Why did substantial parts of Europe abandon the institutionalized churches around 1900? Empirical studies using modern data mostly contradict the traditional view that education was a leading source of the seismic social phenomenon of secularization. We construct a unique panel dataset of advanced-school enrollment and Protestant church attendance in German cities between 1890 and 1930. Our cross-sectional estimates replicate a positive association. By contrast, in panel models where fixed effects account for time-invariant unobserved heterogeneity, education—but not income or urbanization—is negatively related to church attendance. In panel models with lagged explanatory variables, educational expansion precedes reduced church attendance, while the reverse is not true. Dynamic panel models with lagged dependent variables and instrumental-variable models using variation in school supply confirm the results. The pattern of results across school types is most consistent with a mechanism of increased critical thinking in general rather than specific knowledge of natural sciences.

中文翻译：

---

教育和宗教参与：德国1890-1930年世俗化时期的城市级证据

为什么欧洲大部分地区在1900年左右放弃了制度化的教堂？使用现代数据进行的实证研究与传统观点相反，传统观点认为教育是世俗化的地震社会现象的主要来源。我们构建了一个独特的面板数据集，其中包括1890年至1930年之间德国城市的高中入学率和新教教会的出勤率。相比之下，在固定效应导致时间不变的，未观察到的异质性的面板模型中，教育（而非收入或城市化）与教堂出席率负相关。在解释变量滞后的面板模型中，教育扩展先于减少教堂的出勤率，反之则不成立。具有滞后因变量的动态面板模型和使用学校供求差异的工具变量模型证实了这一结果。跨学校类型的结果模式与一般的批判性思维而非自然科学的特定知识的增长机制最一致。