White Christians Dwindle in Numbers While "Nones" Increase

Yet another survey confirms that white Christians are dwindling as a percentage of American population and that the non-religiously affiliated, the so-called "Nones" are now among the largest demographics in the nation.  One may argue as to why the numbers of Nones has grown while white Christians have fallen in numbers, but I maintain that "conservative" Christians have severely damaged the Christian brand by (i) linking Christianity to right wing Republican politics and especially Donald Trump including open racism, and (ii) defining Christianity as a religion of hatred of others and hypocrisy.   Sadly, neither of these phenomenon appear likely to diminish in the short term and more flight from religion may occur, particularly among younger generations.  In my own family which was staunchly Catholic 50 to 60 years ago, no one now identifies as Catholic or regularly attends mass.  The hypocrisy of the Church hierarchy, the Church's anti-gay stance, and the sex abuse scandal simply made Catholicism something one wants no part of.  A piece in the Washington Post looks at the new survey findings.  Here are highlights:

A new sweeping religion survey of nearly half a million Americans shows some regions of the country remain religiously homogenous — especially the Southeast — and charts the growing political influence of the religiously unaffiliated, whose presence has more than doubled in both major parties in recent years.

Public Religion Research Institute analyzed data on interviews with more than 500,000 Americans from 2013 to 2019, and combined it with data from the U.S. Census Bureau on 3,142 counties across the country. The project offers a picture of the religious demographics of every county, including Maryland’s Montgomery and Howard counties, which rank in the top 10 most-diverse.

Dramatic change in the past 20 years, especially the shrinking of the White Christian population and the growth of religiously unaffiliated Americans. PRRI says those two trends appear to be slowing in the last couple years , but CEO Robert Jones says it is too early to know if it’s more like a pause.

White Christians have gone, as a proportion of the U.S. population, from 65 percent in 1996 to 42 percent in 2018. PRRI found that the number ticked up in 2019 and 2020 to 44 percent. Other major pollsters found slightly different numbers, with Pew Research saying it was 40 percent in 2020.

Looking at young Americans, some trend lines appear to be moving in one direction. Last year, 36 percent of Americans aged 18-29 told PRRI they have no religious affiliation, compared with 23 percent of that same age group in 2006 and 10 percent in 1986.

Twenty-three percent of all Americans say they are unaffiliated, PRRI found. . . . . The PRRI survey found the unaffiliated are becoming a much larger part of both parties, the Democrats in particular. Between 2006 and 2020, the percent of Republicans who say they are unaffiliated went from 4 to 13 percent. The percent of Democrats went from 9 to 23 percent.

A book out this year by three well-known political scientists called “The Secular Surge” seeks to advance the years-long discussion about the non-religious and their growing political influence. The book, by John Green, Geoffrey Layman and David Campbell, identifies the boom in Americans who are decidedly secular in their outlook, not just unaffiliated. These are people who are “guided by their understanding of the observable, natural world,” and committed to “science and objective evidence.”

One in four Americans are secularists, the authors’ research finds, and the movement is growing among the young. . . . The book argues that the core divides in the Democratic Party — between progressives and centrists, highly evident in the 2020 presidential race — has secularism “at the very heart of such battles for the soul of the Democratic Party.”

In other words, unaffiliated and secular Americans are growing in both parties, but especially so on the Democratic side, creating an important fault line, the authors argue, with core Black and Latino constituencies. Secular voters generally are more progressive, including on issues like defense spending, the desire for free college education and exemptions from anti-discrimination laws for religious people and businesses.

The map shows increased overall diversity in the West, Midwest, Northeast and in various spots across the country, especially in and around cities. The Southeast quadrant is especially light on diversity.

“What’s remarkable is you can see the cultural history of the country in these maps,” said Jones, noting religious settlement patterns that endure. “You can still see the history of the Civil War, with White evangelicals still concentrated in the Southeast, White non-evangelicals in the Upper Midwest and Northeast. You can still see that North-South divide.”