Religion in the United States

The most popular religion in the U.S. is Christianity, comprising the majority of the population (73.7% of adults in 2016).[1] According to the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies newsletter published March 2017, based on data from 2010, Christians were the largest religious population in all 3,143 counties in the country.[26] Roughly 48.9% of Americans are Protestants, 23.0% are Catholics, 1.8% are Mormons (members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints).[1] Christianity was introduced during the period of European colonization.

Washington National Cathedral, the Episcopal cathedral in Washington, D.C.

According to a 2012 review by the National Council of Churches, the five largest denominations are:[27]

• The Catholic Church, 68,202,492 members
• The Southern Baptist Convention, 16,136,044 members
• The United Methodist Church, 7,679,850 members
• The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 6,157,238 members
• The Church of God in Christ, 5,499,875 members

The Southern Baptist Convention, with over 16 million adherents, is the largest of more than 200[28] distinctly named Protestant denominations.[29] In 2007, members of evangelical churches comprised 26% of the American population, while another 18% belonged to mainline Protestant churches, and 7% belonged to historically black churches.[30]

A 2015 study estimates some 450,000 Christian believers from a Muslim background in the country, most of them belonging to some form of Protestantism.[31] In 2010 there were approximately 180,000 Arab Americans and about 130,000 Iranian Americans who converted from Islam to Christianity. Dudley Woodbury, a Fulbright scholar of Islam, estimates that 20,000 Muslims convert to Christianity annually in the United States.[32]

A Congregational church in Cheshire, Connecticut

Historians agree that members of mainline Protestant denominations have played leadership roles in many aspects of American life, including politics, business, science, the arts, and education. They founded most of the country's leading institutes of higher education.[33] According to Harriet Zuckerman, 72% of American Nobel Prize Laureates between 1901 and 1972, have identified from Protestant background.[34]

Episcopalians[35] and Presbyterians[36] tend to be considerably wealthier and better educated than most other religious groups, and numbers of the most wealthy and affluent American families as the Vanderbilts[35] and Astors,[35] Rockefeller,[37] Du Pont, Roosevelt, Forbes, Whitneys,[35] Morgans[35] and Harrimans are Mainline Protestant families,[35] though those affiliated with Judaism are the wealthiest religious group in the United States[38][39] and those affiliated with Catholicism, owing to sheer size, have the largest number of adherents of all groups in the top income bracket.[40]

Some of the first colleges and universities in America, including Harvard,[41] Yale,[42] Princeton,[43] Columbia,[44] Dartmouth,[45] Williams, Bowdoin, Middlebury,[46] and Amherst, all were founded by mainline Protestant denominations. By the 1920s most had weakened or dropped their formal connection with a denomination. James Hunter argues that:

The private schools and colleges established by the mainline Protestant denominations, as a rule, still want to be known as places that foster values, but few will go so far as to identify those values as Christian.... Overall, the distinctiveness of mainline Protestant identity has largely dissolved since the 1960s.[47]

While the Puritans were securing their Commonwealth, members of the Catholic church in England were also planning a refuge, "for they too were being persecuted on account of their religion."[48] Among those interested in providing a refuge for Catholics was the second Lord of Baltimore, George Calvert, who established Maryland, a "Catholic Proprietary," in 1634,[48] more than sixty years after the founding of the Spanish Florida mission of St. Augustine.[49] Though small in number in the beginning, Catholicism grew over the centuries to become the largest single denomination in the US, primarily through immigration, but also through the acquisition of continental territories under the jurisdiction of French and Spanish Catholic powers.[50] Though the European Catholic and indigenous population of these former territories were small,[51] the material cultures there, the original mission foundations with their canonical Catholic names, are still recognized today (as they were formerly known) in any number of cities in California, New Mexico and Louisiana. (The most recognizable cities of California, for example, are named after Catholic saints.)

As the number of Catholics increased, they built up a vast system of schools (from primary schools to universities) and hospitals. The first US Catholic university, Georgetown University, was founded in 1789. Since then, the Catholic church has founded hundreds of other colleges and universities, along with thousands of primary and secondary schools. Schools like the University of Notre Dame is ranked best in its state (Indiana) as Georgetown University is ranked best in the District of Columbia. 12 Catholic universities are also ranked among the top 100 universities in the US.[52]

Beginning around 1600 European settlers introduced Anglican and Puritan religion, as well as Baptist, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Quaker, and Moravian denominations.[53]

The Salt Lake Temple in Salt Lake City, Utah

Beginning in the 16th century, the Spanish (and later the French and English) introduced Catholicism. From the 19th century to the present, Catholics moved to the US in large numbers due to immigration of Italians, Hispanics, Portuguese, French, Polish, Irish, Highland Scots, Dutch, Flemish, Hungarians, Germans, Lebanese (Maronite), and other ethnic groups.

