This article begins, like so many
others before it, with an impressive set of statistics about Americans and
their self-reported belief in God. This section is then followed with some
typical philosophical navel-gazing about the nature of religion, and what makes
an individual or a group “religious”. The decided difference between this article
and many of those that have gone before it is that while I am fascinated by
American religious history- I am neither a historian, nor a sociologist. I am,
however, a student of the Bible, Christian ministry, and above all Protestant
theology.
The
answer I provide to the question “Why are Americans so religious?” is primarily
a theological answer that draws on sociological, historical, and Biblical
sources. My answer, like all good theological answers, begins with a question:
“Are Americans so religious?”
Part One: Are
Americans so religious?
So,
“Are Americans so religious?” One of the difficulties I have had with the way this
question is usually addressed has been the decidedly Euro-centric position we
have taken. It seems that we have repeatedly attempted to compare religious
behavior and belief in the United States to that in Western Europe, even
though, according to the 2000 census only about nineteen percent of Americans
are of Western European ancestry, with a total of only about sixty-one percent
of the population claiming any
European ancestry at all.[1] What
happens if we ask this question and draw comparisons from Africa, Asia and
Latin America? How does American religious behavior look in comparison?
Religion as belief
Most
of these articles begin by taking some statistical data to compare rates of
belief in God between America and Europe, taking self-professed belief in God
to be a marker of whether or not someone is “religious”. In order to get a
clearer picture of the “religious-ness” of Americans in this sense, belief in
God among Americans will be compared with belief in God among all Europeans,
and rates of belief in God among African Americans in particular (who account
for almost ten percent of the population of the U.S.[2])-
these will be compared to rates of belief among native Africans in order to
determine if rates of belief in God are radically higher among Americans than
among the peoples from whom they are descended. I perform this exercise using a
May, 2007 poll performed by Gallup Inc., research data regarding belief in God
among various populations compiled by Michael Martin, and a 2005 poll conducted
by the European Commission on Public Opinion (Eurobarometer 225, “Social
Values, Science & Technology) as points of comparison.
According to a May, 2007 Gallup survey of over
1,000 people, ninety-two percent of Americans believe in God or some sort of
higher power. Of those ninety-two percent, seventy-eight percent profess a
belief in a God, and fourteen percent profess belief in a universal spirit.[3] At
first blush this represents a staggeringly high degree of “religious-ness” in
the United States[4];
working under the premise that “religious-ness” can be measured by an
individual’s proclivity to self-report that they believe in a higher power of
some kind.
The
statistics for Europe as a whole are slightly lower than those in the United
States, where belief in God is concerned. In Europe fifty-two percent of the
population professes belief in God[5],
twenty-six percent lower than belief in God in the U.S. However, belief in a spirit is held by
twenty-seven percent of the general population of Europe, compared with only
fourteen percent of Americans. Taking both statistics into consideration,
Americans are only about thirteen percent more religious than their European
counterparts as a whole. Examined more closely, the people of Malta, Cyprus,
Greece, Portugal, Poland, Italy, Ireland, Turkey, Romania, and Croatia have
similar or higher rates of belief in God and/or a spirit than the citizenry of
the U.S. In comparison to their European counterparts, and using belief in God
or a spirit as the standard, approximately one third of Europe is just as if
not more religious than America.
When
comparing African American religiosity, (done here because belief rates among
African Americans are higher than any other ethnic group in the United States) with
rates of belief in God among native Africans; one sees that the rates of belief
in God are surprisingly similar. Over ninety-five percent of native Africans
surveyed claim to believe in a God[6].
In the United States, according to a recent study by the University of
California, ninety-five percent of African Americans profess a belief in God as
well.[7]
But,
I have to say, there is a sort of ambiguity in using self reported belief as a
measure of “religious-ness”. When the Harris poll group conducted a study of
Americans religious beliefs they found a similar percentage reported belief in
God when compared to the earlier Gallup survey. They also found, however, than
when pushed for their relative certitude of the existence of God or a higher
power that, “42 percent of all U.S. adults say they are not ‘absolutely
certain’ there is a God”, and of that forty-two percent, over half believe
there may not be or probably isn’t a God.[8]
This leads one to wonder whether or not Americans are reporting that they find
the notion of the existence of God to be plausible, or whether they are
reporting about their heartfelt convictions.
Taking
all of the aforementioned factors into consideration, and using self-reported belief
in God as an indicator of “religious-ness”, Americans as a whole are only slightly
more religious than their European counterparts (based on the Gallup data),
with ten notable exceptions, and African Americans are no more or less religious
than their native African counterparts. This means that if we accept the
definition of religion forwarded by scholars like Jon Butler, who wish to speak
about religiosity in terms of a belief in the supernatural, and if belief in
God and the supernatural were the only factor taken into consideration it would
be a bit of a stretch to claim that Americans are “so religious.”
Religion as Church
Membership
Belief in God or a higher power is
only one way to define religion, however. Some scholars like Peter Eisenstadt
and Patricia Bonomi speak about religious adherence in terms of those who
attend church (who they have creatively called “the churched”).[9] So,
let’s compare the percentage of America’s population that claims to attend a
religious service at least once a week with attendance rates across Europe as a
whole, and with certain European countries in particular in order to determine
whether or not Americans are more religious than their European counterparts
when religious service attendance is used as the determining factor in “religious-ness”.[10]
As is the case before, the 2006 Harris Poll, 2007 Gallup Survey will be used to
gather information about American religious belief and practice. The 2008
Eurobarometer and 2006 EurLIFE religious attendance survey will be used to
provide data to contrast with the U.S. material.
