USA becoming less religious
Believe it or not. Here are some highlights from the 2008 numbers, with the 1990 results in parenthesis for reference:
2008% (1990%)
Total Christians: 76% (86%)
Catholic: 25% (26%)
Mainline Protestant: 13% (17%)
Pentecostal (i.e. Sarah Palin): 3.5% (3.5%)
Mormon (i.e. Mitt Romney): 1.4% (1.4%)
Religious Jews (not “cultural” Jews): 1.2% (1.8%)
Muslim: 0.6% (N/A?)
Agnostic: 12% (N/A?)
Other (Scientology, Wiccan, etc.): 1.2% (1.0%)
No religion: 15% (8%)
Essentially, Latino immigration into the southwest is propping up Catholic numbers, but mainline Protestantism is getting killed.
It seems like moderate religious people are leaving the ranks of the church goers. Although I’m no religious stalwart myself, I worry about leaving the crazy people up to their own devices out there. I bet we’re going to be in for some even gnarlier church nonsense in the future.
