Minor side point about the prevalence of switching to the more demanding religion: I think examples of that switch are more salient, but I doubt that they are more frequent, at least in the US. (And I’d generalize to the liberal West.) Individuals and couples soften their religious stances all the time, and it doesn’t make the news. People seldom gossip about it, because it starts out as attending church less often or giving less money or joining other social circles or working longer hours. Eliezer is the rare example of someone who makes an extreme switch and makes a lot of noise about it. But “lapsed Catholics” is a minor trope because abandoning the faith you were raised in is common.
Minor side point about the prevalence of switching to the more demanding religion: I think examples of that switch are more salient, but I doubt that they are more frequent, at least in the US. (And I’d generalize to the liberal West.) Individuals and couples soften their religious stances all the time, and it doesn’t make the news. People seldom gossip about it, because it starts out as attending church less often or giving less money or joining other social circles or working longer hours. Eliezer is the rare example of someone who makes an extreme switch and makes a lot of noise about it. But “lapsed Catholics” is a minor trope because abandoning the faith you were raised in is common.