Americans who consider themselves Christian have been on a precipitous decline for decades, but that may be changing.
The Christian share of the adult population has remained relatively steady over the past five years, fluctuating between 60 percent and 64 percent, according to a new Pew Research Center survey of nearly 37,000 U.S. adults.
According to the 2024 Religious Landscape Study, 62 percent of U.S. adults identified as Christians, down from 78 percent who self-reported as Christians in 2007 or in the early 1990s, when that percentage was 90 percent.
However, according to the Pew Research Center’s study, the lack of interest in Christianity appears to have remained stable since 2019.
The Christian breakdown is 40 percent Protestant, 19 percent Catholic, and three percent didn’t specify a particular denomination. The “religious unaffiliated” section grew to 29 percent, which may have been impacted by 35 percent of U.S. adults who have “switched religions since childhood.” In that subsection, five percent labeled themselves atheists, six percent were agnostic, and 18 percent claimed “nothing in particular” regarding religious affiliation.
Pew Researchers wrote, “There are fewer Christians and more ‘nones’ among men and women; people in every racial and ethnic category; college graduates and those with less education; and residents of all major regions of the country.”
Regretfully, religious disaffiliation is more common today as more younger adults are raised in what Pew calls “nominally religious homes” or without any sense of religion at all. A November 2023 editorial in The New York Times titled “Americans under 30 don’t trust religion–or anything else.”
A new report from the Survey Center on American Life at the American Enterprise Institute calls this “formative distrust,” noting that older Americans had “greater confidence in political leaders during their childhood years.”
Consider that judgment and the uncertain batch of politicians running for office or leading this country in Congress now, and that revelation may be surprising.
However, just in North Texas alone–a 16-county territory throughout the entire country–12 pastors were fired, arrested, or stepped down from the pulpit because of scandal. Multiply that by the 3,144 counties or the estimated 400,000 churches in America, and you begin to understand why younger adults have a problem with organized religion.
The survey noted patterns associated with this stabilization among U.S. adults and their connections to Christianity. At the top of those trends was gender, which leans on women continuing to be more religious than men in every age range. Not surprisingly, immigration status was another popular trend, as an estimated 58 percent of U.S. immigrants are Christian. Another 14 percent belong to other religions, including four percent Muslim, four percent Hindu, and three percent Buddhist.
Regardless of denomination or affiliation, “cultural Christianity” also seems to be on the rise. Many Americans may not be captivated by the idea of “organized religion,” but they still want to be associated with something greater than them.
- Eighty-six percent believe people have a soul or spirit besides their physical body.
- Eighty-three percent believe in God or a universal spirit.
- Seventy-nine percent believe there is something spiritual beyond the natural world.
- Seventy percent believe in heaven, hell, or both.
The national study surveyed 37,000 Americans between 2023 and 2024. The margin of error was 0.8 percentage points.
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