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Religion in the United States (2012)[1]
Religion in the United States is characterized by a diversity of religious beliefs and practices. Various religious faiths have flourished, as well as perished, in the United States. A majority of Americans report that religion plays a "very important" role in their lives, a proportion unique among developed countries.[2]
The majority of Americans (73%) identify themselves as Christians and about 20% have no religious affiliation.[1] According to the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) of 2008, 76% of the American adult population identified themselves as Christians, with 51% professing attendance at a variety of churches that could be considered Protestant or unaffiliated, and 25% professing Catholic beliefs.[3][4] The same survey says that other religions (including, for example, Judaism, Buddhism, Islam, and Hinduism) collectively make up about 4% of the adult population, another 15% of the adult population claim no religious affiliation, and 5.2% said they did not know, or they refused to reply.[3] According to a 2012 survey by the Pew forum, 36 percent of Americans state that they attend services nearly every week or more.[5] According to the 2011 Gallup poll, Mississippi is the most religious state in the country, while Vermont is the least religious state.
From early colonial days, when some English and German settlers came in search of religious freedom, America has been profoundly influenced by religion.[6] That influence continues in American culture, social life, and politics.[7] Several of the original Thirteen Colonies were established by settlers who wished to practice their own religion within a community of like-minded people: the Massachusetts Bay Colony was established by English Puritans (Congregationalists), Pennsylvania by British Quakers, Maryland by English Catholics, and Virginia by English Anglicans. Despite these, and as a result of intervening religious strife and preference in England[8] the Plantation Act 1740 would set official policy for new immigrants coming to British America until the American Revolution.
The text of the First Amendment to the country's Constitution states that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." It guarantees the free exercise of religion while also preventing the government from establishing a state religion. The Supreme Court has also interpreted this as preventing the government from having any authority in religion.
According to a 2002 survey by the Pew forum, nearly 6 in 10 Americans said that religion plays an important role in their lives, compared to 33% in Great Britain, 27% in Italy, 21% in Germany, 12% in Japan and 11% in France. The survey report stated that the results showed America having a greater similarity to developing nations (where higher percentages say that religion plays an important role) than to other wealthy nations, where religion plays a minor role.[2]
In 1963, 90% of Americans claimed to be Christians while only 2% professed no religious identity.[9] In 2012, the percentage of Christians was closer to 70% with close to 20% claiming no religious identity.[1]
Although some New England States continued to use tax money to fund local Congregational churches into the 1830s, the United States claims to have been the first nation to have no official state-endorsed religion.[10]
Modeling the provisions concerning religion within the
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Including God in the nation's pledge would send a clear message to the world that unlike communist regimes that denied God's existence, the United States recognized a Supreme Being. Official acknowledgement of God would further distinguish freedom-loving Americans from their atheist adversaries.
The table below shows the religious affiliations among the ethnicities in the United States, according to the Pew Forum 2007 survey.[109] People of Black ethnicity were most likely to be part of a formal religion, with 85% percent being Christians. Protestant denominations make up the majority of the Christians in the ethnicities.
Highlights:[3]
Religious Self-Identification of the U.S. Adult Population: 1990, 2001, 2008[3] Figures are not adjusted for refusals to reply; investigators suspect refusals are possibly more representative of "no religion" than any other group.
Adult respondents were asked the open-ended question, "What is your religion, if any?" Interviewers did not prompt or offer a suggested list of potential answers. The religion of the spouse or partner was also asked. If the initial answer was "Protestant" or "Christian" further questions were asked to probe which particular denomination. About one third of the sample was asked more detailed demographic questions.
The United States government does not collect religious data in its census. The survey below, the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) of 2008, was a random digit-dialed telephone survey of 54,461 American residential households in the contiguous United States. The 1990 sample size was 113,723; 2001 sample size was 50,281.
The Association of Religion Data Archives (ARDA) surveyed congregations for their memberships. Churches were asked for their membership numbers. Adjustments were made for those congregations that did not respond and for religious groups that reported only adult membership.[107] ARDA estimates that most of the churches not responding were black Protestant congregations. Significant difference in results from other databases include the lower representation of adherents of 1> all kinds (62.7%), 2>Christians (59.9%) 3>Protestants (less than 36%); and the greater number of unaffiliated (37.3%).
The 2012 Republican presidential nominee Michigan. The Romneys were involved in Mormonism in their states and in the state of Utah.
A Gallup Poll released in 2007[105] indicated that 53% of Americans would refuse to vote for an atheist as president, up from 48% in 1987 and 1999.
