New Pew Poll Finds One-in-Five Adults Have No Religious Affiliation

The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life’s new poll, released today, found that” One-in-Five Adults Have No Religious Affiliation.” The number of Americans who do not identify with any religion continues to grow at a rapid pace. One-fifth of the U.S. public – and a third of adults under 30 – are religiously unaffiliated today. This is the highest percentages ever in Pew Research Center polling.

Interestingly, many of the country’s 46 million unaffiliated adults are religious or spiritual in some way. Two-thirds of them say they believe in God (68%). More than half say they often feel a deep connection with nature and the earth (58%), while more than a third classify themselves as “spiritual” but not “religious” (37%), and one-in-five (21%) say they pray every day.

The percentage of Protestants is also decreasing. In 2007, 53% of adults described themselves as Protestants, but surveys conducted in the first half of 2012 found that fewer than half of American adults say they are Protestant (48%). This marks the first time in Pew Research Center surveys that the Protestant share of the population has dipped significantly below 50%. The Protestant share of the population, by contrast, has been declining since the early 1990s. The Catholic share of the population has been roughly steady over this period

The percentage of Americans who say they never doubt the existence of God has fallen modestly but noticeably over the past 25 years. In 1987, 88% of adults said they never doubt the existence of God. As of 2012, this figure was down 8 percentage points to 80%.

The percentage of Americans who say the Bible should be taken literally has fallen in Gallup polls from an average of about 38% of the public in the late 1970s and early 1980s to an average of 31% since. 

In 2007, 38% of people who said they seldom or never attend religious services described themselves as religiously unaffiliated. In 2012, 49% of infrequent attenders eschew any religious affiliation.

The unaffiliated also are not uniformly hostile toward religious institutions. They are much more likely than the public overall to say that churches and other religious organizations are too concerned with money and power, too focused on rules, and too involved in politics.

At the same time, a majority of the religiously unaffiliated clearly think that religion can be a force for good in society, with three-quarters saying religious organizations bring people together and help strengthen community bonds (78%) and a similar number saying religious organizations play an important role in helping the poor and needy (77%).

The vast majority of religiously unaffiliated Americans are not actively seeking to find a church or other religious group to join. 

Read or download the entire Pew report at -- http://www.pewforum.org/Unaffiliated/nones-on-the-rise.aspx