During the 19th century, two main branches of Eastern Christianity also arrived to America. Eastern Orthodoxy was brought to America by Greek, Russian, Ukrainian, Serbian, and other immigrant groups, mainly from Eastern Europe. In the same time, several immigrant groups from the Middle East, mainly Armenians, Copts and Syriacs, brought Oriental Orthodoxy to America.[54][55]

The Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C., is the largest Catholic church in the US.

Several Christian groups were founded in America during the Great Awakenings. Interdenominational evangelicalism and Pentecostalism emerged; new Protestant denominations such as Adventism; non-denominational movements such as the Restoration Movement (which over time separated into the Churches of Christ, the Christian churches and churches of Christ, and the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)); Jehovah's Witnesses (called "Bible Students" in the latter part of the 19th century); and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormonism).

The strength of various sects varies greatly in different regions of the country, with rural parts of the South having many evangelicals but very few Catholics (except Louisiana and the Gulf Coast, and from among the Hispanic community, both of which consist mainly of Catholics), while urbanized areas of the north Atlantic states and Great Lakes, as well as many industrial and mining towns, are heavily Catholic, though still quite mixed, especially due to the heavily Protestant African-American communities. In 1990, nearly 72% of the population of Utah was Mormon, as well as 26% of neighboring Idaho.[56] Lutheranism is most prominent in the Upper Midwest, with North Dakota having the highest percentage of Lutherans (35% according to a 2001 survey).[57]

The largest religion, Christianity, has proportionately diminished since 1990. While the absolute number of Christians rose from 1990 to 2008, the percentage of Christians dropped from 86% to 76%.[58] A nationwide telephone interview of 1,002 adults conducted by The Barna Group found that 70% of American adults believe that God is "the all-powerful, all-knowing creator of the universe who still rules it today", and that 9% of all American adults and 0.5% young adults hold to what the survey defined as a "biblical worldview".[59]

Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Eastern Orthodox and United Church of Christ members[60] have the highest number of graduate and post-graduate degrees per capita of all Christian denominations in the United States,[61][62] as well as the most high-income earners.[63][64] However, owing to the sheer size or demographic head count of Catholics, more individual Catholics have graduate degrees and are in the highest income brackets than have or are individuals of any other religious community.[65]

After Christianity, Judaism is the next largest religious affiliation in the US, though this identification is not necessarily indicative of religious beliefs or practices.[58] There are between 5.3 and 6.6 million Jews. A significant number of people identify themselves as American Jews on ethnic and cultural grounds, rather than religious ones. For example, 19% of self-identified American Jews do not believe God exists.[66] The 2001 ARIS study projected from its sample that there are about 5.3 million adults in the American Jewish population: 2.83 million adults (1.4% of the U.S. adult population) are estimated to be adherents of Judaism; 1.08 million are estimated to be adherents of no religion; and 1.36 million are estimated to be adherents of a religion other than Judaism.[67] ARIS 2008 estimated about 2.68 million adults (1.2%) in the country identify Judaism as their faith.[58] According to a 2017 study, Judaism is the religion of approximately 2% of the American population.[22]

Touro Synagogue, (built 1759) in Newport, Rhode Island has the oldest still existing synagogue building in the United States.

Jews have been present in what is now the US since the 17th century, and specifically allowed since the British colonial Plantation Act 1740. Although small Western European communities initially developed and grew, large-scale immigration did not take place until the late 19th century, largely as a result of persecutions in parts of Eastern Europe. The Jewish community in the United States is composed predominantly of Ashkenazi Jews whose ancestors emigrated from Central and Eastern Europe. There are, however, small numbers of older (and some recently arrived) communities of Sephardi Jews with roots tracing back to 15th century Iberia (Spain, Portugal, and North Africa). There are also Mizrahi Jews (from the Middle East, Caucasia and Central Asia), as well as much smaller numbers of Ethiopian Jews, Indian Jews, Kaifeng Jews and others from various smaller Jewish ethnic divisions. Approximately 25% of the Jewish American population lives in New York City.[68]

According to the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies newsletter published March, 2017, based on data from 2010, Jews were the largest minority religion in 231 counties out of the 3143 counties in the country.[26] According to a 2014 survey conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public life, 1.7% of adults in the U.S. identify Judaism as their religion. Among those surveyed, 44% said they were Reform Jews, 22% said they were Conservative Jews, and 14% said they were Orthodox Jews.[69][70] According to the 1990 National Jewish Population Survey, 38% of Jews were affiliated with the Reform tradition, 35% were Conservative, 6% were Orthodox, 1% were Reconstructionists, 10% linked themselves to some other tradition, and 10% said they are "just Jewish".[71]

Congregation Shearith Israel (founded 1655) in New York is the oldest Jewish congregation in the United States.

