Less Americans embrace a traditional view of God and Bible reading is becoming less popular according to a survey by the Barna Group. In a national study of 1,006 adults, the Barna Group found that while two-thirds of the American population firmly embraces the idea that their most important purpose is to love God with all their heart, mind, soul and strength, the public's beliefs have changed in the past year.

• The research found that only three types of outreach are offered by U.S. Protestant churches.
  • Food oriented donations tops the list at 73 percent of churches
  • Vacation Bible School (68 percent) 
  • Holiday food programs for poor families during Christmas or Thanksgiving (65 percent).
• Other types of community outreach offered by much smaller proportions of churches in the last year include:
  • prison ministry (25 percent)
  • homeless outreach (24 percent)
  • Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts (20 percent)
  • blood drives (17 percent)
  • after-school programs for kids (14 percent)

• Using census data, the federal Corporation for National and Community Service has found that 3 in 10 college students, or 3.3 million, volunteered last year, mostly as mentors or tutors, and often with religious groups. 
• The number of college students volunteering grew by 600,000 from 2.7 million in 2002 to 3.3 million in 2005.
  • The growth rate of college student volunteers (approximately 20%) is more than double the growth rate of all adult volunteers (9%).
  • In 2005, approximately 30.2 percent of college students volunteered, exceeding the volunteer rate for the general adult population of 28.8 percent.