“A Gallup poll of Americans’ attitudes towards religion released on Christmas Eve found significant recent increases in those responding either that they have no religious preference, that religion is not very important in their lives, or that they believe religion “is largely old-fashioned or out of date.”
Only 78% of Americans now identify as Christian, while 22% describe their religious preference as either “other” or “none.”
Most of these changes have occurred since 2000 and represent the first significant shift since a sharp decline in religious adherence during the 1970s. Over the last nine years, the number with no religious preference has grown from a level of around 8% to 13%. The number for whom religion is not very important has climbed from just over 10% to 19%. And the number who believe religion is out of date and has no answers for today’s problems has jumped from slightly more than 20% to 29%.”
Read more at Raw story
What’s the breakdown for the 22% other/none? Because “other” doesn’t sound like not adhering to religion to me; it sounds like a religion other than Christianity, of which I’m fairly sure there are many.
Interesting in the same period many more Americans started to believe in “paranormal” activity.
More people now believe in things as ESP, Astral Energy, Life after Death and other phenomena (I do not have the list here). Now I wonder whether we can conclude that the majority of the former religious believers have shifted their views towards the paranormal and/or new-age ideas? Or just become agnostic or atheist.
*Mumble* 78% is still far too much..
‘Only 78% of Americans now identify as Christian…’
Which is probably able to be broken down further into groups ranging from “I’m Christian because my parent’s were.” to “I attend catholic church regularly.” to I sit in this nuclear bunker whipping my slaves and molesting their children while raising enough donations to arm my nuke and initiate my second coming.”, with everything in between in varied little 0.00001% +/- 10ish bundles.
Christian is a label meaning “Do not discuss religion with me because you are wrong and my particular gang is right and you are liable to get hurt if you do.” Same as all the other group identities people assume except this one tends to have the support of the ruling groups with the big sticks.
Chris – you’re right, the 22% comprises everything that isn’t Christianity. The stats suggest to me that 13 of that 22 is ‘no religious preference’, leaving 9% for all other religions. I could be mistaken.
I agree. I would have preferred if Other religions and Atheists were not bundled together. Would be more interesting to know how many Atheists there were in \’merka.
i\’m suspicious of “none”, because many institutions & people consider pagan “none”.
‘Only 78% of Americans now identify as Christian, while 22% describe their religious preference as either “other” or “none.” ‘
Seems a bit silly to just put ‘Christianity’ and ‘Other’ on a survey that is supposed to be about religion in general. Do those 29% of Americans think all religions are out of date, or just Christianity? (I know a lot of people who, when they hear that somebody is ‘religious’, immediately think that person must be a Christian.)
What Gallup actually said was this:
“This Christmas, 78% of Americans Identify as Christian
This Christmas season, 78% of Americans identify with some form of Christian religion, a proportion that has been declining in recent decades. The major reason for this decline has been an increase in the percentage of Americans claiming no religious identity, now at 13% of all adults.”
It would have been better to link it to the poll that avoid any bias in the report; you’ll also be giving more facts rather than options (or rather facts on options).
http://www.gallup.com/poll/124793/This-Christmas-78-Americans-Identify-Christian.aspx
I’d bet a lot of the “other” would describe themselves as “spiritual, but not religious”. It’s a slowly growing trend, here in America, especially on the west coast. The “spiritual but not religious” crowd is too lazy to actually practice a religion and too lazy to actually think. They don’t want anyone to tell them what to do, but they don’t want to take the responsibility to arrive at a logical decision about things either. So they go with what they feel. (Maybe I’m being a bit harsh here)
O.K. so it’s not the great breakthrough, I’ve been hoping for as an American Atheist. But they are less susceptible to the religious hierarchy, even if they’re not more susceptible to logic. They probably won’t be dogmatized into supporting a war, but they’re just as likely to be jingoized into supporting one.
I dont think religion is out of date, I think its out of its mind.
Sure I saw QI mention the number of the beast as 616 then it got changed with the bible. Seemingly the folk that wrote it (the book, not QI) were full of it from the start.
Sure I saw on QI the beasts number was 616 then folk changed it in the bible. If god wrote it (on which day was this?) would he be in hell? It’s really quite a nasty book from a rotton past society.