The Pew Research Center report on American Judaism released in October 2013 revealed that 22% of Jewish Americans say they have "no religion" and the majority of respondents do not see religion as the primary constituent of Jewish identity. 62% believe Jewish identity is based primarily in ancestry and culture, only 15% in religion. Among Jews who gave Judaism as their religion, 55% based Jewish identity on ancestry and culture, and 66% did not view belief in God as essential to Judaism.[72]

A 2009 study estimated the Jewish population (including both those who define themselves as Jewish by religion and those who define themselves as Jewish in cultural or ethnic terms) to be between 6.0 and 6.4 million.[73] According to a study done in 2000 there were an estimated 6.14 million Jewish people in the country, about 2% of the population.[74]

According to the 2001 National Jewish Population Survey, 4.3 million American Jewish adults have some sort of strong connection to the Jewish community, whether religious or cultural.[75] Jewishness is generally considered an ethnic identity as well as a religious one. Among the 4.3 million American Jews described as "strongly connected" to Judaism, over 80% have some sort of active engagement with Judaism, ranging from attendance at daily prayer services on one end of the spectrum to attending Passover Seders or lighting Hanukkah candles on the other. The survey also discovered that Jews in the Northeast and Midwest are generally more observant than Jews in the South or West.

The Jewish American community has higher household incomes than average, and is one of the best educated religious communities in the United States.[60]

The Islamic Center of Washington in the nation's capital is a leading American Islamic Center.

Islam is probably the third largest religion in numbers in the United States, after Christianity and Judaism, followed, according to Gallup, by 0.8% of the population in 2016.[1] Hinduism and Buddhism follow it closely in numbers (in 2014 the large scale Religious Life Survey found Islam with 0.9% and the other two with 0.7% each[60]). According to the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies newsletter published in March 2017, based on data from 2010, Muslims were the largest minority religion in 392 counties out of the 3143 counties in the country.[26] According to the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding (ISPU) in 2018, there are approximately 3.45 million Muslims living in the United States, with 2.05 million adults, and the rest being children.[76] Across faith groups, ISPU found in 2017 that Muslims were most likely to be born outside of the US (50%), with 36% having undergone naturalization. American Muslims are also America's most diverse religious community with 25% identifying as black or African American, 24% identifying as white, 18% identifying as Asian/Chinese/Japanese, 18% identifying as Arab, and 5% identifying as Hispanic.[77] In addition to diversity, Americans Muslims are most likely to report being low income, and among those who identify as middle class, the majority are Muslim women, not men. Although American Muslim education levels are similar to other religious communities, namely Christians, within the Muslim American population, Muslim women surpass Muslim men in education, with 31% of Muslim women having graduated from a four-year university. 90% of Muslim Americans identify as straight.[77]

Islam in America effectively began with the arrival of African slaves. It is estimated that about 10% of African slaves transported to the United States were Muslim.[78] Most, however, became Christians, and the United States did not have a significant Muslim population until the arrival of immigrants from Arab and East Asian Muslim areas.[79] According to some experts,[80] Islam later gained a higher profile through the Nation of Islam, a religious group that appealed to black Americans after the 1940s; its prominent converts included Malcolm X and Muhammad Ali.[81][82] The first Muslim elected to Congress was Keith Ellison in 2006,[83] followed by André Carson in 2008.[84]

Out of all religious groups surveyed by ISPU, Muslims were found to be the most likely to report experiences of religious discrimination (61%). That can also be broken down when looking at gender (with Muslim women more likely than Muslim men to experience racial discrimination), age (with young people more likely to report experiencing racial discrimination than older people), and race, (with Arab Muslims the most likely to report experiencing religious discrimination). Muslims born in the United States are more likely to experience all three forms of discrimination, gender, religious, and racial.[77]

The Islamic Center of America in Dearborn, Michigan, is the largest mosque in the United States.

Research indicates that Muslims in the United States are generally more assimilated and prosperous than their counterparts in Europe.[85][86][87] Like other subcultural and religious communities, the Islamic community has generated its own political organizations and charity organizations.

ISPU also conducted a series of impact reports on Muslim Americans in both Michigan and New York City.[76] Looking at those two areas alone, the engagement of Muslim Americans is striking. 22.3% of Muslims live in New York City, the home of more mosques (285 total) than any other American city. Though just shy of 9% of the NYC population, Muslims make up over 12% of the city's pharmacists, lab technicians, and over 9% of all doctors. They make up 11.3% of all engineers, and are engaged at every level of civic life in the city, from senior adviser to the city government to directing outreach at the city council level. Nearly 10,000 NYC teachers are Muslim. Looking at NYC, it is evident that Muslim Americans are engaged and active in important sectors of American life. That level of engagement and dynamic interaction with the communities around them is further highlighted through the Michigan case study as well.

