An influential religious research group says young evangelicals have more liberal opinions than their parents' generation on some social issues – but remain conservative on others.
The Pew Forum found that LGBT rights is the most high-profile hot button issue where younger evangelicals take a more inclusive stance than the older generation.
The pew article states that, 'Evangelical Protestants who are Millennials (those born from 1981 to 1996) are considerably more likely than older evangelical Protestants to support same-sex marriage and to say homosexuality should be accepted by society.'
The report also highlights data which show the Millennial generation takes a less conservative stance than its forbears on both immigration and environmentalism.
However, when it comes to abortion, it seems there has been little change in view with the upcoming generation. 'There is no statistically significant gap at all in the abortion views of older and younger evangelicals,' says the piece. 'Millennial evangelicals are just as likely as their older counterparts to say abortion should be illegal in most or all cases (65 per cent versus 63 per cent).'
Comparing younger evangelicals to their non-evangelical peers reveals that they are still more conservative overall. As far as political affiliation goes, Millennial evangelicals are still following in their parents' footsteps. The report says, 'About half of Millennial evangelicals (51 per cent) identified with or leaned toward the Republican Party in the 2014 Landscape Study, almost on par with the 57 per cent of older evangelicals who said the same.'
