« Shrinking Foam Cups? | Home | Line Rider - Transcendental »
Changing Faith in America
What do American’s believe? A recent Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life survey held some interesting results according to the Chronicle of Higher Ed writer Alan Wolfe. Wolfe reports, “Consider This: Pew in the Pews: A survey on American belief overturns some scholars’ theories,” that American faith is quite a bit more fluid than previously thought. The report indicates that 44% of the 35,000 interviewed have switched faiths at least once in their lives. Further, only 51.1% of Americans as Protestant and one in three Roman Catholics leave the church. Also interesting, almost 2 out of ever 5 (37%) Americans are married to someone who has a different faith. Other interesting facts include there are more Buddhists (0.7%) than Muslims (0.6%) and that a full 16.1% of the population is unaffiliated being atheist, agnostic, or expressing no particular belief. Obviously, these numbers are just the tip of the iceberg both in terms of the data as well as the potential implications of the data.
For more, you can read the entire article, “Consider This: Pew in the Pews: A survey on American belief overturns some scholars’ theories,” read the Summary of Key Findings of the Pew report, or download and read/review the entire report: U.S.Religious Landscape Survey (pdf).
— michael | March 25, 2008 02:18 PM | Something to think about
