Poll: Religious devotion high in US

[Athena]

This is from the United Press and it is incomplete. The story is printed in US Today.

Poll: Religious devotion high in US

Religious devotion sets the United States apart from some of its closest allies. Americans profess unquestioning belief in God and are far more willing to mix faith and politics than people in other countries, AP-Ipsos polling found.
In Western Europe, where Pope Benedict XVI complains that growing secularism has left churches unfilled on Sundays, people are the least devout among the 10 countries surveyed for The Associated Press by Ipsos.

Only Mexicans come close to Americans in embracing faith, the poll found. But unlike Americans, Mexicans strongly object to clergy lobbying lawmakers, in line with the nation's historical opposition to church influence.....


The polling was conducted in May in the United States, Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, South Korea and Spain.

Nearly all U.S. respondents said faith is important to them and only 2% said they do not believe in God. Almost 40% said religious leaders should try to sway policymakers, notably higher than in other countries.....


In contrast, 85% of French object to clergy activism — the strongest opposition of any nation surveyed. France has strict curbs on public religious expression and, according to the poll, 19% are atheists. South Korea is the only other nation with that high a percentage of nonbelievers.

Australians are generally split over the importance of faith, while two-thirds of South Koreans and Canadians said religion is central to their lives. People in all three countries strongly oppose mixing religion and politics.

Researchers disagree over why people in the United States have such a different religious outlook, said Brent Nelsen, an expert in politics and religion at Furman University in South Carolina.

Some say rejecting religion is a natural response to modernization and consider the United States a strange exception to the trend. Others say Europe is the anomaly; people in modernized countries inevitably return to religion because they yearn for tradition, according to the theory.

Some analysts, like Finke, use a business model. According to his theory, a long history of religious freedom in the United States created a greater supply of worship options than in other countries, and that proliferation inspired wider observance. Some European countries still subsidize churches, in effect regulating or limiting religious options, Finke said.

History also could be a factor.

Many countries other than the United States have been through bloody religious conflict that contributes to their suspicion of giving clergy any say in policy.

A variety of factors contribute to the sentiment about separating religion and politics.

"In Germany, they have a Christian Democratic Party, and they talk about Christian values, but they don't talk about them in quite the same way that we do," Nelsen said. "For them, the Christian part of the Christian values are held privately and it's not that acceptable to bring those out into the open."

May I suggest our Christian controlled education has much to do with this high religious devotion? We do not know the beginning and reasoning of democracy.

[fedfem]

Education is not controlled by religion except in a few states--Texas, deep southern states. Even the Parochial schools in most places use secular curriculums.

I would argue it is a lack of education overall that has not strengthened the critical thinking skills of our citizens for the past 25 years or so with the advent of technical schools and bare minimum literacy. This has done much to dumb down the average joe regarding civics, history etc...

I would love to know where the polls were taken.

[SNPete]

Quote by: fedfem I would argue it is a lack of education overall that has not strengthened the critical thinking skills of our citizens for the past 25 years or so with the advent of technical schools and bare minimum literacy. This has done much to dumb down the average joe regarding civics, history etc...

Sorry to disappoint you, but education is not a factor with religious belief. I see way to many highly educated Christians around. Of course, being an atheist, you probably don’t associate with Christians much and are unaware of how many of them are highly educated. I don’t associate with atheists much. The only atheists that I have met are high school graduates.

I associate with Christians and many of them hold college degrees. At my church of 1000 people, about one third of the adults hold some sort of college degree. The senior pastor holds a PhD and his wife is public school teacher. The other two pastors are college graduates. We have doctors, dentists, teachers, nurses, engineers, attorneys and at least one judge. I am a Social Worker and my wife is an attorney.

I would like to see some unbiased statistics, which show poorly educated people are more religious than well educated people.

Psalm 14:1 says: “The fool has said in his heart, there is no God.”

[SNPete]

Quote by: Athena May I suggest our Christian controlled education has much to do with this high religious devotion? We do not know the beginning and reasoning of democracy.

With all due respect, schools in the US tend to be secular and a bit on anti-religion side. Teachers get in trouble if they talk about religion. I have a number of friends who are teachers.

[Gorgo]

I think you'll find that educated people are religious, but their idea of religion changes with education and income. This from Barna.org:

"One of the intriguing findings from the research is that education and income are negatively correlated with belief in Heaven and Hell. In other words, the more education a person gets or the more income they earn, the less likely they are to believe that Heaven or Hell exists. While most high-income households and college graduates maintain belief in Heaven and Hell, the finding reinforces the popular notion – and, indeed, Jesus’ teaching – that people of economic means and those with considerable education struggle to embrace biblical teachings on such matters.

[fedfem]

Quote by: SNPete Sorry to disappoint you, but education is not a factor with religious belief. I see way to many highly educated Christians around. Of course, being an atheist, you probably don’t associate with Christians much and are unaware of how many of them are highly educated. I don’t associate with atheists much. The only atheists that I have met are high school graduates. I associate with Christians and many of them hold college degrees. At my church of 1000 people, about one third of the adults hold some sort of college degree. The senior pastor holds a PhD and his wife is public school teacher. The other two pastors are college graduates. We have doctors, dentists, teachers, nurses, engineers, attorneys and at least one judge. I am a Social Worker and my wife is an attorney. I would like to see some unbiased statistics, which show poorly educated people are more religious than well educated people. Psalm 14:1 says: “The fool has said in his heart, there is no God.”

