{"id":11358,"date":"2018-04-25T10:05:06","date_gmt":"2018-04-25T15:05:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/short-reads\/%year%\/%monthnum%\/%day%\/key-findings-about-americans-belief-in-god\/"},"modified":"2024-04-13T23:47:11","modified_gmt":"2024-04-14T04:47:11","slug":"key-findings-about-americans-belief-in-god","status":"publish","type":"short-read","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/short-reads\/2018\/04\/25\/key-findings-about-americans-belief-in-god\/","title":{"rendered":"Key findings about Americans\u2019 belief in God"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Michelangelo's<\/a>
(Lucas Schifres\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In recent years, the share of American adults who do not affiliate with a religious group<\/a> has risen dramatically. In spite of this trend, the overwhelming majority of Americans, including a majority of the religiously unaffiliated\u00a0\u2013 those who describe themselves, religiously, as atheists, agnostics or \u201cnothing in particular\u201d \u2013 <\/span>say they believe in God or a higher power, according to a new Pew Research Center survey<\/a>\u00a0conducted in December of 2017. At the same time, only a slim majority of Americans now believe in the God of the Bible and roughly one-in-ten U.S. adults don\u2019t believe in any higher power or spiritual force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here are six key takeaways from the report:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The vast majority of Americans (90%) believe in some kind of higher power<\/strong>, with 56% professing faith in God as described in the Bible and another 33% saying they believe in another type of higher power or spiritual force. Only one-in-ten Americans say they don\u2019t believe in God or a higher power of any kind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

In the U.S.,<\/strong> Christians are particularly likely (99%) to believe in God or a higher power, with 80% claiming faith in a biblical God.<\/strong> Three-quarters of Christians describe God as all-loving, all-knowing and all-powerful. Like Christians, most Jews (89%) have faith in a deity. But just a third of Jews (33%) say they believe in God as described in the Bible, while 56% say they believe in some other higher power. Jews are also more likely than Christians to say they don\u2019t believe in a spiritual force of any kind (10% vs. 1%).\u00a0Finally, among those who describe themselves as religiously unaffiliated \u2013 also known as “nones” \u2013 72% say they believe in a higher power of some kind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

About half (48%) of U.S. adults believe God determines what happens to them most or all of the time.<\/strong> Nearly eight-in-ten U.S. adults think God or a higher power has protected them, and two-thirds of Americans say they have been rewarded by the Almighty. At the same time, fewer see God as judgmental and punitive, with just four-in-ten saying they<\/em> have been punished by the deity in which they believe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Younger adults (those under the age of 50) are less inclined than older Americans to believe in a biblical God and more likely to say they don\u2019t believe in any<\/em> higher power or spiritual force.<\/strong> While roughly two-thirds of older adults say they believe in the biblical God, just 49% of those in their 30s and 40s \u2013 and just 43% of adults under 30 \u2013 say the same. Even with this age gap, an overwhelming majority of the youngest adults continue to believe in God or a higher power: Eight-in-ten of those ages 18 to 29 say they believe in at least some kind of spiritual force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Americans with a high school education or less are more likely than college graduates to believe in God or a higher power (94% vs. 84%). <\/strong>They also are more likely than those who graduated from college to believe in the God of the Bible (66% vs. 45%) and to believe that a higher power determines what happens in their lives most or all of the time (59% vs. 33%).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Republicans and Democrats have very different beliefs about God.<\/strong> Democrats and those who lean toward the Democratic Party are less likely to say they believe in the God of the Bible than Republicans and Republican leaners (45% vs. 70%). Democrats are more likely than Republicans (39% vs. 23%) to say they believe in a higher power other than the biblical God. They also are more likely to say they don\u2019t<\/em> believe in any deity at all (14% vs. 5%). The survey also finds big racial differences among Democrats; most nonwhite Democrats \u2013 who are predominantly black or Hispanic \u2013 believe in God as described in the Bible (61%), compared to just 32% of white Democrats.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The overwhelming majority of Americans, including a majority of the religiously unaffiliated, say they believe in God or a higher power. Read six key takeaways from a report on Americans’ belief in God. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":448,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"sub_headline":"","sub_title":"","_prc_public_revisions":[],"_ppp_expiration_hours":0,"_ppp_enabled":false,"ai_generated_summary":"","apple_news_api_created_at":"","apple_news_api_id":"","apple_news_api_modified_at":"","apple_news_api_revision":"","apple_news_api_share_url":"","apple_news_cover_media_provider":"image","apple_news_coverimage":0,"apple_news_coverimage_caption":"","apple_news_cover_video_id":0,"apple_news_cover_video_url":"","apple_news_cover_embedwebvideo_url":"","apple_news_is_hidden":"","apple_news_is_paid":"","apple_news_is_preview":"","apple_news_is_sponsored":"","apple_news_maturity_rating":"","apple_news_metadata":"\"\"","apple_news_pullquote":"","apple_news_pullquote_position":"","apple_news_slug":"","apple_news_sections":[],"apple_news_suppress_video_url":false,"apple_news_use_image_component":false,"relatedPosts":[],"_prc_fork_parent":0,"_prc_fork_status":"","_prc_active_fork":0,"datacite_doi":"","datacite_doi_citation":"","_prc_seo_qr_attachment_id":0,"spoken_article_player_enabled":true,"displayBylines":true,"footnotes":"","prc_watchers":[]},"categories":[382,161],"bylines":[689],"collection":[],"datasets":[],"_post_visibility":[],"formats":[467],"_fund_pool":[],"languages":[],"regions-countries":[515],"research-teams":[517],"workflow-status":[],"class_list":["post-11358","short-read","type-short-read","status-publish","hentry","category-atheism-agnosticism","category-beliefs-practices","bylines-dalia-fahmy","formats-short-read","regions-countries-united-states","research-teams-religion"],"label":"Short Read","post_parent":0,"word_count":620,"canonical_url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/short-reads\/2018\/04\/25\/key-findings-about-americans-belief-in-god\/","art_direction":{"A1":{"id":22026,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp?w=564&h=317&crop=1","width":564,"height":317,"chartArt":false},"A2":{"id":22026,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp?w=268&h=151&crop=1","width":268,"height":151,"chartArt":false},"A3":{"id":22026,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp?w=194&h=110&crop=1","width":194,"height":110,"chartArt":false},"A4":{"id":22026,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp?w=268&h=151&crop=1","width":268,"height":151,"chartArt":false},"XL":{"id":22026,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp?w=640&h=320&crop=1","width":640,"height":320,"chartArt":false},"social":{"id":22026,"rawUrl":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp","url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2018\/04\/FT_18.04.25_typologyBeliefsGod_feature-jpg.webp?w=640&h=320&crop=1","width":640,"height":320,"chartArt":false}},"_embeds":[],"watchers":[],"table_of_contents":[],"datacite_doi":"","prc_seo_data":{"title":"Americans' belief in God: Key findings","description":"The overwhelming majority of Americans, including a majority of the religiously unaffiliated, say they believe in God or a higher power.","og_title":"Key findings about Americans\u2019 belief in God","og_description":"The overwhelming majority of Americans, including a majority of the religiously unaffiliated, say they believe in God or a higher power. 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