DEATH, DEARTH OR REBIRTH? By RAY WADDLE Protestantism -- the faith that broke from Rome in the 16th century and gave us lay Bible reading, church-state separation, a steeple on every corner, Lake Wobegone covered dish, 35-minute sermons, Shaker furniture, pentecostal passion, Martin Luther King Jr., Davey and Goliath, a national work ethic and America’s very identity -- is on the ropes. The Protestant Deformation is underway. Statisticians predict this mid-decade year is the likely moment when Protestantism finally loses its majority status in American life. The nation’s future will be a galaxy of religious minorities. So when Protestants host annual Reformation Day services tomorrow (OCT 30) -- singing hymns by founder Martin Luther and marking nearly 500 years of religious innovation -- the faith might already be the America’s latest minority. The news has a funereal ring -- the symbolic eclipse of old-time religion in a brassy new world of pluralism, secularism and do-it-yourself spirituality. Well, not so fast. The death of Protestantism? I wouldn’t bet on it. In politics and private life, the Protestant spirit looks unusually robust right now, even if the word “Protestant” is going out of style. A study of Protestant decline was done last year by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago. It says the number of Americans who identify themselves as Roman Catholic (25 percent) has been steady for a generation (mostly because of immigration). Jewish identity has been stable (almost 2 percent) for a decade. Not so the Protestants. The bottom is dropping out. After decades of Protestant stability, pollsters chart a dramatic nose-dive since 1993 among people who identify themselves as Protestant (the group including Baptist, Presbyterian, Methodist, Lutheran, Episcopalian, Holiness, Disciples of Christ, Congregationalist and, in this survey, Mormon). In 1993, 63 percent of Americans called themselves Protestant. By 2002, it was 52 percent -- and falling. Among the reasons: a continuing hemorrhage of liberal mainline church membership, defections by young people who were raised Protestant, and fewer youth getting any religious training at all. During the same period (’93-’02), the number of people with no religion went up from 9 percent to 14 percent, the survey said. And other religions were on the rise. People identifying with Buddhism, Hinduism, Orthodox Christianity and Native American faiths jumped from 3 percent to 7 percent. That group of rising “other religions” included a new category -- interdenominational Christians. The rise of these non-denominational (or community) congregations and megachurches has been one of the big stories of the past 30 years. They mostly call themselves “Christian,” shunning “Protestant.” But the fact is, non-denominational churches are overwhelmingly Protestant in outlook -- Bible-oriented, with stress on a personal relationship with Jesus, free-style in worship, suspicious of liturgy and proud of autonomy. At about the same time, some three decades ago “contemporary Christian” music became the term for a new music niche/ministry. The word Protestant was never used, though the business was (is) run overwhelmingly by Protestants. The upshot: The word Protestant is losing the publicity war: it sounds too churchy, too old-fashioned, too old-Europe for a digital generation that can’t be bothered to learn a little church history. Yet the Protestant spirit lives on. Look at politics, where evangelicals -- a coalition of Protestants, non-denominationals and others -- have taken charge as a voter bloc, influencing today’s Republican Party and defining the national debate about biblical values, public morality and biomedical ethics. Part of their appeal is a nostalgia for a specifically Protestant past, when more Americans shared the same doctrinal assumptions and faith in Christ Jesus. Other signs point to new mutations of Protestantism. Joel Osteen, possibly America’s most popular minister (he heads the nation’s largest church -- Houston’s Lakewood Church, 30,000 worshipers -- and wrote the big-selling Your Best Life Now) gives advice for a happy, successful, God-blessed life. This might be the new face of Protestantism -- a gospel of optimism that (critics say) rarely quotes Jesus. It’s a long way from early Protestant America’s grim philosophy of Puritanism, human depravity and predestination. Then I read this week that hugely influential Protestant minister Rick Warren (author of The Purpose-Driven Life) will soon be quoted on a Starbucks coffee cup: “You were made by God and for God, and until you understand that, life will never make sense.” Sounds like Protestantism is still being served up fresh, hot and caffeinated.