The American Religious Landscape in 2020

[brooklynite]

Public Religion Research Institute

Seven in ten Americans (70%) identify as Christian, including more than four in ten who identify as white Christian and more than one-quarter who identify as Christian of color. Nearly one in four Americans (23%) are religiously unaffiliated, and 5% identify with non-Christian religions.

The most substantial cultural and political divides are between white Christians and Christians of color. More than four in ten Americans (44%) identify as white Christian, including white evangelical Protestants (14%), white mainline (non-evangelical) Protestants (16%), and white Catholics (12%), as well as small percentages who identify as Latter-day Saint (Mormon), Jehovah’s Witness, and Orthodox Christian[2]. Christians of color include Hispanic Catholics (8%), Black Protestants (7%), Hispanic Protestants (4%), other Protestants of color (4%), and other Catholics of color (2%)[3]. The rest of religiously affiliated Americans belong to non-Christian groups, including 1% who are Jewish, 1% Muslim, 1% Buddhist, 0.5% Hindu, and 1% who identify with other religions. Religiously unaffiliated Americans comprise those who do not claim any particular religious affiliation (17%) and those who identify as atheist (3%) or agnostic (3%).

Over the last few decades, the proportion of the U.S. population that is white Christian has declined by nearly one-third. As recently as 1996, almost two-thirds of Americans (65%) identified as white and Christian. By 2006, that had declined to 54%, and by 2017 it was down to 43%[4]. The proportion of white Christians hit a low point in 2018, at 42%, and rebounded slightly in 2019 and 2020, to 44%. That tick upward indicates the decline is slowing from its pace of losing roughly 11% per decade.

[Thomas Hurt]

1. The panic and extremism of the christofascist explained largely in these facts...

White christians losing their racial majority status and becoming religiously irrelevant is freaking them out.

[lindysalsagal]

2. According to PEW in 2019:

The decline of Christianity is continuing at a rapid pace in the U.S. Around two-thirds of U.S.
adults (65%) describe themselves as Christian, according to Pew Research Center telephone
surveys conducted in 2018 and 2019. That’s down 12 percentage points since 2009. At the same
time, the share of “nones” – religiously unaffiliated adults who describe their religion as atheist,
agnostic or “nothing in particular” – has reached 26%, up from 17% a decade ago.

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/12/13/19-striking-findings-from-2019/

Xtians are down 12 and nones are up 9 in 11 years.

[walkingman]

3. The Evangelical movement is one crazy bunch of cult members. In areas where

you are surrounded by these folks and never see or hear anything other than that it is on the verge of mental illness based upon guilt. I personally escaped after graduating HS and it took be years to get over it. What kind of GOD would profess such ideology?

[rownesheck]

4. I reckon

the percentages of atheist and agnostic are much higher in reality. There are still people who feel uneasy about admitting their true feelings on this issue. I mean, if you're told from the day you are born that you will burn in a lake of fire for all eternity if you don't believe in god, that can really fuck you up for a long time. And there are others who claim to be religious because the thought of nothingness after death is worrisome to them.