Bahá'í House of Worship (built 1953) in Wilmette, Illinois, is the oldest still existing Bahá'í house of worship in the world and the only one in the United States.

The United States has perhaps the second largest Bahá'í community in the world. First mention of the faith in the U.S. was at the inaugural Parliament of World Religions, which was held at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. In 1894, Ibrahim George Kheiralla, a Syrian Bahá'í immigrant, established a community in the U.S. He later left the main group and founded a rival movement.[88] According to the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies newsletter published March, 2017, based on data from 2010, Bahá'ís were the largest minority religion in 80 counties out of the 3143 counties in the country.[26]

Rastafarians began migrating to the United States in the 1950s, '60s and '70s from the religion's 1930s birthplace, Jamaica.[89][90] Marcus Garvey, who is considered a prophet by many Rastafarians,[91][92] rose to prominence and cultivated many of his ideas in the United States.

Hsi Lai Temple ("Coming West Temple"), a Buddhist monastery in Hacienda Heights, California, near Los Angeles

Services at the Hompa Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, Los Angeles, around 1925.

Tibetan Buddhist temple in Seattle, Washington

Buddhism entered the US during the 19th century with the arrival of the first immigrants from East Asia. The first Buddhist temple was established in San Francisco in 1853 by Chinese Americans.The first prominent US citizen to publicly convert to Buddhism was Henry Steel Olcott in 1880 who is still honored in Sri Lanka for these efforts. An event that contributed to the strengthening of Buddhism in the US was the Parliament of the World's Religions in 1893, which was attended by many Buddhist delegates sent from India, China, Japan, Vietnam, Thailand and Sri Lanka.

During the late 19th century Buddhist missionaries from Japan traveled to the US. During the same time period, US intellectuals started to take interest in Buddhism.

The early 20th century was characterized by a continuation of tendencies that had their roots in the 19th century. The second half, by contrast, saw the emergence of new approaches, and the move of Buddhism into the mainstream and making itself a mass and social religious phenomenon.[93][94]

According to a 2016 study, Buddhists are approximately 1% of the American population.[22] According to the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies newsletter published March, 2017, based on data from 2010, Buddhists were the largest minority religion in 186 counties out of the 3143 counties in the country.[26]

Kauai Hindu monastery in Kauai Island in Hawaii is the only Hindu Monastery in the North American continent

Swaminarayanan Akshardham Temple Complex in New Jersey, USA

Hinduism is the fourth largest faith in the United States, representing approximately 1% of the population in 2016.[22] In 2001, there were an estimated 766,000 Hindus in the US, about 0.2% of the total population.[95][96]

The first time Hinduism entered the U.S. is not clearly identifiable. However, large groups of Hindus have immigrated from India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Pakistan, Bangladesh, the Caribbean, southern Africa, eastern Africa, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Mauritius, Fiji, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and other regions and countries since the enactment of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. During the 1960s and 1970s Hinduism exercised fascination contributing to the development of New Age thought. During the same decades the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (a Vaishnavite Hindu reform organization) was founded in the US.In 2003, the Hindu American Foundation—a national institution protecting rights of the Hindu community of U.S.—was founded.

According to the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies newsletter published March, 2017, based on data from 2010, Hindus were the largest minority religion in 92 counties out of the 3143 counties in the country.[26]

American Hindus have one of the highest rates of educational attainment and household income among all religious communities, and tend to have lower divorce rates.[60] Hindus also have higher acceptance towards homosexuality (71%), which is higher than the general public (62%).[97]

Jain Center of Greater Phoenix (JCGP)

Adherents of Jainism first arrived in the United States in the 20th century. The most significant time of Jain immigration was in the early 1970s. The United States has since become a center of the Jain Diaspora. The Federation of Jain Associations in North America is an umbrella organization of local American and Canadian Jain congregations to preserve, practice, and promote Jainism and the Jain way of life.[98]

Front of the Stockton Sikh Temple, circa 1915. This wooden structure was replaced with a new building in 1929.

Sikh Center of San Francisco Bay Area, a Sikh Gurdwara in El Sobrante, California.

Sikhism is a religion originating from the Indian subcontinent which was introduced into the United States when, around the turn of the 20th century, Sikhs started emigrating to the United States in significant numbers to work on farms in California. They were the first community to come from India to the US in large numbers.[99] The first Sikh Gurdwara in America was built in Stockton, California, in 1912.[100] In 2007, there were estimated to be between 250,000 and 500,000 Sikhs living in the United States, with the largest populations living on the East and West Coasts, with additional populations in Detroit, Chicago, and Austin.[101][102]

The United States also has a number of non-Punjabi converts to Sikhism.[103]

In 2004 there were an estimated 56,000 Taoists in the US.[104] Taoism was popularized throughout the world through the writings and teachings of Lao Tzu and other Taoists as well as the practice of Qigong, Tai Chi Chuan and other Chinese martial arts.[105]

Atheism promoted on an electronic billboard in Times Square.