In 2006 Keith Ellison of Minnesota became the first Muslim elected to Congress; when re-enacting his swearing-in for photos, he used the copy of the Qur'an once owned by Thomas Jefferson.[104]
The only Jewish major party candidate was Joe Lieberman in the Gore-Lieberman campaign of 2000 (although John Kerry and Barry Goldwater both had Jewish ancestry, they were practicing Christians).
Joe Biden is the first Catholic vice president.[103]
Only three presidential candidates for major parties have been Catholics, all for the Democratic party:
Politicians frequently discuss their religion when campaigning, and Democrats before the 1970s, while mainline Protestants comprised the core of the Republican Party. Those patterns have faded away—Catholics, for example, now split about 50–50. However, white evangelicals since 1980 have made up a solidly Republican group that favors conservative candidates. Secular voters are increasingly Democratic.[101]
In August 2010 67% of Americans said religion is losing influence, compared with 59% who said this in 2006. Majorities of white evangelical Protestants (79%), while mainline Protestants (67%), Black Protestants (56%), Catholics (71%), and the religiously unaffiliated (62%) all agree that religion is losing influence on American life; 53% of the total public says this is a bad thing while just 10% see it as a good thing.[100]
In a 2009 Gallup International survey, 41.6%[97] of American citizens said that they attended church or synagogue once a week or almost every week. This percentage is higher than other surveyed Western countries.[98][99] Church attendance varies considerably by state and region. The figures ranged from 63% in Mississippi to 23% in Vermont.
In 2006, an online Harris Poll (they stated that the magnitude of errors cannot be estimated due to sampling errors, non-response,etc.; 2,010 U.S. adults were surveyed)[96] found that 26% of those surveyed attended religious services "every week or more often", 9% went "once or twice a month", 21% went "a few times a year", 3% went "once a year", 22% went "less than once a year", and 18% never attend religious services.
A 2013 survey reported that 31% Americans attend religious services at least weekly. It was conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute with a margin of error of 2.5.[95]
The U.S. Census does not ask about religion. Various groups have conducted surveys to determine approximate percentages of those affiliated with each religious group. Some surveys ask people to self-identify, while others calculate church memberships. The first table below represents the ranges that have been found.
Various American presidents have often stated the importance of religion. On February 20, 1955, President Dwight D. Eisenhower stated that "Recognition of the Supreme Being is the first, the most basic, expression of Americanism."[91] President Gerald Ford agreed with and repeated this statement in 1974.[92]
The First Amendment guarantees both the free practice of religion and the non-establishment of religion by the federal government (later court decisions have extended that prohibition to the states).[86] The U.S. Pledge of Allegiance was modified in 1954 to add the phrase "under God", in order to distinguish itself from the state atheism espoused by the Soviet Union.[87][88][89][90]
Unitarian Universalists do not share a creed; rather, they are unified by their shared search for spiritual growth and by the understanding that an individual's theology is a result of that search and not obedience to an authoritarian requirement.[85]
. Divine Science and Unity Church, Religious Science. The movement had been previously known as the Mental Sciences or The Christian Sciences. The three major branches are Church of Christ, Scientist's Mary Baker Eddy ("teacher of teachers") after Hopkins broke off from Emma Curtis Hopkins The New Thought concept was named by [84] A group of churches which started in the 1830s in the United States is known under the banner of "
Wicca advanced in North America in the 1960s by Raymond Buckland, an expatriate Briton who visited Gardner's Isle of Man coven to gain initiation.[82] Universal Eclectic Wicca was popularized in 1969 a diverse membership drawing from both Dianic and British Traditional Wiccan backgrounds.[83]
According to the Reformed Druids of North America (RDNA) was founded by students at Carleton College, Northfield, Minnesota. They adopted elements of Neopaganism into their practices, for instance celebrating the festivals of the Wheel of the Year.[81]
Neopaganism in the United States is represented by widely different Wicca, followed by Neo-Druidism.[78][79] Other neopagan movements include Germanic Neopaganism, Celtic Reconstructionist Paganism, Hellenic Polytheistic Reconstructionism, and Semitic Neopaganism.
Native American religions historically exhibited much diversity, and are often characterized by animism or panentheism.[76] The membership of Native American religions in the 21st century comprises about 9000 people.[77]
Many other religions are represented in the United States, including Shinto, Caodaism, Thelema, Santería, Kemetism, Religio Romana, Kaldanism, Zoroastrianism, Vodou, and many forms of New Age spirituality.
