Christianity, Pluralism, and Public Life

RELIGIOUS IDENTITY
Although many surveys ask Americans about religion, few include enough questions and large enough samples to identify
percentages of many religious subgroups. The most comprehensive such study to date is the Pew Research Center’s 2014
Religious Landscape Study, which showed that Christianity remains the dominant religion in the United States, with seven of
ten Americans (70.6 percent) identifying as some form of Christian. Evangelicals are the largest Christian group (25.4 percent
of the population), followed by Catholics (20.8 percent), mainline Protestant (14.7 percent), and black Protestant (6.5 percent).
About 1 in 12 (7.4 percent) Americans identify with other religions, including 1.9 percent Jews, .9 percent Muslims, .7 percent
Buddhist and .7 percent Hindu. Although most Americans choose a religious affiliation, 22.8 percent of the respondents in the
Pew survey do not. Some of the unaffiliated described themselves as Atheists or Agnostics, but many people (15.8 percent of
all respondents) said their religion was “nothing in particular.” 3
TOTAL AFFILIATION
22.8%
NO AFFILIATION
5.9 % 70.6%
NON-CHRISTIAN FAITHS
CHRISTIAN FAITHS
1.5 % OTHER FAITHS
<1 % OTHER WORLD RELIGIONS
<1 % MUSLIM
<1 % BUDDHIST
<1 % HINDU
1.9 % JEWISH
<1 % OTHER
<1 % JEHOVAH’S
WITNESS
<1 % ORTHODOX
CHRISTIAN
1.6 % MORMON
25.4 % EVANGELICAL
14.7 % MAINLINE
PROTESTANT
6.5 % HISTORICALLY
BLACK PROTESTANT
20.8 % CATHOLIC
3
“America’s Changing Religious Landscape,” Report, Pew Research Center, May 12, 2015, p. 4, Accessed September 20, 2019. Available at:
https://www.pewforum.org/2015/05/12/americas-changing-religious-landscape/.
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