A 2001 survey directed by Dr. Ariela Keysar for the City University of New York indicated that, amongst the more than 100 categories of response, "no religious identification" had the greatest increase in population in both absolute and percentage terms. This category included atheists, agnostics, humanists, and others with no stated religious preferences. Figures are up from 14.3 million in 1990 to 34.2 million in 2008, representing an increase from 8% of the total population in 1990 to 15% in 2008.[58] A nationwide Pew Research study published in 2008 put the figure of unaffiliated persons at 16.1%,[96] while another Pew study published in 2012 was described as placing the proportion at about 20% overall and roughly 33% for the 18–29-year-old demographic.[106]

In a 2006 nationwide poll, University of Minnesota researchers found that despite an increasing acceptance of religious diversity, atheists were generally distrusted by other Americans, who trusted them less than Muslims, recent immigrants and other minority groups in "sharing their vision of American society". They also associated atheists with undesirable attributes such as amorality, criminal behavior, rampant materialism and cultural elitism.[107][108] However, the same study also reported that "The researchers also found acceptance or rejection of atheists is related not only to personal religiosity, but also to one's exposure to diversity, education and political orientation – with more educated, East and West Coast Americans more accepting of atheists than their Midwestern counterparts."[109] Some surveys have indicated that doubts about the existence of the divine were growing quickly among Americans under 30.[110]

On 24 March 2012, American atheists sponsored the Reason Rally in Washington, D.C., followed by the American Atheist Convention in Bethesda, Maryland. Organizers called the estimated crowd of 8,000–10,000 the largest-ever US gathering of atheists in one place.[111]

In the United States, Enlightenment philosophy (which itself was heavily inspired by deist ideals) played a major role in creating the principle of religious freedom, expressed in Thomas Jefferson's letters and included in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. American Founding Fathers, or Framers of the Constitution, who were especially noted for being influenced by such philosophy of deism include Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Cornelius Harnett, Gouverneur Morris, and Hugh Williamson. Their political speeches show distinct deistic influence. Other notable Founding Fathers may have been more directly deist. These include Thomas Paine, James Madison, possibly Alexander Hamilton, and Ethan Allen.[112]

Various polls have been conducted to determine Americans' actual beliefs regarding a god:

• In 2014 the Pew Research Center's Religious Landscape Study showed 63% of Americans believed in God and were "absolutely certain" in their view, while the figure rose to 89% including those who were agnostic.[113]
• A 2012 WIN-Gallup International poll showed that 5% of Americans considered themselves "convinced" atheists, which was a fivefold increase from the last time the survey was taken in 2005, and 5% said they did not know or else did not respond.[114]
• A 2012 Pew Research Center survey found that doubts about the existence of a god had grown among younger Americans, with 68% telling Pew they never doubt God's existence, a 15-point drop in five years. In 2007, 83% of American millennials said they never doubted God's existence.[110][115]
• A 2011 Gallup poll found 92% of Americans said yes to the basic question "Do you believe in God?", while 7% said no and 1% had no opinion.[116]
• A 2010 Gallup poll found 80% of Americans believe in a god, 12% believe in a universal spirit, 6% don't believe in either, 1% chose "other", and 1% had no opinion. 80% is a decrease from the 1940s, when Gallup first asked this question.
• A late 2009 online Harris poll of 2,303 U.S. adults (18 and older)[117] found that "82% of adult Americans believe in God", the same number as in two earlier polls in 2005 and 2007. Another 9% said they did not believe in God, and 9% said that they were not sure. It further concluded, "Large majorities also believe in miracles (76%), heaven (75%), that Jesus is God or the Son of God (73%), in angels (72%), the survival of the soul after death (71%), and in the resurrection of Jesus (70%). Less than half (45%) of adults believe in Darwin's theory of evolution but this is more than the 40% who believe in creationism..... Many people consider themselves Christians without necessarily believing in some of the key beliefs of Christianity. However, this is not true of born-again Christians. In addition to their religious beliefs, large minorities of adults, including many Christians, have "pagan" or pre-Christian beliefs such as a belief in ghosts, astrology, witches and reincarnation.... Because the sample is based on those who agreed to participate in the Harris Interactive panel, no estimates of theoretical sampling error can be calculated."
• A 2008 survey of 1,000 people concluded that, based on their stated beliefs rather than their religious identification, 69.5% of Americans believe in a personal God, roughly 12.3% of Americans are atheist or agnostic, and another 12.1% are deistic (believing in a higher power/non-personal God, but no personal God).[58]
• Mark Chaves, a Duke University professor of sociology, religion and divinity, found that 92% of Americans believed in God in 2008, but that significantly fewer Americans have great confidence in their religious leaders than a generation ago.[118]
• According to a 2008 ARIS survey, belief in God varies considerably by region. The lowest rate is in the West with 59% reporting a belief in God, and the highest rate is in the South at 86%.[119]