Various polls have been conducted to determine Americans' actual beliefs regarding a god:
In the United States, Enlightenment philosophy (which itself was heavily inspired by deist ideals) played a major role in creating the principle of religious freedom, expressed in Thomas Jefferson's letters and included in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. American Founding Fathers, or Framers of the Constitution, who were especially noted for being influenced by such philosophy of deism include Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Cornelius Harnett, Gouverneur Morris, and Hugh Williamson. Their political speeches show distinct deistic influence. Other notable Founding Fathers may have been more directly deist. These include Thomas Paine, James Madison, possibly Alexander Hamilton, and Ethan Allen,[69]
On 24 March 2012, American Atheists sponsored the Reason Rally in Washington D.C. This was followed by the American Atheist Convention at the Bethesda North Marriott and Convention Center in Bethesda, MD. Organizers called the estimated crowd of 8,000–10,000 the largest-ever US gathering of nonbelievers in one place.[68]
In a 2006 nationwide poll, University of Minnesota researchers found that despite an increasing acceptance of religious diversity, atheists were generally distrusted by other Americans, who trusted them less than Muslims, recent immigrants and other minority groups in "sharing their vision of American society". They also associated atheists with undesirable attributes such as criminal behavior, rampant materialism, and cultural elitism.[64][65] However, the same study also reported that "The researchers also found acceptance or rejection of atheists is related not only to personal religiosity, but also to one's exposure to diversity, education and political orientation – with more educated, East and West Coast Americans more accepting of atheists than their Midwestern counterparts."[66] Some surveys have indicated that doubts about the existence of a god were growing quickly among Americans under 30.[67]
A 2001 survey directed by Dr. Ariela Keysar for the City University of New York indicated that, amongst the more than 100 categories of response, "no religious identification" had the greatest increase in population in both absolute and percentage terms. This category included atheists, agnostics, humanists, and others with no theistic religious beliefs or practices. Figures are up from 14.3 million in 1990 to 34.2 million in 2008, representing an increase from 8% of the total population in 1990 to 15% in 2008.[3] A nation-wide Pew Research study published in 2008 put the figure of unaffiliated persons at 16.1%,[56] while another Pew study published in 2012 was described as placing the proportion at about 20% overall and roughly 33% for the 18–29-year-old demographic.[63]
"Unaffiliated" does not necessarily mean "non-religious". Some people who are unaffiliated with any particular religion express religious beliefs (such as belief in God or reincarnation) and engage in religious practices (such as prayer).
This group includes atheists, agnostics and people who describe their religion as "nothing in particular".[62]
In 2004 there were an estimated 56,000 Taoists in the US.[60] Taoism was popularized throughout the world through the practice of Tai Chi Chuan and other martial arts.[61]
The first Sikh Gurdwara in America was built in Stockton, California in 1912.[59]
Around 1900 some Sikhs emigrated to the United States to work on farms in California. They were the first community to come from India to the US in large numbers.[58]
Adherents of Jainism and the Jain Way of Life.[57]
In 2004 the Hindu American Foundation—a national institution protecting rights of the Hindu community of US—was founded.
In 2001, there are an estimated 400 thousand Hindus in the US, about 0.2% of the total population.[55][56]
The first time Hinduism entered the US is not clearly identifiable. However, large groups of Hindus have immigrated from India and other Asian countries since the enactment of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. During the 1960s and 1970s Hinduism exercised fascination contributing to the development of New Age thought. During the same decades the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (a Vaishnavite Hindu reform organization) was founded in the US.
Estimates of the number of Buddhists in the United States vary between 0.5%[3] and 0.9%,[53] with 0.7% reported by both the CIA[30] and PEW.[54]
Many foreign associations and teachers—such as Soka Gakkai and Tenzin Gyatso (the 14th Dalai Lama for Tibetan Buddhism)—started to organize missionary activities, while US converts established the first Western-based Buddhist institutions, temples and worship groups.
The early 20th century was characterized by a continuation of tendencies that had their roots in the 19th century. The second half, by contrast, saw the emergence of new approaches, and the move of Buddhism into the mainstream and making itself a mass and social religious phenomenon.[51][52]
The first prominent US citizen to publicly convert to Buddhism was Henry Steel Olcott. An event that contributed to the strengthening of Buddhism in the US was the Parliament of the World's Religions in 1893, which was attended by many Buddhist delegates sent from India, China, Japan,Vietnam, Thailand and Sri Lanka.
During the late 19th century Buddhist missionaries from Japan came to the US. During the same time period, US intellectuals started to take interest in Buddhism.
