{"id":198630,"date":"2025-02-26T06:09:14","date_gmt":"2025-02-26T11:09:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/?p=198630"},"modified":"2025-10-28T14:49:22","modified_gmt":"2025-10-28T18:49:22","slug":"religious-landscape-study-spiritual-experiences","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/religion\/2025\/02\/26\/religious-landscape-study-spiritual-experiences\/","title":{"rendered":"12. Spiritual experiences"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

How often do Americans think about spiritual matters or feel moved in spiritual ways? Large majorities of U.S. adults say they experience various kinds of spiritual thoughts and feelings at least several times a year, according to the new Religious Landscape Study (RLS).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, 93% of U.S. adults say that they feel a sense of awe at the beauty of nature several times a year or more often. This includes 61% who say they experience this feeling at least once a week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Bar<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Nearly as many (91%) say they feel a strong sense of gratitude or thankfulness at least several times a year, including 62% who report feeling deeply grateful on a weekly basis or more often. Large shares of Americans also say they think about the meaning and purpose of life at least several times a year (84%) and feel a deep sense of wonder about the universe (80%) that often.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Smaller majorities of U.S. adults say they feel a deep sense of spiritual peace and well-being (74%), a deep sense of connection with humanity (72%), or the presence of something from beyond this world (61%) several times a year or more often.[59. numoffset=”59″ Several of these questions were included, in a different context, in a 2023 Pew Research Center survey that focused on spirituality<\/a>. That survey asked whether Americans feel a deep sense of spiritual peace and well-being; a deep sense of wonder about the universe; the presence of something from beyond this world; and a deep sense of connection with humanity. Overall, respondents reported fewer spiritual experiences in the 2023 survey than in the 2023-24 Religious Landscape Study (RLS). The difference may be due, in part, to posing the same questions in different contexts. The 2023 survey had a relatively short questionnaire that asked mostly about spirituality, while the 2023-24 RLS was a longer survey that focused heavily on religious identity, beliefs and practices. Focusing on religion may have primed some respondents to report more frequent feelings of peace, wonder, connection with humanity and the presence of \u201csomething from beyond this world.\u201d The questions about spiritual peace, wonder about the universe, gratitude and purpose, also were asked in previous religious landscape surveys, but they are coded \u201cred\u201d \u2013 meaning that the results are not<\/em> comparable \u2013 because of differences in the way the studies were conducted. For details, refer to Appendix A<\/a>.]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jump to sections in this chapter on the survey\u2019s questions about:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n