With the recent release of the U.S. Religious Landscape Survey by the Pew Forum making news, I've been examining how Mississippi compares with the U.S. averages on many fascinating indices of religious belief. Here is a quick summary of what I have learned about religion in our state.
Regarding religious affiliation, 47% of Mississippians identify as evangelical Protestants compared with a U.S. average of 26%. So if it seems like we are surrounded by bible-thumping lunatics, it just might be because we are!
Only 6% of Mississippians are unaffiliated with a religious tradition, compared with 16% nationwide. However, the data suggest that many of these unaffiliated people are still believers. Only 1% of Mississippians indicate that they do not believe in a god, compared with a U.S. average of 5%. No wonder Mississippi is perceived as a hostile environment for atheists.
For the following comparisons, the first number if from our state, and the second number is the U.S. average.
Evidence that Mississippi is more religious than many other parts of the United States is hardly newsworthy. Still, I couldn't help being both surprised and disappointed that the differences were this large. I guess we've got our work cut out for us.
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6 comments:
What do you think about the study's findings about atheists:
-21% say they believe in God (8% are absolutely certain)
-12% believe in heaven and 10% believe in hell.
-10% pray atleast once a week.
I'm not trying to make a point, I just don't understand. Seems like some of these beliefs go against the definition of athiesm.
(Source:
http://religions.pewforum.org/pdf/report2religious-landscape-study-key-findings.pdf
Pages 5,9,11,13)
You are right, tapdraw. I haven't examined the questionnaire used in this study carefully, but my guess would be that either it was confusing to many respondents or that there is far more confusion out there about the meaning of atheism than I realized.
These responses defy credulity when 60% of Mississippians claim to go to church at least once a week. That would figure to be about 1.5 million in church every Sunday. I don't care enough to run the numbers, but I bet there's not near enough seats to hold that many! And I bet you sure won't find that many there.
Maybe, Ken, but our state does have the distinction of having the highest number of churches per capita in the U.S.
The report that 60% of people in Mississippi attend church once a week is something that I can believe based on keeping attendance numbers at services that I visit.
Yeah with as many churches as we have, someone besides Oliver must be going!
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