Posted on 07/15/2019 9:23:55 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Those with no particular religious affiliation, often called "nones," continue to grow in number in the United States, new data show.
Eastern Illinois University political science professor Ryan Burge explains in an essay for Religion in Public that while much of the media often frames the statistics that nones now constitute the largest religious group in the U.S., the reality is much more complicated. Nevertheless, the trend is clear.
Self-identified nones made up 22.2% of Americans in 2008, Burge noted; today they comprise 29.5%.
The aggregated data was taken from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study which has been conducted since 2006, and has a sample size that is 10 to 20 times the size of the General Social Survey, an older source of data that has regularly collected and maintained a record of concerns, experiences, attitudes, and practices of U.S. citizens since 1972.
When examined state-by-state, the CCES numbers tell a more interesting story.
From 2008–2018, Catholics saw the greatest decline as a share of the population in 24 states, though they increased their share of the population in Washington, D.C.
Similarly, evangelicals saw their numbers drop in the same way in 11 states. Mainline churches decreased by the greatest percentage in eight states.
In Arizona, Florida and Maryland, black Protestants declined the most. In Utah, Jews saw the greatest decrease in 10 years.
South Dakota was the lone state where those with no religion saw a decline, 0.3%, in its share of the total population.
South Dakota is also one of three states, along with Wyoming and Alaska, where the evangelical percentage of the population has grown from 2008–2018. The only state where mainline churches grew in the past 10 years was Vermont.
In 46 states and in Washington, D.C., the nones have grown the most.
In Hawaii, the nones grew by 22.9% in 10 years. In 22 states, nones increased by double-digit percentages.
The states where the nones grew the slowest, by 5.3% or less, were Arkansas, Kansas and Florida.
When GGS and CCES figures are examined together, the trajectory is unmistakable that Americans are moving away from religious affiliation.
In the past 25 years, from 1993–2018, evangelicals declined nationwide by 7.4%, according to the GSS measurements. Between 2008 and 2018, the nones have risen by nearly the same amount, 7.3%, according to CCES data. Using GSS data, the shift in nones is just over a half of 1 percentage point per year since 1993.
"The one question that I am often asked that I can’t answer is: how large will the nones get? I think that they will plateau," Burge observed.
"I don’t know if that’s in five years or 15 years, but even if they stopped growing this year, it will still be the most dramatic unbroken streak of growth we have seen in the last five decades. And the United States will be altered forever, both socially and politically, because of it."
Thanks Francis.
A lot of self-identified Christians rarely attend services and are ignorant of their faith. A lot of them don’t take their children to church or raise then with any kind of ChristIan consciousness. And then, there a plenty of clergy who do not present a compelling and umcompromised Christian message. I have been in church pretty much every Sunday my whole life. But I have attended church services which left me thinking, what exactly was the point of this? I am guessing these are problems with non-Christian faiths too.
I like it. Next time someone asks me my religious
affiliation, I’m going to say, “I’m a none.”
“You don’t look like a nun.”
“I had a sex change.”
“Well, okay, Sister.”
This is another Misshun Akomlishd fo da Publik Skrool Sistem.
Religions have all been infiltrated by the Left.
What the heck does this article have to do with Catholics per say. The study was primarily talking about Protestant evangelical and mainline faith traditions?
And America’s problems continue to mount right along side our departure from God and Jesus.
JP2 was the gold standard. Frank is Mao without the charisma.
I am Catholic, I think Pope Francis is not too bright and not a good Pope. What I don’t see is how the lack of quality leadership in the Catholic Church impacts Mainline Protestants and more so the Evangelical Protestantism declining numbers mot of which like seeing a Catholic Church with weak leadership since most, not all, are not Catholic friendly.
The declining of practicing Catholics, that is on the Catholic Church. What is going on in mainline and evangelical protestant faith communities, that is on them.
"The declining of practicing Catholics, that is on the Catholic Church. What is going on in mainline and evangelical protestant faith communities, that is on them."
Exactly right on all points. If the Protestants start increasing in numbers, would they give whoever is Pope credit for it?
There will be poaching of members from both sides, but most of all there will be bringing in new members from the unchurched.
I know former Catholics who like the less heiarchial style of Protestants as well as former Protestants who appreciate it. The style is less importance than the substance of preaching Gospel over trendy politics.
JP2 was exceptional not because he was effective at politics (although he was), but because he understood the Gospel of Jesus Christ could not thrive in the barren soil of athesistic Communism. I give the same credit to Billy Graham and others who understood Christianity could not be hijacked in the way that Oprah and ObaMao's Rev. Wright preached.
Speak the proper English!
No you specifically talked about Catholic Church in DC. The author did not just site Catholic statistics. You only cited the Catholic part of the article which was not much of the total part of the story.
When some one asks me what my religious preference is
I tell them that I do not believe in religion, that I
believe in God and his word.
You may be surprised how many believers there is out
there that does not believe in religion because it is
of the devil.
Hebrews 10:25-26.
I have heard people say that, and I even understand why they say it, but I think that view is mistaken.
So that we have a common term for discussion, we use the term "religion" simply to describe a way of organizing belief and practice. Jews, Muslims, Zoroastrians, etc. have that. Christians have that too. We see the beginnings of the organization of Christian belief and practice in the New Testament itself, in the Acts of the Apostles and in the various Epistles. That is not to say there hasn't been corruption in Christianity. Sometimes the history of what some Christians have taught and done in the name of Christ is sickening. There is plenty of bad stuff out there today. But that fact that if you were asked, "What is your religion?" you would say you believe in God and His Word, and I would say I am an Orthodox Christian (which is also a believer in God and His Word), proves to me that all along the way over the past two thousand years, there have been good and faithful members of the Christian Church who have preserved the Gospel and kept the Bible available to us so that you and I can know and believe in God and His Word. That was and is God's work in them and through them, not the devil's. Not at all.
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