America Is Becoming Steadily Less Religious

According to new data from the General Social Survey, the number of Americans who answered “no religion” in response to the question “What is your religious tradition?” is now greater than those who identify as Catholics or evangelical Christians. Ryan Burge shared this graph of the trends from the past 50 years:

The “no religion” trend has been growing steadily since 1991. But as this piece notes, it’s tough to tell exactly why people are answering the question that way.

Even then, those who claim “no religion” are not inherently atheists or agnostics: A 2017 Pew Research survey found that only 22 percent of “nones” listed not believing in God as the most important reason for their lack of religious affiliation.

(via @heif)

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