Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World

Read our research on:

Search results for: “religion”

Refine Your Results

  • report

    How Muslims Compare With Other Religious Americans

    by Robert Ruby and Greg Smith, Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life Although Muslims constitute a small minority in the United States, and their holy book and many of their religious rituals are distinctly their own, Muslim Americans are by no means “the other” when it comes to religious life or politics in the […]

  • fact sheet

    From the Ten Commandments to Christmas Trees: Public Religious Displays and the Courts

    For most of the nation’s history, public religious displays were not controversial. But in recent decades, a growing number of citizens and civil liberties groups have sued towns, cities and states over religious symbols in the public square, arguing that these displays should be removed because they violate the First Amendment’s prohibition on government establishment […]

  • report

    Same-Sex Marriage: Redefining Legal Unions Around the World

    In many countries around the globe, gay and lesbian couples are seeking the right to marry or enter into other legally recognized forms of domestic partnerships. The legal definition of marriage is in flux, particularly in the developed world.

  • short reads

    Americans See Less Religious Influence on U.S. Life

    That’s the percentage of Americans who say that religion’s influence on life in the U.S. is waning. Among these, eight in ten (79%) believe this declining religiosity is a bad thing.

  • report

    Religion in the Public Schools

    Nearly a half-century after the Supreme Court issued its landmark ruling striking down school-sponsored prayer, Americans continue to fight over the place of religion in public schools. Indeed, the classroom has become one of the most important battlegrounds in the broader conflict over religion’s role in public life.

  • fact sheet

    Religion in the Curriculum

    The Supreme Court’s decisions about officially sponsored religious expression in schools consistently draw a distinction between religious activities such as worship or Bible reading, which are designed to inculcate religious sentiments and values, and “teaching about religion,” which is both constitutionally permissible and educationally appropriate. On several occasions, members of the court have suggested that […]

  • report

    A Spiritual Network Grows On The Net

    There have been a few twists and turns in the eight-year history of Beliefnet.com, the faith-oriented web site. But the outlet, which recently captured a major National Magazine Award, has reinvented itself by trying to turn a potentially polarizing subject into an all-inclusive gathering place.