Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
Alexis de Tocqueville, the well-known, early 19th-century French chronicler of democracy in America, recognized the vital role religion plays in shaping American life. “This civilization is the result … of two quite distinct ingredients, which anywhere else have often ended in war but which Americans have succeeded somehow to meld together in wondrous harmony; namely […]
Relatively few Americans say they look to religion as the primary source of their views on social and political issues. Nevertheless, the Landscape Survey confirms the strong links that exist between Americans’ religious affiliation, their beliefs and practices, and their basic social and political attitudes. Religion may, in fact, be playing a more powerful, albeit […]
Just 18% of Americans say they are satisfied with the way things are going in the country today, down from 22% in March and 27% at the end of 2007. This represents a new low in 20 years of Pew Research Center polling. Previously, the lowest measure of satisfaction was in September 1993 when 20% […]
U.S. Catholics Occupy Something of a Middle Ground in the Catholic Faith
May 6, 2008 Before the pope’s plane – dubbed “Shepherd One” – touched down at Andrews Air Force Base on April 15, the news media portrayed Pope Benedict XVI as a largely unknown religious figure about to introduce himself to American Catholics still recovering from the clergy sex abuse scandal. By the time he left, […]
A major survey confirms the close link between Americans’ religious affiliation, beliefs and practices, on the one hand, and their social and political attitudes, on the other. The social and political fault lines in American society run through, as well as alongside, religious traditions.
For the most part, the Democratic electorate is politically and socially liberal, but there are divisions within the party, especially along racial, class, and generational lines. Looking at divisions just among white Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents, the older and less educated are significantly more conservative on key political values. A quarter of white Democrats believe […]
Italians’ Spirits Are Flagging – But Not Their Sense of Cultural Superiority