There are now as many Americans who claim no religion as there are evangelicals and Catholics, a sur

[Eugene]

Source: CNN

There are now as many Americans who claim no religion as there are evangelicals and Catholics, a survey finds

By Neil Monahan and Saeed Ahmed, CNN
Updated 1058 GMT (1858 HKT) April 13, 2019

(CNN) — For the first time "No Religion" has topped a survey of Americans' religious identity, according to a new analysis by a political scientist. The non-religious edged out Catholics and evangelicals in the long-running General Social Survey.

Ryan Burge, a political scientist at Eastern Illinois University and a Baptist pastor, found that 23.1% of Americans now claim no religion.

Catholics came in at 23.0%, and evangelicals were at 22.5%.

The three groups remain within the margin of error of each other though, making it a statistical tie. Over 2,000 people were interviewed in person for the survey.

-snip-

Read more: https://edition.cnn.com/2019/04/13/us/no-religion-largest-group-first-time-usa-trnd/index.html

[Butterflylady]

1. Read the article and think it's fantastic

To me organized religion is hogwash. If you have to check off a box to decide which god to go with then you're really missing who or what god is. It's like you're saying my god is better then you're god. So glad people are starting to wake up and realize they don't need to check off a box to be spiritual.

[Kath2]

2. Wow, Butterflylady. I was just posting on the subject of religion (or lack of).

https://www.democraticunderground.com/12218958

[Kath2]

3. I consider that a beautiful thing.

[erronis]

4. When I was around 7 or 8 I asked my father what he thought about "god"

My father told me "I really haven't spent much time worrying about that." And that was the last discussion we had. And that's how I like to lead my life.

We came from a melding of southerners (don't know their religion) and fairly puritan New Englanders.

My mother liked going to services (Episcopalian), especially the "holy days" - more a social thing. I sort of liked the pomp and circumstance but was also creeped out by the old men that anointed themselves in charge.

I really don't care how others feel as long as they don't impinge on my basic human rights. But most religions seem to want to be controlling - sometimes to the point of killing those that don't agree with their current high priests' edicts.

[TlalocW]

5. In discussions with religious people about this

They normally will argue that it should be the message of the Bible that's important and not the actions of the flawed-as-we-all-are leaders, but when one sect is constantly working to hide its child-abusing clergy members and the others are always working to hurt the most vulnerable of society in contradiction of the teachings of the guy they claim to follow culminating in bullshit about what a great Christian Trump is, then why should we trust them to give us an accurate interpretation of the Bible? Thanks to the internet, the rank hypocrisy of Catholic and Evangelical leaders are saved forever. They can offer up excuse after excuse for this phenomenon, but they only have to look in their bathroom mirrors to see the real cause.

TlalocW