Acts More Important than Numbers
I believe it is a move from sickness TO health. The greatest time of measured growth for institutional, denominational-based religion when growth was carefully measured was during the post World War II era. Conformity and church membership and belonging was at the center of community life. The institutional church of that period was "theologically light." The institutional church was not yet challenged by the radicalization of the 1960's. There were no shopping malls, no youth sports on Sundays and there was normally only one wage earner in a family and no "turn key" kids. People had more free time, and community life revolved around church life. Institutionalized religion mirrored a life style where "issues" were not really part of the theological discourse in church life.

