Like no other country in the modern westernized world, America has the highest rate or religious devotion. We also have no problem with mixing politics and faith; this is apparent with the high level of exposure the American Taliban in the past 5 years.
Religious devotion sets the United States apart from some of its closest allies. Americans profess unquestioning belief in God and are far more willing to mix faith and politics than people in other countries, AP-Ipsos polling found.
…
Only Mexicans come close to Americans in embracing faith, the poll found. But unlike Americans, Mexicans strongly object to clergy lobbying lawmakers, in line with the nation’s historical opposition to church influence.
“In the United States, you have an abundance of religions trying to motivate Americans to greater involvement,” said Roger Finke, a sociologist at Penn State University. “It’s one thing that makes a tremendous difference here.”
70% of Americans and 80% of Mexicans “Know God really exists […] and have no doubts about it.” While Canada is at 43%, Italy is at 53% and the U.K. came in at 23% when asked the same question.
Full results here.
Well that is scary, and a monumental change in the principals established by our founding fathers. I was born into a country vastly different than the country I now see day to day. Unfortunately it gets worse according to the same article.
Nearly all U.S. respondents said faith is important to them and only 2 percent said they do not believe in God. Almost 40 percent said religious leaders should try to sway policymakers, notably higher than in other countries.
“Our nation was founded on Judeo-Christian policies and religious leaders have an obligation to speak out on public policy, otherwise they’re wimps,” said David Black, a retiree from Osborne, Pa., who agreed to be interviewed after he was polled.
Wimps! Unbelievable, no it is actually believable and scary.
When compared to the French we are a religious state; French population overwhelmingly agree (85%) that there should be no “clergy activism“. Australians are at 50%, while 2/3 of South Korean and Canadian populations said “religion is central to their lives“. But in difference with the new American trend all three countries oppose the mixing of faith and politics, strongly.
Why is this happening? I think it is a combination of the effects of 11 September 2001 and the use of religion by conservative politicians. Real researchers say:
Researchers disagree over why people in the United States have such a different religious outlook, said Brent Nelsen, an expert in politics and religion at Furman University in South Carolina.
Some say rejecting religion is a natural response to modernization and consider the United States a strange exception to the trend. Others say Europe is the anomaly; people in modernized countries inevitably return to religion because they yearn for tradition, according to the theory.
Some analysts, like Finke [Penn State Univ.], use a business model. According to his theory, a long history of religious freedom in the United States created a greater supply of worship options than in other countries, and that proliferation inspired wider observance. Some European countries still subsidize churches, in effect regulating or limiting religious options, Finke said.
Some cited history:
Many countries other than the United States have been through bloody religious conflict that contributes to their suspicion of giving clergy any say in policy.
A variety of factors contribute to the sentiment about separating religion and politics.
“In Germany, they have a Christian Democratic Party, and they talk about Christian values, but they don’t talk about them in quite the same way that we do,” Nelsen said. “For them, the Christian part of the Christian values are held privately and it’s not that acceptable to bring those out into the open.”
In Spain, where the government subsidizes the Catholic Church, and in Germany, which is split between Catholics and Protestants, people are about evenly divided over whether they consider faith important. The results are almost identical in Britain, whose state church, the Church of England, is struggling to fill pews.
Italians are the only European exception in the poll. Eighty percent said religion is significant to them and just over half said they unquestioningly believe in God.
But even in Italy, home to the Catholic Church, resistance to religious engagement in politics is evident. Only three in 10 think the clergy should try to influence government decisions; a lower percentage in Spain, Germany and England said the same.
But as I said above, in the U.S.,
some of the most pressing policy issues involve complex moral questions — such as gay marriage, abortion and stem cell research — that understandably draw religious leaders into public debate, said John Green, an expert on religion and politics at the University of Akron.
The poll found Republicans are much more likely than Democrats to think clergy should try to influence government decisions — a sign of the challenges ahead for Democrats as they attempt to reach out to more religious voters.
“Rightly or wrongly, Republicans tend to perceive religion as, quote-unquote, `on their side,'” Green said.
(I got my first degree from the Univ. of Akron)
More trends are covered noting that women are more devout than men and the old more devout than the young.
Polling info; 10000 adults, 1000 each in 10 countries with a MoE of +/-3%.