"Spiritual but not religious" (SBNR) is self-identified stance of spirituality that takes issue with organized religion as the sole or most valuable means of furthering spiritual growth. Spirituality places an emphasis upon the wellbeing of the "mind-body-spirit,"[120] so holistic activities such as tai chi, reiki, and yoga are common within the SBNR movement.[121] In contrast to religion, spirituality has often been associated with the interior life of the individual.[122]

One fifth of the US public and a third of adults under the age of 30 are reportedly unaffiliated with any religion, however they identify as being spiritual in some way. Of these religiously unaffiliated Americans, 37% classify themselves as spiritual but not religious.[123]

Bear Butte, in South Dakota, is a sacred site for over 30 Plains tribes.

Native American religions historically exhibited much diversity, and are often characterized by animism or panentheism.[124] The membership of Native American religions in the 21st century comprises about 9,000 people.[125]

Neopaganism in the United States is represented by widely different movements and organizations. The largest Neopagan religion is Wicca, followed by Neo-Druidism.[126][127] Other neopagan movements include Germanic Neopaganism, Celtic Reconstructionist Paganism, Hellenic Polytheistic Reconstructionism, and Semitic neopaganism.

According to the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS), there are approximately 30,000 druids in the United States.[128] Modern Druidism arrived in North America first in the form of fraternal Druidic organizations in the nineteenth century, and orders such as the Ancient Order of Druids in America were founded as distinct American groups as early as 1912. In 1963, the Reformed Druids of North America (RDNA) was founded by students at Carleton College, Northfield, Minnesota. They adopted elements of Neopaganism into their practices, for instance celebrating the festivals of the Wheel of the Year.[129]

Wicca advanced in North America in the 1960s by Raymond Buckland, an expatriate Briton who visited Gardner's Isle of Man coven to gain initiation.[130] Universal Eclectic Wicca was popularized in 1969 for a diverse membership drawing from both Dianic and British Traditional Wiccan backgrounds.[131]

Nordic Paganism is the umbrella term for polytheistic followers of the Proto-Norse period religions involving the Nordic pantheon of gods. This pantheon includes gods such as the Æsir; Odin, Thor, Loki, Sif, Heimdallr, Baldr, and Týr, as well as goddesses that include Vanir; Freyja, Freyr, Njörðr, and Nerthus. The followers of Nordic Paganism include Odinists, Tyrists, Lokians, Asatru, and practitioners of Seiðr, among other varying followers. Nordic Pagans follow the teachings of the Hávamál. This old text, along with the Prose Edda and Poetic Edda, gives the basis for Norse mythology, stories, legends, and beliefs.

Norse mythology is portrayed in popular culture and Nordic symbols and teachings are also used by many white supremacy groups. This use has prompted some prisons to ban the wearing of these symbols, such as Mjölnir, by inmates due to their gang affiliation.

Church of the Holy City in Washington, D.C. is tied to the New Church.

A group of churches which started in the 1830s in the United States is known under the banner of "New Thought". These churches share a spiritual, metaphysical and mystical predisposition and understanding of the Bible and were strongly influenced by the Transcendentalist movement, particularly the work of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Another antecedent of this movement was Swedenborgianism, founded on the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg in 1787.[132] The New Thought concept was named by Emma Curtis Hopkins ("teacher of teachers") after Hopkins broke off from Mary Baker Eddy's Church of Christ, Scientist. The movement had been previously known as the Mental Sciences or the Christian Sciences. The three major branches are Religious Science, Unity Church and Divine Science.

Sign on a UU church in Rochester, Minnesota. The denomination stems from the original Congregationalism of the Pilgrim Fathers.

Unitarian Universalists (UUs) are among the most liberal of all religious denominations in America.[133] The shared creed includes beliefs in inherent dignity, a common search for truth, respect for beliefs of others, compassion, and social action.[134] They are unified by their shared search for spiritual growth and by the understanding that an individual's theology is a result of that search and not obedience to an authoritarian requirement.[135] UUs have historical ties to anti-war, civil rights, and LGBT rights movements,[136] as well as providing inclusive church services for the broad spectrum of liberal Christians, liberal Jews, secular humanists, LGBT, Jewish-Christian parents and partners, Earth-centered/Wicca, and Buddhist meditation adherents.[137]

Former New York City headquarters of the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society run by Jehovah's Witnesses

