How Many Born Again Believers in America

In U.S., smaller share of adults identify as Christians, while religious 'nones' have grown The religious landscape of the U.s. continues to change at a rapid clip. In Pew Research Eye telephone surveys conducted in 2018 and 2019, 65% of American adults depict themselves as Christians when asked about their religion, down 12 percent points over the by decade. Meanwhile, the religiously unaffiliated share of the population, consisting of people who describe their religious identity equally atheist, doubter or "nothing in particular," now stands at 26%, up from 17% in 2009.

Both Protestantism and Catholicism are experiencing losses of population share. Currently, 43% of U.S. adults identify with Protestantism, down from 51% in 2009. And one-in-v adults (twenty%) are Catholic, downwards from 23% in 2009. Meanwhile, all subsets of the religiously unaffiliated population – a group as well known every bit religious "nones" – have seen their numbers swell. Cocky-described atheists at present account for 4% of U.S. adults, up modestly only significantly from two% in 2009; agnostics brand upward five% of U.S. adults, upward from 3% a decade ago; and 17% of Americans now describe their organized religion as "nix in item," upwardly from 12% in 2009. Members of non-Christian religions as well have grown modestly as a share of the adult population.

These are amidst the key findings of a new analysis of trends in the religious composition and churchgoing habits of the American public, based on recent Pew Research Center random-digit-dial (RDD) political polling on the telephone.^one The information shows that the tendency toward religious disaffiliation documented in the Center'south 2007 and 2014 Religious Landscape Studies, and before that in major national studies like the General Social Survey (GSS), has connected quickly.

Pew Research Center's 2007 and 2014 Religious Landscape Studies were huge national RDD surveys, each of which included interviews with more than 35,000 respondents who were asked dozens of detailed questions nigh their religious identities, beliefs and practices. The Center has not yet conducted a third such report, and when the Landscape Study is repeated, it is likely to apply new methods that may preclude information technology from being directly comparable to the previous studies; growing challenges to conducting national surveys by telephone accept led the Center to rely increasingly on self-administered surveys conducted online.ⁱⁱ

But while no new Religious Landscape Study is available or in the immediate offing, the Center has collected v additional years of data (since the 2014 Landscape Study) from RDD political polls (see detailed tables). The samples from these political polls are non as large every bit the Landscape Studies (fifty-fifty when all of the political polls conducted in a yr are combined), just together, 88 surveys from 2009 to 2019 included interviews with 168,890 Americans.

These surveys do non include well-nigh as many questions nigh organized religion every bit the Landscape Studies do. However, as part of the demographic battery of questions that ask respondents about their age, race, educational attainment and other groundwork characteristics, each of these political polls also include one basic question about religious identity – "What is your present religion, if any? Are you lot Protestant, Roman Catholic, Mormon, Orthodox such every bit Greek or Russian Orthodox, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, atheist, agnostic, something else, or nothing in particular?"

In U.S., church attendance is declining Additionally, most of these political polls include a question almost religious attendance – "Aside from weddings and funerals, how often do yous attend religious services? More once a week, once a week, once or twice a month, a few times a yr, seldom, or never?" Taken together, these two questions (1 about religious identity, the other most religious attendance) can help shed low-cal on religious trends in the U.S.

The information shows that only like rates of religious amalgamation, rates of religious attendance are declining.³ Over the last decade, the share of Americans who say they attend religious services at least once or twice a month dropped by vii pct points, while the share who say they nourish religious services less frequently (if at all) has risen by the same degree. In 2009, regular worship attenders (those who attend religious services at least once or twice a month) outnumbered those who attend services just occasionally or not at all by a 52%-to-47% margin. Today those figures are reversed; more Americans now say they attend religious services a few times a year or less (54%) than say they attend at least monthly (45%).

Broad-based declines in share of Americans who say they are Christian The changes underway in the American religious mural are broad-based. The Christian share of the population is down and religious "nones" have grown across multiple demographic groups: white people, black people and Hispanics; men and women; in all regions of the country; and among higher graduates and those with lower levels of educational attainment. Religious "nones" are growing faster amid Democrats than Republicans, though their ranks are swelling in both partisan coalitions. And although the religiously unaffiliated are on the rise among younger people and virtually groups of older adults, their growth is virtually pronounced among immature adults.

