It’s increasingly commonplace for religious beliefs and practices to be nonexistent among Generation Z in Canada, representing a shift from previous generations, where religion was simply the social norm.
“Religion was just part of everyday life [for previous generations]. There was no question about what you were doing on Sunday,” said Alyshea Cummins, a religion instructor at Carleton University.
Religious transmission across generations is deeply tied to community, but as Canadian society becomes increasingly secular, younger generations are redefining spirituality and community outside traditional religious structures.
Today, more than a third of Canadians identify as a religious “none,” having no religious affiliation whatsoever. It’s a figure that’s doubled in the last 20 years, going from 16.5 per cent in 2001 to 34.6 per cent in 2021. Thirty-six per cent of Canadians aged 18 to 35 identify as a religious none.
There isn’t a common belief system or worldview unifying non-religious individuals, leaving these people to freely express their values outside of a core set of beliefs traditionally defined under a religious identity.
Cummins said pinpointing specific factors driving religious declines is difficult due to the variability across contexts and cultures.
“As soon as we don’t acknowledge the diversity that exists [within this group of religious ‘nones’], then people start to make generalizations that are often harmful,” Cummins said.
Some Carleton students who identify as religious “nones” are still choosing to experience the world in a more spiritual way. Others are finding meaning through student-led activism clubs, nature and shared values. Despite the decline in religiosity, younger generations are also fostering tolerance of religious and spiritual diversity.
Transmission of religion across generations
One of the biggest factors in the transmission of religion is maintaining religious community connections throughout an individual’s life. This starts at a young age, with parents encouraging children to engage in their local religious community, practice religious rituals and discuss faith.
Today, parents are giving their children more choice in their religious involvement, something many parents didn’t have in their childhood. Research on religious “nones” conducted at Ambrose University in Calgary found Canadian parents currently emphasize giving their children a choice on whether to be religious.
“When they were younger, they didn’t like feeling that they had to go to church and [now] want to make sure that their kids have that sort of choice,” Cummins said.
Being part of a religious community as a child is key to becoming a religious adult, she added. Having a religious presence in these formative years means that a child begins to think early on about religion in relation to problems they are facing.
“When you talk about religion in relation to other important issues that a child or an adolescent is facing, it makes religion more resilient to scrutiny,” Cummins said.
In the 2025 Edgar and Dorothy Davidson Lecture at Carleton, Sarah Wilkins-Laflamme explained that under this theoretical framework, parents with weakened religiosity resulting from their more secular social environment raise their children with little-to-no religion.
“Each successive cohort is less religious than the preceding one,” she said. “[It’s a] compounded effect over generations.”
Using this theory, spiritual needs among individuals are not understood as innate, biological human traits, but rather “socially constructed and interiorized through socialization processes,” Wilkins-Laflamme said.
According to Cummins, university is a key time for the transmission of religiosity among Canadians, as individuals are exposed to new people and ideas. Students’ identities are challenged as they approach adulthood and experience changes in their peer network. Consequently, the religious views that they held close in their youth can change, too.
“Teachers, for the most part, will have more liberal values. Many of the courses will talk about gender and sexuality,” Cummins said.
This was the case for Meaghan Caves, a Carleton third-year film student whose perspective on religion shifted after taking an environmental humanities course. She said she now experiences the world more spiritually, as opposed to religiously, viewing humans as interconnected to their environment and other beings.
Spiritual but not religious
Caves’ views are representative of a broader group for whom spirituality has replaced religion. Spiritual but not religious individuals comprise about one fifth of Canadians aged 18 to 30.
Caves said her spirituality is rooted in a connection with the Earth. While she grew up attending a Catholic school, its teachings regarding the 2SLGBTQ+ community and instances of abuse made her question the institution.
Caves said her worldview changed when her environmental course prescribed Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, a book based on Indigenous teachings that explores the reciprocal relationship between humans and the land. Kimmerer articulates a world where trees are valued beyond what they provide for humans — they’re seen as equals to humans.
