subsequent years, especially in Europe. I would imagine that having to go through (and survive) such difficult times, and the horrors of two major wars, the Holocaust, a pandemic, a major economic depression, etc, it would be easy to lose your faith.

The US didn’t suffer as much as Europe did, since the world wars (especially the first one) had a more limited impact here, and I wonder if this is one reason that religion did not decline (and still hasn’t) to the same extent here as it did there.