Well I was educated in Parochial schools for the most part and wasn't saying christians were not educated. Devout would not be a description of most christians I know. Most are Sunday Christians. It was studying religion/theology that led me to becoming an atheist and you would be surprised how many educated church leaders are more agnostic and Deistic than "devout."

It is not a big secret that the more uneducated/impovershed a person is, the more likely they are to be devout followers of a religion. That in itself is not a negative thing since that is one of the purposes of religion--to give hope.

The article was dealing with devout believers having no problem mixing politics and religion and nobody in their right mind would think that unless they were not aware of the history and founding of our country as well as history prior to the US founding.

[Cephus]

The vast majority of Christians in the US are what I term 'social Christians'. They do it because they think it looks good to the neighbors. Most rarely, if ever, attend church other than maybe on Easter or Christmas and the overwhelming majority have never cracked the cover of a Bible in their lives. They really don't have a clue what they're supposed to believe and if you look at how they live, you couldn't tell they were Christian.

Polls can easily be slanted to match what the pollster wants the results to be. Most polls are so tiny as to be ridiculous and the specific questions that are asked are never released.

[belverron]

Quote by: Athena Education is not controlled by religion except in a few states--Texas, deep southern states.

I think I resent this statement just a little. Maybe that's true in rural Texas, but at my school it didn't get any worse than the damned Moment of Silence. Those two minutes always dragged by....

[belverron]

Oh, right! the topic at hand. I don't know. Oh, good book, if you want to tackle evolution and religion at the same time: The God Gene.

Almost 40% said religious leaders should try to sway policymakers, notably higher than in other countries.....

I frankly don't care how many people are religious in our country. This statistic is the dangerous part.

[The Analog Kid]

I frankly don't care how many people are religious in our country. This statistic is the dangerous part.

Excluding a group of people from attempting to sway policymakers is far more dangerous.
It's un-democratic and it's un-American to the core.

[SNPete]

Quote by: Cephus The vast majority of Christians in the US are what I term 'social Christians'. They do it because they think it looks good to the neighbors. Most rarely, if ever, attend church other than maybe on Easter or Christmas and the overwhelming majority have never cracked the cover of a Bible in their lives. They really don't have a clue what they're supposed to believe and if you look at how they live, you couldn't tell they were Christian.

Thank you for pointing that out. I agree with you, except I would use the word half instead of vast majority. I live on the west coast where there is little to be gained socially by being a Christian. So most people here, who say they are Christians, truly are. I am aware though that in the south going to church is the respectable thing to do. So you get a lot of the ‘go to church on Sunday and live like hell people’ there.

My major issue with Social Christians is they often give Christianity a bad name by their behavior and attitudes.

[Segomo]

Some interesting statistics regarding Christianity and education: http://webapp.icpsr.umich.edu/GSS/

For the row variable, use "degree"; for the column variable use "bible."

You can also choose from a whole slew of other variables.

[fedfem]

Quote by: belverron I think I resent this statement just a little. Maybe that's true in rural Texas, but at my school it didn't get any worse than the damned Moment of Silence. Those two minutes always dragged by....

That was me, not Athena but the point I was making was the textbook selection is done by fundamentalists thus there is a bit of control over education in that respect.

[Gorgo]

Quote by: Segomo Some interesting statistics regarding Christianity and education: http://webapp.icpsr.umich.edu/GSS/

Sorry, stupid alert. How do you use this?

[Segomo]

Click on "Analyze" and then "Frequences or Crosstabulation" and hit start. Put in the variables you want. To view a list of variables, go to http://sda.berkeley.edu:7502/D3/GSS02/Doc/gs02.htm

[Cephus]

Quote by: The Analog Kid Excluding a group of people from attempting to sway policymakers is far more dangerous. It's un-democratic and it's un-American to the core.

It's also a violation of church and state. They can play politics when they pay their entry fee like everyone else.

So... are we going to tax churches now? Heck, we could get rid of the national debt right there.

[Cephus]

Quote by: SNPete Thank you for pointing that out. I agree with you, except I would use the word half instead of vast majority. I live on the west coast where there is little to be gained socially by being a Christian. So most people here, who say they are Christians, truly are. I am aware though that in the south going to church is the respectable thing to do. So you get a lot of the ‘go to church on Sunday and live like hell people’ there.

I think the numbers are far higher, even on the West Coast. No matter where you are in the country, it's virtually impossible to get elected unless you at least claim to be a Christian. A moral atheist is going to lose to a child-molesting, alcoholic, wife-beating Christian almost every time, just because there are so many Christian voters who stop thinking when they get past the "what church does he go to" question.

And yes, Christians should be mad as hell at that, but Americans are couch potatoes. We don't care who we put in office or who we allow to speak for us, so long as they look good on TV.

[SNPete]

Quote by: fedfem That was me, not Athena but the point I was making was the textbook selection is done by fundamentalists thus there is a bit of control over education in that respect.

Maybe in your part of the country. Sure ain't the case on the west coast.Very anti religion and revisionist!

[belverron]

Quote by: fedfem That was me, not Athena but the point I was making was the textbook selection is done by fundamentalists thus there is a bit of control over education in that respect.

Sorry about the misquote. And you are right to some extent. Check it out here.

[belverron]

Quote by: The Analog Kid Excluding a group of people from attempting to sway policymakers is far more dangerous. It's un-democratic and it's un-American to the core.

Perhaps I was too unclear. I think it's perfectly fine for them to represent their personal interests. I think it's inappropriate for them to represent the interests of their religion, however, given that the United States is to "make no law respecting an establishment of religion."