News

Christians in decline, nones on the rise

The United States is a significantly less Christian country than it was seven years ago. That’s the top finding in the Pew Research Center’s report, America’s Changing Religious Land­scape, released May 12.

This trend “is big, it’s broad, and it’s everywhere,” said Alan Cooperman, Pew’s director of religion research.

Christianity still dominates American religious identity (71 percent), but the survey shows dramatic shifts as more people move out of denominations. Atheists and agnostics have nearly doubled their share of the religious marketplace, and overall indifference to religion is rising as well.