Furthermore, the data shows a wide gap between older Americans (Infant Boomers and members of the Silent Generation) and Millennials in their levels of religious affiliation and attendance. More than than eight-in-ten members of the Silent Generation (those born between 1928 and 1945) depict themselves as Christians (84%), as do three-quarters of Baby Boomers (76%). In stark contrast, only one-half of Millennials (49%) describe themselves equally Christians; iv-in-ten are religious "nones," and ane-in-x Millennials identify with not-Christian faiths.

Only virtually i-in-three Millennials say they nourish religious services at least in one case or twice a month. Roughly ii-thirds of Millennials (64%) attend worship services a few times a year or less often, including well-nigh four-in-10 who say they seldom or never go. Indeed, there are every bit many Millennials who say they "never" attend religious services (22%) as there are who say they go at least once a week (22%).

Large generation gap in American religion

Among Christians, little change in rates of church attendance While the trends are clear – the U.Due south. is steadily becoming less Christian and less religiously observant equally the share of adults who are non religious grows – cocky-described Christians written report that they nourish religious services at about the same rate today as in 2009. Today, 62% of Christians say they attend religious services at to the lowest degree once or twice a month, which is identical to the share who said the same in 2009. In other words, the nation's overall rate of religious attendance is failing not because Christians are attention church building less often, simply rather because there are at present fewer Christians every bit a share of the population.

Other central takeaways from the new assay include:

The data suggests that Christians are declining not only every bit a share of the U.S. adult population, but as well in accented numbers. In 2009, in that location were approximately 233 million adults in the U.S., according to the Demography Agency. Pew Research Heart's RDD surveys conducted at the fourth dimension indicated that 77% of them were Christian, which means that by this mensurate, there were approximately 178 1000000 Christian adults in the U.S. in 2009. Taking the margin of error of the surveys into business relationship, the number of adult Christians in the U.Southward. as of 2009 could accept been every bit depression as 176 million or as high every bit 181 one thousand thousand.

Today, there are roughly 23 million more adults in the U.South. than at that place were in 2009 (256 1000000 as of July 1, 2019, according to the Census Bureau). Almost two-thirds of them (65%) identify equally Christians, according to 2018 and 2019 Pew Enquiry Center RDD estimates. This means that at that place are at present roughly 167 million Christian adults in the U.S. (with a lower bound of 164 1000000 and an upper spring of 169 million, given the survey's margin of mistake).

Meanwhile, the number of religiously unaffiliated adults in the U.S. grew by nearly 30 meg over this catamenia.

The share of Americans who describe themselves as Mormons has held steady at two% over the by decade.^four Meanwhile, the share of U.Due south. adults who identify with not-Christian faiths has ticked up slightly, from v% in 2009 to 7% today. This includes a steady 2% of Americans who are Jewish, along with ane% who are Muslim, ane% who are Buddhist, 1% who are Hindu, and iii% who identify with other faiths (including, for example, people who say they abide by their ain personal religious beliefs and people who draw themselves as "spiritual")⁵
The rise share of Americans who say they attend religious services no more than a few times a year (if at all) has been driven past a substantial jump in the proportion who say they "never" go to church building. Today, 17% of Americans say they never attend religious services, up from 11% a decade ago. Similarly, the reject in regular churchgoing is attributable mainly to the shrinking share of Americans who say they attend religious services at least once a week, which was 37% in 2009 and at present stands at 31%.
The trends documented in Pew Research Centre surveys closely resemble those institute in the long-running General Social Survey (GSS), a project of the independent research arrangement NORC at the Academy of Chicago, with principal funding from the National Science Foundation. In GSS surveys conducted in the early 2000s (2000 to 2004), lxxx% of U.S. adults identified every bit Christians, including 54% who described themselves as Protestants and 25% who were Catholic. By the late 2010s, 71% of GSS respondents described themselves as Christians (48% Protestant, 23% Catholic). Over the aforementioned period, the GSS institute that religious "nones" grew from xiv% of the U.S. adult population to 22%.