Buddhism entered the US during the 19th century with the arrival of the first immigrants from East Asia. The first Buddhist temple was established in San Francisco in 1853 by Chinese Americans.
The United States has perhaps the second largest Bahá'í community in the world. First mention of the Faith in the U.S. was at the inaugural Parliament of World Religions, which was held at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. In 1894, Ibrahim Kheiralla, a Syrian Bahá'í immigrant established a community in the U.S. He later left the main group and founded a rival movement.[50]
Research indicates that Muslims in the United States are generally more assimilated and prosperous than their counterparts in Europe.[47][48][49] Like other subcultural and religious communities, the Islamic community has generated its own political organizations and charity organizations.
Islam is the third largest faith in the United States, after Christianity and Judaism, representing 0.8% of the population.[38][39] Islam in America effectively began with the arrival of African slaves. It is estimated that about 10% of African slaves transported to the United States were Muslim.[40] Most, however, became Christians, and the United States did not have a significant Muslim population until the arrival of immigrants from Arab and East Asian Muslim areas.[41] According to some experts,[42] Islam later gained a higher profile through the Nation of Islam, a religious group that appealed to black Americans after the 1940s; its prominent converts included Malcolm X and Muhammad Ali.[43][44] The first Muslim elected in Congress was Keith Ellison in 2006,[45] followed by Andre Carson in 2008.[46]
Beginning in the 1960s, a worldwide movement among previously secular Jews, called baalei teshuva ("returners", returning to a more religious, in most cases, Orthodox, style of observance) has had a noticeable presence in America.[37] It is uncertain how widespread or demographically important this movement is at present.
According to the 2001 National Jewish Population Survey, 4.3 million American Jewish adults have some sort of strong connection to the Jewish community, whether religious or cultural.[36] Jewishness is generally considered an ethnic identity as well as a religious one. Among the 4.3 million American Jews described as "strongly connected" to Judaism, over 80% have some sort of active engagement with Judaism, ranging from attendance at daily prayer services on one end of the spectrum to attending Passover Seders or lighting Hanukkah candles on the other. The survey also discovered that Jews in the Northeast and Midwest are generally more observant than Jews in the South or West. Reflecting a trend also observed among other religious groups, Jews in the Northwestern United States are typically the least observant of tradition.
A 2009 study estimated the Jewish population (including both those who define themselves as Jewish by religion and those who define themselves as Jewish in cultural or ethnic terms) to be between 6.0 and 6.4 million.[34] According to a study done in 2000 there were an estimated 6.14 million Jewish people in the country, about 2% of the population.[35]
The Pew Research Center report on American Judaism released in October 2013 revealed that 22% of Jewish Americans say they have “no religion” and the majority of respondents do not see religion as the primary constituent of Jewish identity. 62% believe Jewish identity is based primarily in ancestry and culture, only 15% in religion. Among Jews who gave Judaism as their religion, 55% based Jewish identity on ancestry and culture, and 66% did not view belief in God as essential to Judaism.[33]
According to a 2007 survey conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public life, 1.7% of adults in the U.S. identify Judaism as their religion. Among those surveyed, 43% said they were Reform Jews, 31% said they were Conservative Jews, and 10% said they were Orthodox Jews.[30][31] According to the 1990 National Jewish Population Survey, 38% of Jews were affiliated with the Reform tradition, 35% were Conservative, 6% were Orthodox, 1% were Reconstructionists, 10% linked themselves to some other tradition, and 10% said they are "just Jewish."[32]
Jews have been present in what is now the US since the 17th century, and specifically allowed since the British colonial Plantation Act 1740. Although small Western European communities initially developed and grew, large scale immigration did not take place until the late 19th century, largely as a result of persecutions in parts of Eastern Europe. The Jewish community in the United States is composed predominantly of Ashkenazi Jews whose ancestors emigrated from Central and Eastern Europe. There are, however, small numbers of older (and some recently arrived) communities of Sephardi Jews with roots tracing back to 15th century Iberia (Spain, Portugal, and North Africa). There are also Mizrahi Jews (from the Middle East, Caucasia and Central Asia), as well as much smaller numbers of Ethiopian Jews, Indian Jews, Kaifeng Jews and others from various smaller Jewish ethnic divisions. Approximately 25% of the Jewish American population lives in New York City.[29]
