“I’m just not much of a reader.”

I heard that a lot while serving in the local church, and more so from adults than teenagers. Anecdotal and objective studies affirm that Americans are far more interested in just about anything other than reading.

• 1/3 of high school graduates never read another book for the rest of their lives.
• 42 percent of college graduates never read another book after college.
• 80 percent of U.S. families did not buy or read a book in 2009.
• 70 percent of U.S. adults have not been in a bookstore in the last five years.
• 57 percent of new books are not read to completion.
• Each day in the U.S., the average adult spends 4 hours watching TV, 3 hours listening to the radio (talk or music) and 14 minutes reading (and reading magazines at that).

These statistics don’t necessarily show an illiterate culture , but…