The betoken estimates from the GSS and Pew Research Center surveys (that is, the share of adults who identify every bit Protestant or Cosmic or as religious "nones") are non directly comparable; the two studies inquire different questions and utilize unlike modes of survey assistants. But the fact that the direction of the trend is similar in both studies strongly suggests that both are picking up on existent and meaning change underway in the U.S. religious landscape.

These findings most the religious composition of Hispanics closely resemble those from Pew Research Center'due south National Surveys of Latinos (NSL) – a nationally representative survey of U.South. Latino adults fielded almost every year. (See the detailed tables for complete trends in the religious composition of Hispanics based on both Pew Enquiry Center political surveys and the NSL.)

Among white adults, the share of people who say they nourish religious services a few times a twelvemonth or less at present exceeds the share who nourish monthly or more (57% vs. 42%); a decade ago, the white population was evenly divided between those who went to church at least monthly and those who did not. Regular churchgoers still outnumber those who infrequently or never go to religious services amidst blackness Americans (58% vs. 41%), though the share of people who say they attend religious services a few times a yr or less often has risen over the last decade among blackness Americans, merely as it has among the population every bit a whole. U.Southward. Hispanics are now almost evenly divided betwixt those who say they attend religious services at least once or twice a month (51%) and those who say they attend a few times a year or less (49%).
There is still a gender gap in American religion. Women are less likely than men to draw themselves every bit religious "nones" (23% vs. 30%), and more likely than men to say they attend religious services at least once or twice a month (50% vs. 40%). Merely women, like men, have grown noticeably less religious over the concluding decade. The share of "nones" among women has risen by 10 percentage points since 2009 – similar to the increase among men. And the share of women who identify as Christian has fallen by 11 points (from 80% to 69%) over that same menstruum.
Christians have declined and "nones" accept grown every bit a share of the developed population in all 4 major U.S. regions. Catholic losses accept been most pronounced in the Northeast, where 36% identified as Catholic in 2009, compared with 27% today. Amid Protestants, declines were larger in the South, where Protestants now account for 53% of the adult population, down from 64% in 2009.
Religious "nones" now brand up fully i-third of Democrats. And well-nigh 6-in-ten people who identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party say they attend religious services no more than a few times a year. The ranks of religious "nones" and infrequent churchgoers also are growing inside the Republican Party, though they make up smaller shares of Republicans than Democrats.
The religious profile of white Democrats is very unlike from the religious profile of racial and ethnic minorities within the Democratic Party. Today, fewer than one-half of white Democrats draw themselves as Christians, and just three-in-ten say they regularly attend religious services. More than 4-in-ten white Democrats are religious "nones," and fully seven-in-10 white Democrats say they attend religious services no more a few times a year. Black and Hispanic Democrats are far more than likely than white Democrats to describe themselves equally Christians and to say they attend religious services regularly, though all 3 groups are becoming less Christian. Although 2009 surveys did not include plenty black Republicans to analyze separately, the well-nigh recent surveys show smaller religious differences past race and ethnicity amongst Republicans than Democrats.
Pew Research Center's telephone political polls do not typically include the detailed questions that are needed to make up one's mind whether Protestants identify with denominations in the evangelical, mainline or historically black Protestant tradition. However, the political polls upon which this analysis is based exercise ask Protestants whether they think of themselves as "born-again or evangelical" Christians. The information shows that both Protestants who describe themselves equally born-over again or evangelical Christians and Protestants who are non born-again or evangelical have declined every bit a share of the overall U.Southward. adult population, reflecting the state'southward broader shift away from Christianity as a whole. However, looking merely at Americans who identify every bit Protestants – rather than at the public as a whole – the share of all Protestants who are born-again or evangelical is at least equally loftier today as it was in 2009.
The share of U.Southward. adults who are white born-once more or evangelical Protestants now stands at 16%, downwards from 19% a decade ago. The shrinking white evangelical share of the population reflects both demographic changes that have occurred in the United States (where white people constitute a declining share of the population) and broader religious changes in American society (where the share of all adults who identify with Christianity has declined). However, looking only at white Protestants – rather than at the public as a whole – the share of white Protestantswho describe themselves equally built-in-again or evangelical Christians is at least as high every bit it was a decade ago.