What Does it Mean to Religion If Young People are "Spiritual"

I read a piece by a couple of intellectuals about what is happening to Christianity (and other faiths) as young people are joining churches and identifying with organized religion less and less. 

The link discusses polling which shows a majority of young people answer they have religious thoughts and values. There values do not line up with any religion nor any denomination within Christianity. The authors of the link conclude that because there is so much "spirituality" there is great potential for youth ministries.

They discuss the old method of Christian and Jewish youth ministries. It is to show videos of how much fun it is to be a Christian/Jew. This is followed by modern religious rock, free pizza and soda along with much conversation and an attractive youth minister. 

The result of this approach, however, has not been good. Numbers have fallen.

The solution, say the authors, is a more ecumenical approach and mostly does not involve preaching or persuasion. As I understand it, it is to take a hands-on approach to solving social problems. Young people organize efforts to help in great social causes with religion as a seldom-mentioned sponsor.

If this modern approach could be funded without goals or objectives it might have some future. I don't see, however, denominations funding programs that do not have numbers as objectives. People in the pews want to see measurable results. There are plenty of MBA's involved in churches and they think only in returns on investments.

For example, say a large denomination like Methodists was funding youth programs from the central office. A typical way to measure the success of such a thing would be to poll incoming students about the views on faith/religion. Then, as students graduated they would be polled again to see if they had become more religious, especially more Methodist. Would it be acceptable to the home office if graduates polled more "spiritual" but less Methodist? (This is the way polling tends to look these days.)

I could see lay Methodists saying, "Spiritual? That could mean pagan or Hindu. What the point of paying for that result?" 

To a broad swath of the Christian faith, influencing city, state and national laws is what it is all about. As we speak there are at least a couple dozen states considering laws against trans students using the "wrong" gender rest room. A lot of anti abortion politics is funded by Christian institutions.

Being "spiritual" has almost nothing in common with being a paying member of a Christian denomination.