God, Gen Z and the Great British Divine Comeback

There was a time when we assumed that religion, much like CDs and plimsoll shoes, was doomed to fade into the annals of the past. Yet, as the fashions of the early 2000s have been enjoying a revival, a recent poll has revealed that belief in God is also back in vogue.

According to YouGov, belief in God among 18 to 24-year-olds in Britain has more than doubled, from 16 per cent in 2021 to 37 per cent in 2025. Let that sink in: while our parents’ generation raged against the machine, casting off the shackles of organised religion and swearing off Sunday services, today’s youth is rebelling in their own way – by turning to that very same faith.

For Christians, the data paints a particularly attractive picture. Church attendance has swelled since the end of lockdown restrictions, with monthly attendance rising by 56 per cent to 5.8 million compared to pre-pandemic figures. Gen Z were responsible for a sizeable portion of this resurgence, with their monthly churchgoing having leapt from a paltry 4 per cent to 16 per cent.

It is tempting to ascribe this to the usual suspects – pandemic-era existentialism, social media burnout, loneliness – but there may be a more ideological root to the Great British Divine Comeback.

Young men, especially, find themselves untethered in a culture that has drastically redefined gender roles, the workplace, and the importance of the family unit. Disillusioned by the erosion of traditional identities and craving a sense of belonging, many are rediscovering their faith not as an archaic relic, but as a refuge from the stormy tides of modern Western ideology.

The Bishop of Lancaster dubbed this shift a “spiritual awakening”, while the Church Times concluded that young people’s affirmation of God’s existence is “no fluke”. But if Jesus is truly making a second comeback (his first being in the tomb near Golgotha on Easter Sunday, of course), it is not in a blaze of fire and brimstone. It is a soft, almost silent turn towards the timeless traditionalism of Christian structures that we can thank for the revival of interest in the transcendent.

It is easy to assume that tradition alienates the young. But perhaps it is that rejection of ideological pandering — its discipline, its conservatism, its unabashed archaisms — that makes Christianity compelling in an age of curated chaos.

Among those raised in an age of single-use masks and Zoom classes, we witnessed the consequences of social isolation in real time. TikTok and Instagram took the place of playing in the park with friends, and teenagers had only the faint blue glow of their phone screens to keep them company through the long, lonely days of lockdown. Fatigue with the online stratosphere was acutely felt: watching the lives of influencers, Love Islanders, and the ultra-wealthy became frustrating and made them seem even further removed from our ordinary lives. Where we once aspired to be like them, such totemic figures came to represent the antithesis of our desires. We wanted something stable, comforting, and familiar.

Thus, religion presented itself as a warm blanket in which we could wrap ourselves – not to escape reality, but to withstand it. A framework of permanence in a culture addicted to the ephemeral, offering order where the algorithm offers only noise.

What is even more surprising, however, is the appeal of the archaic among young converts. The silence of vespers, the architecture of ancient cathedrals, the ritual of the Latin Mass — these are drawing young people in, not pushing them away. This aesthetic turn, a kind of sacred counterculture, stands in opposition to the chaos of digital life.

Beauty has become subversive. We are turning to God not because it is ‘trendy’, but because it goes against the trends. The social structures that were a given to our grandparents – having a family, a community and a culture – are now a rarity. There is an increasing desperation for the tangibility of times past. The traditional structures promoted in Catholic doctrine stand apart from the secularism of the modern era, offering a path back to the truth found in generations prior, and a life directed toward something higher than oneself.

Over the past two decades Gen Z have been told that life is fleeting, that identity is self-determined, that truth is secular and subjective. And yet, for all the progressive confidence, it appears that young people are desperate to reclaim ideological permanence. They want to believe that there is something beyond their own existence – a higher power that will grant them everlasting salvation and safeguard their souls when their bodies decline.

Indeed, it seems Gen Z has grown tired of reinventing themselves every week. They are rediscovering not only a moral tradition, but an aesthetic, an anchor, and a narrative that offers a pragmatic structure for their lives. As with many generations before them, God is emerging as the answer to the existential crisis of the age

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