s been a rise in young people turning to religion (Picture: Metro.co.uk/@nathanieldwo/Peter Ptschelinzew/Deborah van der Bij) ‘God’s just doing stuff,’ Pastor Dave Brackenridge of Home Church Scotland says, when asked why he thinks there’s been a rise in young people turning to religion. ‘There’s a shift happening across the country. Young people are showing up, not because they have to, but because they’re choosing to. They’re searching and they’re starting to find what they’re looking for.’ This shift has been christened a ‘quiet revival’ of the Church, and it’s being spearheaded by Gen Z (those aged between 13 and 28), according to a new report by the Bible Society, based on data from YouGov. The research found that church attendance is on the rise, particularly amongst the younger generation. In 2018, just 4% of people aged 18 to 24 said they went to church at least monthly, but flash forward to today and this figure is now 16% — making them the second most likely age group to attend church regularly. In particular, there’s been an increase in the number of young men going to church, with just 4% going in 2018, but 21% going today. Studies have shown the number of young people going to church regularly has substantially risen (Picture: Getty Images) Nathan Lawson is one of the young men who found faith in his early 20s, becoming interested in Christianity at the age of 22, while studying at Oxford University. He explained to Metro that he was raised ‘culturally Hindu’ by his parents, but gave up on his faith after his mother passed away. ‘For quite a few years after, I didn’t want anything to do with religion. It didn’t make sense to me anymore,’ he recalls. However, he became curious about it again a few years later, thanks to a Christian friend he made in his third year of uni. ‘She would intrigue me when I was hanging out with her as she didn’t engage in a lot of the typical student behaviour, like drinking, but she was very happy and content,’ he says. ‘She invited me to church with her many times and I soon found myself going every week as I felt a real sense of peace there.’ Nathan first became interested in religion when he was 22 (Picture: @nathanieldwo) Nathan, who is now 25, says he explored several different religions before deciding to become a Christian, but feels happier and has become more ‘patient’ since finding faith. ‘When you start to have a relationship with Christ, you naturally become a nicer person,’ he shares. As well as going to church every Sunday, he also has several other ‘non-negotiable’ disciplines he follows as part of his religion. ‘I pray twice a day, once in the morning and once before I go to bed. I’ve also made a spiritual discipline of fasting once a week, usually that’s on a Monday. It’s something that’s very personal to me, but it’s really helped my relationship with God increase. I’ve seen lots of fruits from it.’ Deborah shares her religious journey on social media with her 42,000 followers (Picture: Deborah van der Bij) For Deborah van der Bij, being a Christian involves praying every day as well as reading the Bible as much as possible. She also likes to ‘connect with God’ by listening to worship music, going for walks and looking at nature. The 27-year-old from London shares her religious journey online and has amassed more than 42,000 followers on Instagram, where she’s known as the internet’s ‘big sis in Christ’. She claims her followers are predominantly women in their early 20s, but she’s recently seen an increase in the number of teenagers responding to her content, with girls as young as 15 wanting to learn more. ‘I get a lot of messages from young people who are new to Christianity but say there’s something in what I’m sharing about the message of Jesus that really pulls them. It ranges in ages but I’ve been getting emails from girls who are 15, 17 and 18. ‘I think the younger generation are more curious to figure things out for themselves, they don’t want to be spoon-fed things as much, they’re open to exploring and reading up on things for themselves to work out what’s true and what’s not.’ https://www.instagram.com/reel/C-DERTeobnE/?igsh=MXNyNmNlamNoYXh6MA%3D%3D And she’s speaking from first-hand experience, having previously drifted away from ‘boring’ religion while attending university, before finding her own way back to it in her 20s. ‘When religion is passed on from home, as a routine thing, you’re more inclined to rebel against it because you don’t know why you have to do this. But I’ve realised that being a Christian is not a boring life, it’s not a life filled with restrictions and I believe that a lot of things in the Bible are actually set in place to protect us,’ she explains. ‘I experienced it when I went outside of religion and tried to do my own thing, I ended up hurting myself in ways that could have been prevented. ‘I spent a lot of time trying to get validation from men, in a more physical way, and as freeing as that felt in the moment, it was actually hurting me more than it was benefiting me. I ended up in this cycle where I constantly wanted validation, I wanted guys to text me and I was placing so much worth on it.’ She continues: ‘I couldn’t live like that, so for me, there had to be another way, which is where I really found the love of God and honestly, it’s changed my life.’ The 29-year-old priest thinks social media has big part to play in attracting Gen Z to religion (Picture: Peter Ptschelinzew) Reverend Pippa White believes open and honest social media accounts like Deborah’s could be one of the main reasons Gen Z are finding religion so appealing right now. The 29-year-old priest from Shropshire, is a TikTok sensation in her own right with more than 20,000 followers on the app. She regularly posts videos about her love of Taylor Swift and playing Rugby, as well as sharing a look at what being a member of the clergy really involves. ‘Lots of people are surprised that priests have social lives too,’ she tells Metro. ‘I made a TikTok about going to a Ministry of Sound concert, and the comments were really divided between people who thought a priest shouldn’t be doing something like that, or people who thought it was really fun that I had similar interests to them.’ Visitors to her church often don’t realise she’s a priest, but she admits it’s only older generations that are ever truly surprised by her age — children and teenagers are ‘never phased by it’. @not_a_priestess hope this helps xx #christiantiktok #anglican #episcopal #fyp #christianwoman #priest ♬ Bonkers – Dizzee Rascal & Armand Van Helden Pippa believes this could be because Gen Z haven’t inherited the same ‘embarrassment’ about going to church Millennials and Gen X have experienced. ‘For some Gen X and Millennials, there can be a feeling that being Christian can mean you’re a bit wet and weird. But when so many popular young people are open about their faith (especially online), it helps to dispel this misconception for Gen Z,’ she says. ‘There are also loads of celebrities and online personalities who talk about their faith and going to church on social media and it seems to have taken away some of the discomfort surrounding exploring religion.’ Pippa also thinks the COVID pandemic, which made many face their own mortality in an extreme way, coupled with headlines dominated by war and climate change, will have caused Gen Z to think more deeply about what the meaning of life really is and where they should find meaning. ‘People naturally turn to religion when faced with these kinds of questions, and I hope and pray we will be able to support them well,’ she adds. Comment nowHave you noticed a rise in Gen Z’s interest in religion?Comment Now At a time when Trump’s Republicanism (and ‘traditional’ conservative values) are dominating headlines and TikToks alike, Nathan points out the importance of scrutinising your own journey to religion in the context of global events. ‘We live in a world where materialism is really being pushed, but people are really starting to wake up to the fact that most of these worldly things are fleeting and don’t really give you that much happiness. ‘There’s a sense of peace you get when you get when you go to any place of worship that I don’t think many secular places can recreate. There’s been a rise in meditation, yoga and wellness which I think is attempting to do that, but I don’t think anywhere gives the peace that God does.’ For young men specifically though, he believes there’s a bit more to it. ‘A lot of young men like the discipline that comes with religion and they like the greater calling and the purpose. And if you genuinely look around, what are the alternatives for them? ‘I don’t want to encourage people to come to religion just because there are bad alternatives, but it’s very difficult for young men right now, and a lot of them are also turning to the likes of Andrew Tate. ‘I think we’ve got to be really careful about how we come to religion, you need to have a broad education and good tolerance because there’s a lot of Bible verses that can be taken out of context and used in a very bad way. But honestly, there’s nothing better for a young man to do than to develop a relationship with God, because the way it impacts your relationships with others is beautiful. ‘Having done it myself, it’s had a really positive impact in my life, and I want other young men to have the same thing.’ Coincidence or divine intervention? When Chloe Keyes decided to go to church for the first time as an adult, the last thing she expected was to bump into both her boyfriend and her ex at the service. The 27-year-old had been invited by a friend to visit their church in Kirkintilloch, Scotland, as she had been keen to find out what it was all about. Little did she know her boyfriend Kieran, who lives an hour away in Edinburgh, had also been invited to the same church by a new group of friends, one of whom happened to be Chloe’s ex-boyfriend, Christie. ‘It was so funny,’ recalls Chloe. ‘I never knew Christie had become religious and then there he was. ‘There wasn’t any bad blood between us or anything, I just hadn’t spoken to him for a few years. ‘I started telling people the story as I thought it was such a coincidence, but they said these sorts of things happen a lot and I should get used to it. ‘It’s funny that I’d been floating around the idea of going to church and then we were all there and we’ve all been going to Home Church consistently since then.’ What’s more, the three of them might even end up being baptized on the same day, if Chloe and Kieran decide they are ready to take that step. Chloe and Kieran couldn’t believe it when they bumped into Chloe’s ex at church (Picture: Chloe Keyes) ‘We didn’t plan to get baptized together, it’s just that we all recently joined the church and it’s part of the process and they’re doing them all on the same day,’ explains Christie, 30, from Glasgow. Christie, who was previously a ‘staunch athiest’, became interested in religion over the last year. He claims many of the questions he’d always had about religion were answered for him by Christian influencers on social media and the more he looked into it ‘the more convinced [he] became’. He eventually stumbled across Home Church and says the services he’s been going to have been ‘incredible’. Praying each day has also made a big difference to his life and he believes it’s a ‘powerful’ tool if you do it properly. ‘It’s mad but there’s been things in my life that I’ve been really anxious about and I’ve just prayed and prayed and then things completely changed. For instance, I recently quit my job, and was experiencing a bit of turmoil as I wasn’t sure what my next move would be. I was praying in the morning about it and in the afternoon I got a call from a recruiter about a really good opportunity.’ Do you have a story to share? Get in touch by emailing MetroLifestyleTeam@Metro.co.uk.