According to the 2006 Harris Poll, twenty-six
percent of Americans claim to attend religious services once a week or more,
with the majority of born-again Christians attending weekly, and nearly half of
the nations Catholics and main-line Protestants claiming to be planted in their
pews on a weekly basis[11]. Is it fair to call a nation where only one
quarter of its population regularly attends religious services “so religious”?
Well, perhaps… I suppose it would largely depend one’s basis for comparison,
and with that in mind let us turn to Europe.
According to EurLIFE, seventeen
percent of all Europeans are in their places of worship once a week or more,
about nine percent lower than statistics for America as a whole. Looking at
attendance on a nation by nation basis, one finds that eleven nations belonging
to the European Union have similar or higher rates of weekly participation. In
Cyprus, twenty-two percent of the population attends weekly religious services.
In Romania, twenty-three percent of the population attends weekly services. In
Hungary and Italy about twenty-nine percent of the population attends weekly
religious services. In Portugal that number is around thirty percent. In
Turkey, thirty-two percent of the population attends weekly religious services.
In Slovakia, thirty-three percent of the
population attends weekly services. In Ireland, fifty-six percent of the
population can be found in their pews on a Sunday morning. In Poland that
number is closer to sixty-three percent, and in Malta an astonishing
seventy-one percent of the population attends church on at least a weekly
basis.[12]
Additionally, according to the Eurobarometer, as reported by Gallup,
twenty-seven percent of the population of Greece attends worship at least once
a week. This means that while the United States has a higher rate of attendance
as a whole, there are eleven countries within the European Union that have
similar or higher rates of participation (see Fig. 1). This would mean the
United States would come in tenth out of twenty-six nations where church
attendance is considered if compared to the nations that comprise the European
Union on a nation by nation basis. While such a showing is admirable, it hardly
makes Americans seem “so religious.”
Countries
|
2002
|
2003
|
2004
|
2006
|
AT
|
19
|
12
|
15
|
|
BE
|
11
|
8
|
9
|
|
BG
|
4
|
|||
HR
|
24
|
|||
CY
|
22
|
|||
CZ
|
8
|
5
|
7
|
|
DK
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
|
EE
|
3
|
4
|
||
FI
|
5
|
5
|
5
|
|
FR
|
6
|
6
|
||
DE
|
9
|
8
|
10
|
|
EL
|
26
|
19
|
23
|
|
HU
|
11
|
8
|
12
|
|
IE
|
54
|
46
|
56
|
|
IT
|
32
|
29
|
||
LV
|
5
|
|||
LT
|
11
|
|||
LU
|
13
|
15
|
12
|
|
MT
|
71
|
|||
NL
|
12
|
9
|
14
|
|
PL
|
57
|
53
|
63
|
|
PT
|
30
|
23
|
30
|
|
RO
|
23
|
|||
SK
|
32
|
33
|
||
SI
|
20
|
17
|
17
|
|
ES
|
20
|
17
|
19
|
|
SE
|
5
|
4
|
4
|
|
TR
|
41
|
32
|
||
UK
|
13
|
13
|
14
|
|
CC-13
|
32
|
|||
EU-15
|
14
|
|||
EU-25
|
17
|
Abbreviations
- Countries
AT : Austria
BE : Belgium BG : Bulgaria HR : Croatia CY : Cyprus CZ : Czech Republic DK : Denmark EE : Estonia FI : Finland FR : France |
DE : Germany
EL : Greece HU : Hungary IE : Ireland IT : Italy LV : Latvia LT : Lithuania LU : Luxembourg MT : Malta NL : Netherlands |
PL : Poland
PT : Portugal RO : Romania SK : Slovakia SI : Slovenia ES : Spain SE : Sweden TR : Turkey UK : United Kingdom CC-13 : 13 acceding/candidate countries (before May 2004) EU-15 : 15 EU Member States (before May 2004) EU-25 : 25 EU Member States (after May 2004) |
(Figure
1: Weekly participation rates in religious services in the European Union by
nation)[13]
It would seem, then, that it is
difficult to make the case that the people of the United States are
dramatically more religious than their European counterparts when one takes
into consideration either self-reported belief in God, or self-reported church
attendance, rather the United States would seem to fit in well at the bottom of
the top third of nations in the European Union in terms of “religious-ness”.
As I noted before, I would suggest a
different approach to our question “Why are Americans so religious?” One that
draws upon a biblical definition of religion and looks for solid points of comparison
with other nations that do not rely on self-reported behavior, and I hope to
bring that piece to you tomorrow.
[1] http://www.census.gov/prod/2004pubs/c2kbr-35.pdf,
accessed 12/07/08.
[2] http://www.census.gov/prod/2004pubs/c2kbr-35.pdf,
accessed 12/07/08.
[4] Compare to the Harris Poll
conducted in October of 2005 with a 2,000 person sample that found, ”that 42
percent of all U.S. adults say they are not ‘absolutely certain’ there is a
God, including 15 percent who are ‘somewhat certain,’ 11 percent who think
there is probably no God and 16 percent who are not sure.” http://www.harrisi.net/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=707, accessed 12/04/08.
[6] Martin, Michael ed. “The
Cambridge Companion to Atheism” (New York, Cambridge University Press; 2007),
53-54.
[8] http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=707, accessed 12/07/08. This is
the October 2006 Harris Poll, as opposed to the October 2005 information
referenced earlier.
[9]
Bonomi, Patricia and Eisenstadt, Peter “Church Adherence in the Eighteenth
Century British American Colonies,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd
ser. 39/2 (April 1982):246-86.
[10] Unfortunately, the only data I
have available is self-reported. This is troublesome as self-reported data
tends to skew towards what the individual perceives to be the better behavior
(for more on this topic see Stephen K. Moroney’s The Noetic Effects of Sin). This being the case, it is difficult to
determine whether Americans and Europeans are over or under estimating their
weekly attendance, as this could provide wildly varying data.
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