Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
This appendix provides an overview of the data sources and analytic approaches used in the report. The general population data underlying this study come from 106 countries for religious identity, 106 countries for the importance of religion, 105 countries for prayer frequency and 102 countries for religious service attendance. The countries where religious service attendance […]
Virtually all U.S. Christians say they believe in God or a higher power of some kind. Among evangelical Protestants, 91% put their faith in God “as described in the Bible,” as do 92% of those in the historically black Protestant tradition. Most Catholics and mainline Protestants also believe in the God of the Bible, though […]
Nine-in-ten Americans believe in a higher power, but only a slim majority believe in God as described in the Bible.
Government restrictions by region In 2016, the global median level of government restrictions on religion increased slightly to 2.8 from 2.7 in 2015. The median score rose in three out of five regions (the Americas, sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East-North Africa region) and remained about the same in two regions (Asia-Pacific and Europe). While […]
Most people in Western Europe say they believe in God. But in Europe today, believing in God does not necessarily mean belief in the God of the Bible. Indeed, even though all 15 countries surveyed are historically Christian, and nearly all of them still have Christian majorities, fewer respondents say they believe in God “as […]
The analysis in this report is based on telephone interviews conducted Jan. 10 to 15, 2018, among a national sample of 1,503 adults (including 316 Catholics), 18 years of age or older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia (376 respondents were interviewed on a landline telephone, and 1,127 were interviewed […]
About three-quarters of Americans say they try to talk to God or another higher power. And 28% indicate that their attempts at communication are answered, saying God or the spiritual force in the universe talks directly with them. Communicating with God is most common among evangelical Protestants and those in the historically black Protestant tradition, […]