Yay! Churchless are on the march in U.S.

Excellent news: a survey has found that the ranks of faithless, irreligious, and pagan people are growing rapidly in the United States.

"nones"—people claiming no religion—constitute the only "religious" tradition that's growing in all 50 states

Keep not-believing, churchless brothers and sisters. We are overcoming!

The only depressing part of the survey findings for me was how Oregon has slipped over the past 18 years. I feel like I should have done more to keep up my state's godless credentials.

This nifty USA Today chart shows that back in 1990 Oregon was #1 in No Religion.

Now look at us in 2008. Vermont is kicking our butt. (Along with New Hampshire, Wyoming, Washington, and Maine.) Sad.

 Well, back to the positive: this table shows how various belief systems have fared, popularity-wise, from 1990-2008. "No religion" had by far the greatest percentage growth -- from 8.2% to 15.0% of the population.

That's an 83% increase! At that rate, we'll eventually cover the country with unbelievers.

The South, though, is going to be a tough religious nut to crack. Arkansas and Mississippi aren't growing the faithless very fast. Need to send some anti-missionaries down there to do some unconverting.

It was nice to see that those who profess a fondness for Eastern religions more than doubled, from .4% to .9% of the U.S. population. Maybe bookstores will start carrying more Taoist and Buddhist titles, which I'd like.

This country is still deeply traditionally religious. But as USA Today reported in an in-depth story on the survey, "Most religious groups in USA have lost ground."

So many Americans claim no religion at all (15%, up from 8% in 1990), that this category now outranks every other major U.S. religious group except Catholics and Baptists. In a nation that has long been mostly Christian, "the challenge to Christianity … does not come from other religions but from a rejection of all forms of organized religion," the report concludes.

Nice.

Comments

[The Rambling Taoist]

I saw this report on the NBC Nightly News. While the no religion surge is promising, it does come with a caveat: 70% of Americans still believe in a personified God. So, we still have some work to do. :)

[Rain]

*laughing* and I like the new banner, very apropos

[Catherine]

The University of Cape Town, S. Africa, distributed their fund raiser magazine (rag mag)last week and created a stir. This is a fun-filled riotous affair with students in dress-up encouraging motorists at robots to part with their money for a mag. All money goes to charity.

Their editor is an atheist and overstepped the line with pages of religious satirical comment. Apparently there is a newish law which makes it illegal to blaspheme. The question is whether hate speech or blasphemy was used.
www.carteblanche.co.za

[tAo]

A Churchless Reverend speaks out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKWNi8v1ilY