“That really reshaped my view of how I think about the non-human world and my relationship and my connection to the natural world,” Caves said.
She described a warmth and joy that comes from spending time in nature among the trees, something the traditional religious institutions she grew up with did not offer her.
“I don’t quite know how to describe it sometimes because with spirituality, for me, it’s this kind of personal thing and it’s a feeling,” Caves said.
While some of her beliefs are influenced by pagan and Wiccan teachings, she said she doesn’t align herself with a religion and instead practices her spirituality in a way that feels most right to her. She observes pagan ideas of connection to the Earth and caring for others, but is also unsure of pagan beliefs in the existence of a god and a goddess.
Recognizing the spirituality of religious “nones” is important, according to Cummins, as there is a common assumption that being non-religious is equivalent to being an atheist.
But this is not the case, Cummins said. The spiritual beliefs of religious “nones” vary, but she said many still believe in some form of higher power.
“It could be a life force; they may refer to it as God or the universe.”
However, this belief doesn’t form the basis of a hierarchical religious community. Instead, some Carleton students are finding community in other ways.
Creating community in the absence of religion
Religious institutions, such as the Catholic Church in Quebec, used to have a heavy hand in education and health care, but no longer. Religion has traditionally been seen as a place to gather around a shared set of beliefs and worldview as a community through consistent events.
But in the absence of traditional religion, younger generations are redefining what community means.
“Communities can look different,” Cummins said. “They can consist of family and friends, your coworkers, the people that you run into on your daily errands that you get to know, [like] the checkout person or the bank teller.”
For some students at Carleton, this community is centred around activism.
Malick Sylla is president of Impact Carleton, a social justice club focused on breaking stigmas surrounding poverty and homelessness, and a religious “none.” He said he builds community around service.
“The first step towards building community is including people who may not regularly be included in our conceptions of community,” Sylla said.
He finds the non-profit space can be more wide-ranging in the creation of community because it isn’t limited to a shared sense of faith or belief. Instead, he said building community around a shared goal of bettering the lives of those around you feels natural.
“It was so intuitive and natural,” Sylla said. “Service to other people and bettering the conditions of the people around me … it just made sense.”
Andrew Fitzel, a third-year cognitive science student and president of Carleton’s animal rights society, said his activism is based on harm reduction. He said minimizing his harm to others is what underpins his animal rights involvement.
Fitzel said he identifies as a religious “none,” but believes environmental activism can foster a similar sense of community to what can be offered by religion. For him, community is built on a shared idea that helps individuals relate to one another.
“Finding like-minded people is very empowering because you don’t feel alone in it, you feel a little bit more validated,” Fitzel said. “You can uniquely identify with their ideas, their beliefs and you come at things from a similar point of view.”
Non-religion as a new social norm
As a result of shifting religious trends, Cummins said younger generations are less likely to judge individuals for their religious choices.
Based on interviews she’s conducted, Cummins said youth can successfully change their parents’ perspectives on religion. Even if the parents are non-religious, Cummins said their children can recognize and respect the religious choices of others.
“I’ve interviewed people that were staunch atheists and their kids are not. And then the kids change their parents’ point of view on it, that religious people aren’t that scary and bad,” Cummins said.
Students at Carleton who spoke to the Charlatan agree that Generation Z is fostering a growing religious tolerance.
“I think young people, we might be better at seeing the person behind certain ideologies,” Sylla said.
Colin VanDerLoo, a first-year Carleton political science student who identifies as a religious “none,” said he focuses on finding people that he enjoys spending time with, instead of only those sharing his lack of religion.
Furthermore, he said he enjoys spending time with those who respectfully disagree with him, as it encourages him to challenge his own beliefs.
“The more ideas you view, the more times your idea is challenged, the better your idea becomes,” VanDerLoo said.
Cummins said the future of Canadian religiosity is in good hands with the youngest generation’s emphasis on ensuring everyone is welcome, equal and has rights.
“Seeing the human behind the identity, I think that is the message.”
Featured image by Miriam Visser/the Charlatan.
