Belief in God Drops to Below Half in US

Slightly less than half of Americans say they have no doubt that God exists, according to the General Society Survey recently released by NORC, the University of Chicago research organization.

As recently as 2008, more than 60% said they had no doubt about God’s existence.

In addition, in the highest figure recorded in five decades of surveys, 34% of Americans never go to church.  

There were 29% of Americans claiming no religion in 2021, up from 23% in 2018 and 5% in 1972.  

“We have a data point from the 1950s where only 3% of people said they had no [religious] affiliation,” said Mark Chaves, Anne Firor Scott Distinguished Professor of Sociology at Duke University. “It got up to 8 or 9% in the 1990s, and it’s sort of accelerated since then,” The Hill reported.

Other results from the survey: 

• True nonbelievers (atheists) account for only 7% of the population, while agnostics, who say the existence of God is unknowable, make up 7%. However, the vast majority of Americans still report they believe in God without reservation, with some doubts, or at least some of the time. If not God, they believe in “some higher power.” 
• Since the 1970s, the share of Americans who identify with Protestant denominations has declined from nearly one in three to about one in 10. 
• Nearly 15% reports no religious upbringing, while decades ago, nearly every American was raised in some religion.
• According to another new report, from the Public Religion Research Institute, the share of white Americans who identify as evangelical Protestants has decreased from 23% to 14% since 2006. The share of mainline white Protestants has gone down from 18% to 14%. White Catholics have declined from 16% to 13%. 
• While many religion trend lines are sinking, nondenominational Protestants has risen from next to nothing in the 1970s to nearly 15% of Americans, making them the second largest religious group in America after Catholics.