That I have no doubt there is a Great Spirit and belief in that spirit has profoundly changed my life, is fact. That this belief is personal and should have no sway of any kind on anyone else’s spiritual beliefs is a cornerstone of my belief system. That anyone else would forcefully try to exert their spiritual/religous beliefs upon me via the political system is repugnant and repulsive at the very least. I know there is a Great Spirit because my life is so much different and a great disease has been lifted from my life. The faith I place in Great Spirit has allowed me to become a more open and giving person. I have no doubt that many others who practice religious or spiritual paths have this same uplifting and energizing feeling of wholeness. I also know and see that many who profess to believe in something greater than themselves are opportunists who are a malignancy not only upon that spiritual/religious belief, but upon our society.
100% agreed, completly within. hasn’t changed my life yet, can’t say I expect it to but it is personal.
I think this is due to a number of factors… we’ve not (yet) had wars on our soil over religion, nor have we had the religious in control of govt as has happened in European history (whether direct control or influence). Plus, we’ve never had a state religion. I think if the Christianists who are pushing for this sort of thing get their way, that will (eventually) be the beginning of the end of religious worship and freedom in this country as we know it. The eventual backlash would be pretty mighty, I think.
While we commie pinko athiest First Amendmenters are working for our own protection, we are also working to protect the religious from themselves ;).
I think you’re last sentence would make a nice T-shirt slogan..
These figures are essentially no different than figures for the last several decades. 9/11 had nothing to do with it. The recruitment of religion in service of reactionary politics is relatively new, dating from the 1970s, but Americans have long been far more religious, and far more open to mixing religion and politics, since we haven’t had the first hand experience of the Spanish Inquisition and other such delights.
The experts failed to note one obvious correlation: The US enthusiasm for religious meddling and our appalling ignorance of history.
This leads me to the Buffy Summers explanation:
“Those of us who fail history, doomed to repeat it in summer school.”
— “Buffy, The Vampire Slayer,” Episode 103, “AfterLife”
So IYO my combo is half correct? If so, I can deal with that.
I still think, because I personally saw it happen, that 11 Sept. 2001 pulled a lot of people into the churches; a kind of coping mechanism.
Well, 9/11 certainly intensified people’s authoritarian atttiudes, which are generally fed by fundamentalist churches. That’s certainly true. But that sort of thing happens periodically, and then wears off for most people. For example, there was a lot less media attention to it, but there was substantial churchification going on around the Millenium. The whole Y2K scare was the only thing that mainstream media paid a lot of attention to, but there was a lot of conspiracy mongering, prophesizing and recruitment happening into rightwing, fundamentalist churches.
You’re absolutely right about the truly appalling ignorance of our history(any history) being a main ingredient in most people parroting the Judeo-Christian line perpetrated by their religious leaders. And it drives me crazy when people simply regurgitate this line when they have no idea of what they are talking about.
I agree that since the 70’s the religious right have been extremely diligent in infiltrating positions of power from school boards to state and national politics and with the culmination of Bush as president they feel they now have the upper hand to push hard their idea to make this a theocracy.
I think 9/11 probably pushed a very small percentage of people toward more religious outlook but I think that has faded and it’s more a ‘patriotic’ outlook that 9/11 brought out. And I don’t mean patriotic in a good way.
Patriotism was originally identified with republican government, because it was believed that only people who had an active role in shaping their government and the conditions of life in their society could experience that sort of emotion, and–more importantly–the commitment that it springs from.
It took several centuries, but eventually a substitute was developed–the ideology of nationalism, which gives people an ersatz sense of citizenship. However, even that is wearing off now, as the “‘W’ is for A-WOL” legions so clearly demonstrate. But the original, genuine patriotism remains a very noble and precious thing. So we ought not contribute to degrading it by confusing it with something that is quite opposite–a blind and fearful conformity, combined with demonization of those who don’t conform that is deeply toxic to real patriotism.
Fortunately, there’s already a name for it–jingoism. That’s what the Republicans have a monopoly on. Patriotism, well, no one has a monopoly on it. It’s just that nowadays Democrats–and independents like Bernie Sanders–are the only ones who seem the least bit interested in it.
not 9/11.
I highly recommend reading our very own Frederick Clarkson’s book Eternal Hostilities for a very good in depth historical account of the growth of the Christian Coalition and Republican’s right wing politics. This group wants to destroy the constitution and instal Biblical Law-or Their interpretation of God’s Law. Scary stuff.