One-fifth of U.S. adults say they are not part of a traditional religious denomination, new data from the Pew Research Center
show, evidence of an unprecedented reshuffling of Americans’ spiritual
identities that is shaking up fields from charity to politics.
But despite their nickname, the “nones” are far from godless. Many pray, believe in God and have regular spiritual routines.
Their numbers have increased dramatically over the past two decades,
according to the study released Tuesday. About 19.6 percent of Americans
say they are “nothing in particular,” agnostic or atheist, up from
about 8 percent in 1990. One-third of adults under 30 say the same. Pew
offered people a list of more than a dozen possible affiliations,
including “Protestant,” “Catholic,” “something else” and “nothing in
particular.”
For the first time, Pew also reported that the number of Americans identifying themselves as Protestant dipped below half,
at 48 percent. But the United States is still very traditional when it
comes to religion, with 79 percent of Americans identifying with an
established faith group.
Experts have been tracking unaffiliated
Americans since their numbers began rising, but new studies are adding
details to the portrait.
Members can be found in all educational
and income groups, but they skew heavily in one direction politically:
68 percent lean toward the Democratic Party. That makes the “nones,” at
24 percent, the largest Democratic faith constituency, with black Protestants at 16 percent and white mainline Protestants at 14 percent.
By comparison, white evangelicals make up 34 percent of the Republican base.
The
study presents a stark map of how political and religious polarization
have merged in recent decades. Congregations used to be a blend of
political affiliations, but that’s generally not the case anymore.
Sociologists have shown that Americans are more likely to pick their
place of worship by their politics, not vice versa.
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