After Christianity, Judaism is the next largest religious affiliation in the US, though this identification is not necessarily indicative of religious beliefs or practices.[3] There are between 5.3 and 6.6 million Jews. A significant number of people identify themselves as American Jews on ethnic and cultural grounds, rather than religious ones. For example, 19% of self-identified American Jews believe God does not exist.[27] The 2001 ARIS study projected from its sample that there are about 5.3 million adults in the American Jewish population: 2.83 million adults (1.4% of the U.S. adult population) are estimated to be adherents of Judaism; 1.08 million are estimated to be adherents of no religion; and 1.36 million are estimated to be adherents of a religion other than Judaism.[28] ARIS 2008 estimated about 2.68 million adults (1.2%) in the country identify Judaism as their faith.[3]
Episcopalian, Presbyterian and Eastern Orthodox Christians have the highest number of graduate and post-graduate degrees per capita of any other Christian denomination in the United States,[25] as well as the most high-income earners.[26]
Despite its status as the most widespread and influential religion in the US, Christianity has undergone a continuous relative decline in demographics. While the absolute number of Christians rose from 1990 to 2008 as the overall population increased, the actual percentage of Christians dropped from 86% to 76%.[3] A nationwide telephone interview of 1,002 adults conducted by The Barna Group found that 70% of American adults believe that God is "the all-powerful, all-knowing creator of the universe who still rules it today", and that 9% of all American adults and 0.5% young adults hold to what the survey defined as a "biblical worldview".[24]
The strength of various sects varies greatly in different regions of the country, with rural parts of the South (except Louisiana and the Gulf Coast, and the Hispanic community, which both consist mainly of Catholics), having many evangelicals but very few Catholics, while urbanized areas of the north Atlantic states and Great Lakes, as well as many industrial and mining towns, are heavily Catholic, though still quite mixed, especially due to the heavily Protestant African-American communities. In 1990, nearly 72% of the population of Utah was Mormon, as well as 26% of neighboring Idaho.[22] Lutheranism is most prominent in the Upper Midwest, with North Dakota having the highest percentage of Lutherans (35% according to a 2001 survey.[23])
Several Christian groups were founded in America during the Great Awakenings. Interdenominational evangelicalism and Pentecostalism emerged; new Protestant denominations such as Adventism; non-denominational movements such as the Restoration Movement (which over time separated into the Churches of Christ the Christian churches and churches of Christ, and the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)); Jehovah's Witnesses (called 'Bible Students' in the later part of the 19th century); and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormonism).
Greek, Ukrainian, Russian, Armenians, Central and Eastern European, Middle Eastern, Ethiopian, and South Indian immigrants brought Eastern Orthodoxy and Oriental Orthodoxy to the United States. These branches of Christianity have since spread beyond the boundaries of ethnic immigrant communities and now include multi-ethnic membership and parishes.
Beginning in the 16th century, the Spanish (and later the French and English) introduced Catholicism. From the 19th century to the present, Catholics came to the US in large numbers due to immigration of Italians, Hispanics, Portuguese, French, Polish, Irish, Highland Scots, Dutch, Flemish, Hungarians, Germans, Lebanese (Maronite), and other ethnic groups.
Members of mainline Protestant denominations have played leadership roles in many aspects of American life, including politics, business, science, the arts, and education. They founded most of the country's leading institutes of higher education.[19] mainline Protestant as Episcopalians and Presbyterian tend to be considerably wealthier[20] and better educated than most other religious groups in Americans.[21]
The Southern Baptist Convention, with over 16 million adherents, is the largest of more than 200[17] distinctly named Protestant denominations.[18] In 2007, members of Evangelical Churches comprised 26% of the American population, while another 18% belonged to mainline Protestant churches, and 7% belonged to historically black churches.
According to the 2011 Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches, from which members in the United States are combined with Canadian members, and of the National Council of Churches, the five largest denominations are:[15]
[11]
Gautama Buddha, Tibetan Buddhism, Sīla, Mahayana, Hinduism
Quran, Arabic language, God, Muhammad, Shia Islam
Yoga, Mahabharata, Buddhism, Upanishads, Ramayana
Joseph Smith, Book of Mormon, Jesus, Doctrine and Covenants, Brigham Young
Martin Luther, Anglicanism, Bible, Lutheranism, Protestantism
United States, New England, Culture, Indigenous peoples of the Americas, Sports in the United States
Irreligion, Atheism, United States, Secular humanism, Nontheism
Canada, Mexico, China, Germany, Real estate
Hispanic and Latino Americans, Western United States, New York City, Southern United States, Midwestern United States
Social class in the United States, Poverty in the United States, United States, Wealth in the United States, Income in the United States