The First Church of Christ, Scientist in Boston, Massachusetts

• Pentecostalism – movement which emphasizes the role of the Holy Spirit, finds its historic roots in the Azusa Street Revival in Los Angeles from 1904 to 1906, sparked by Charles Parham. It is estimated to have over 279 million followers worldwide, many in Africa and South America.[138]
• Adventism – began as an inter-denominational movement. Its most vocal leader was William Miller, who in the 1830s in New York became convinced of an imminent Second Coming of Jesus. The most prominent modern group to emerge from this is the Seventh-day Adventists.
• The Latter Day Saint movement founded in 1830 by Joseph Smith in upstate New York – a product of the Christian revivalist movement of the Second Great Awakening and based in Christian primitivism. Multiple Latter Day Saint denominations can be found throughout the United States. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), the largest denomination, is headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, and it has members in many countries. The Community of Christ, the second-largest denomination, is headquartered in Independence, Missouri. Worldwide they claim about 15 million members.
• Jehovah's Witnesses – originated with the religious movement known as Bible Students, which was founded in Pennsylvania in the late 1870s by Charles Taze Russell. In their early years, the Bible Students were loosely connected with Adventism, and the Jehovah's Witnesses still share some similarities with it. They claim about 7.69 million active members worldwide.
• Christian Science – founded by Mary Baker Eddy in the late 19th century. The church claims some 400,000 members worldwide.
• Churches of Christ/Disciples of Christ – a restoration movement with no governing body. The Restoration Movement solidified as a historical phenomenon in 1832 when restorationists from two major movements championed by Barton W. Stone and Alexander Campbell merged. It has an estimated 3 million followers worldwide.
• Metropolitan Community Church – founded by Troy Perry in Los Angeles, 1968.
• Unitarianism Developed out of the Congregational Churches. In 1825 the American Unitarian Association was formed in Boston, MA.
• Universalist Church of America's first regional conference was founded in 1793.

Church of Scientology building in Los Angeles, California

• International Society for Krishna Consciousness(ISKCON) or Hare Krishna movement was founded in 1966 in New York City by A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada.It preaches Gaudiya Vaishnavism, a sect of Hinduism[139][140]
• New Thought Movement – two of the early proponents of New Thought beliefs during the mid to late 19th century were Phineas Parkhurst Quimby and the Mother of New Thought, Emma Curtis Hopkins. The three major branches are Religious Science, Unity Church and Divine Science.
• Scientology – founded by L. Ron Hubbard in 1954. Numbers estimated from a few tens of thousands to 15 million (latter is the religion's estimation in 2004).
• Reconstructionist Judaism – founded by Mordecai Kaplan and started in the 1920s.
• Native American Church – founded by Quanah Parker beginning in the 1890s and incorporating in 1918. An estimated 250,000 followers.
• Nation of Islam – a sect of Islam, created and followed predominantly by African-Americans.
• Church of Satan – founded in San Francisco in 1966 by Anton LaVey.
• Eckankar – founded in Las Vegas in 1965 by Paul Twitchell.
• Self-Realization Fellowship - founded in Los Angeles by Paramahansa Yogananda in 1920.
• Unitarian Universalist Association in 1961 from the consolidation of the American Unitarian Association and the Universalist Church of America. Historically Christian denominations, the UUA is no longer Christian and is the largest Unitarian Universalist denomination in the world.

In 2016, a poll by the Public Religion Research Institute estimated that 69% of the Americans are Christians, with 45% professing attendance at a variety of churches that could be considered Protestant, and 20% professing Catholic beliefs. The same study says that other non-Christian religions (including Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam) collectively make up about 7% of the population.[22]

Percentage of Americans by religious identification (1948–2017)[199]

     Protestantism      Catholicism      Christian (nonspecified)      Mormonism      Jewish      Other      None      no answer

Church, synagogue, or mosque attendance by state (2014)

A 2013 Public Religion Research Institute survey reported that 31% of Americans attend religious services at least weekly.[200]

In a 2009 Gallup International survey, 41.6%[201] of American residents stated that they attended a church, synagogue, or mosque once a week or almost every week. This percentage is higher than other surveyed Western countries.[202][203] Church attendance varies considerably by state and region. The figures, updated to 2014, ranged from 51% in Utah to 17% in Vermont.

