Church attendance can thus help insulate children from criminal activity. Chuck Colson, the founder of Prison Fellowship, argues that crime is a moral problem, a questions of individual conscience. A society that has no moral compass is understandably ripe for deviant behavior. Crime today is often explained in terms of unemployment, racism, poor housing, too little schooling, and a lack of self esteem. Faith, however, changes people from the inside to influence people's beliefs and their behavior.
Religion also helps people fill a moral vacuum.
People develop a sense of morality from faith, which helps them face temptation, economic deprivation, and peer pressure. Religion can put the brakes on deviant and socially destructive behavior and can produce other benefits as well. For example, church attendance has been shown consistently to deter juvenile delinquency. Five published studies found that personal church attendance has a negative correlation with delinquency. Many studies demonstrate that frequent church attenders commit crimes less often than church non-attenders.