Religious institutions of all sizes and denominations are reeling from a decline in donations, the New York Times reports.

Since the recession began in 2008, the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., the most prominent Episcopal church in the United States, has had four rounds of staff layoffs, while the Crystal Cathedral, an evangelical "megachurch" in Garden Grove, California, has sold off some of its property and been sued by creditors. Closer to home, the 55-member Primera Iglesia Getsemani in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn has seen its monthly intake fall to $400 from $900 and is making ends meet by hosting a weekly flea market.

But while the recession has contributed to the drop in giving, it is not entirely responsible for it. Indeed, the downturn has merely accelerated a trend away from giving to religious organizations that scholars have been tracking for at least a decade. A 2007 study by professors at Indiana University-Purdue University in Indianapolis, for example, found that baby boomers ten years ago were donating approximately 10 percent less to faith-based groups than their parents had at a comparable age in the 1970s and almost 25 percent less than their parents were giving in 2000. What's more, the impending wave of baby boomer retirements is likely to exacerbate the trend.

"It's wrong to look at this as a money problem," said Mark Ottoni-Wilhelm, an Indiana-Purdue economics professor who co-authored the study. "The drop in giving follows the involvement pattern. Because people aren't as involved, the giving pattern traces it."