When it comes to mosque attendance specifically, data collected by a 2017 poll by the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding (ISPU) shows that American Muslim women and men attend the mosque at similar rates (45% for men and 35% for women).[77] Additionally, when compared to the general public looking at the attendance of religious services, young Muslim Americans attend the mosque at closer rates to older Muslim Americans. Muslim Americans who regularly attend mosques are more likely to work with their neighbors to solve community problems (49 vs. 30 percent), be registered to vote (74 vs. 49 percent), and plan to vote (92 vs. 81 percent). Overall, “there is no correlation between Muslim attitudes toward violence and their frequency of mosque attendance".[77]

Weekly church attendance by state[204]

Rank	State	Percent
1	Utah	51%
2	Mississippi	47%
3	Alabama	46%
4	Louisiana	46%
5	Arkansas	45%
6	South Carolina	42%
7	Tennessee	42%
8	Kentucky	41%
9	North Carolina	40%
10	Georgia	39%
11	Texas	39%
12	Oklahoma	39%
13	New Mexico	36%
14	Nebraska	35%
15	Indiana	35%
16	Virginia	35%
17	Delaware	35%
18	Missouri	35%
19	Idaho	34%
20	West Virginia	34%
21	Arizona	33%
22	Kansas	33%
23	Michigan	32%
24	Ohio	32%
25	Illinois	32%
26	North Dakota	32%
27	Pennsylvania	32%
28	Iowa	32%
29	Florida	32%
30	Maryland	31%
31	South Dakota	31%
32	Minnesota	31%
33	New Jersey	30%
34	Wisconsin	29%
35	Rhode Island	28%
36	Wyoming	28%
37	California	28%
38	New York	27%
39	Nevada	27%
40	Montana	27%
41	Alaska	26%
42	Connecticut	25%
43	Colorado	25%
44	Hawaii	25%
45	Oregon	24%
46	Washington	24%
47	District of Columbia	23%
48	Massachusetts	22%
49	Maine	20%
50	New Hampshire	20%
51	Vermont	17%

The following is the percentage of Christians and all religions in the U.S. territories as of 2010:[5][205][206][207][208][209][210][211]

Territory	Percent Christian	Percent all religions
American Samoa	98.3%	99.3%
Northern Mariana Islands	81.3%	99%
Guam	94.2%	98.3%
Puerto Rico	89%	98.1%
US Virgin Islands	94.8%	96.3%

In 2018 The Institute for Social Policy and Understanding published an important study that examined the sentiments of various american faith populations on a variety of issues, focused primarily around ideas of violent extremism, religious pluralism and islamophobia. Their results found that majority of americans, across faith groups, do hold balanced views on Islam and Muslims, and also highlighted the shared sentiments of Muslim and Jewish communities on many of the questions, and the gaps identified between the Evangelical Christians polled and the other members of the study.[212]

The following graph shows data across six different faith populations in the United States, and their answers to the two questions below. (Note: "W. Evang." is short for White Evangelical, the specific demographic surveyed.):

Question 1: Some people think that for the military to target and kill civilians is sometimes justified, while others think that this kind of violence is never justified. Which is your opinion?

Question 2: Some people think that for an individual or a small group of people to target and kill civilians is sometimes justified, while others think that this kind of violence is never justified. Which is your opinion?

The following graph contains additional data collected by ISPU during their 2018 poll. The following statements were posed to participants and they were asked to answer on a scale from strongly agree to strongly disagree. The chart below shows the total percentage from each American faith demographic that agreed with the statements below. (Note: "W. Evang." is short for White Evangelical, the specific demographic surveyed.)

Question 1: I want to live in a country where no one is targeted for their religious idenitity

Question 2: The negative things politicians say regarding Muslims is harmful to our country

Question 3: Most Muslims living in the United States are committed to the wellbeing of America

Question 4: Most people associate negative stereotypes with my faith identity

• Buck, Christopher (2009). Religious myths and visions of America: how minority faiths redefined America's world role. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger Publishers. ISBN 978-0-313-35959-0..
• Richard Dawkins, "Secularism, the Founding Fathers and the religion of America", in The God Delusion, Black Swan, 2007 (ISBN 978-0-552-77429-1).
• De La Torre, Miguel A., Encyclopedia on Hispanic American Religious Culture 2 vol, ABC-CLIO Publishers, 2009.
• FitzGerald, Thomas (2007). "Eastern Christianity in the United States". The Blackwell Companion to Eastern Christianity. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing. pp. 269–279. ISBN 9780470766392.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Gaustad, Edwin (1962). "Historical atlas of religion in America". Harper & Row. Cite journal requires |journal= (help)CS1 maint: ref=harv (link).
• Gordon, Melton, J. Encyclopedia of American Religions (7th ed. Thomson, 2003) 1408pp
• Hill, Samuel S., Charles H. Lippy, and Charles Reagan Wilson, eds. Encyclopedia of Religion in the South (2005)
• Lippy, Charles H., ed. Encyclopedia of the American Religious Experience (3 vol Scribners, 1988)
• National Council of the Churches of Christ. Yearbook of American Churches: 2010 (2010)
• Putnam, Robert D., and David E Campbell American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us (2010) excerpt and text search
• Queen, Edward L. et al. eds, Encyclopedia of American Religious History (3rd ed. 3 vol, Facts on File, 2009)

• Goff, Philip, ed. The Blackwell Companion to Religion in America (2010) online; 43 essays by scholars