Who is Secular in the World Today?
Holly sent me this link yesterday. Go check it out for yourselves. From the website of Trinity College:
WHO IS SECULAR IN THE WORLD TODAY?
A SymposiumA special pullout supplement to the Fall 2006 edition of Religion in the News (Volume 9, No. 2). It features nine articles contributed by international scholars on what it means to be “secular” in the world today. The pieces included are:
1. Introduction by Barry A. Kosmin
2. “Secular Americans: Freethinkers in a Free Market”
by Ariela Keysar and Barry A. Kosmin3. “Understanding American ‘Nots’” by Frank Pasquale
4. “Is Anyone in Canada Secular?” by William A. Stahl
5. “Secularity in Great Britain” by David Voas
6. “Laicite and Secular Attitudes in France” by Nathalie Caron
7. “Secularism: The Case of Denmark” by Lars Dencik
8. “Secularism in India” by Asghar Ali Engineer
9. “The Secular Israeli Jewish Identity” by Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi
10. “Secularism in Iran: A Hidden Agenda?” by an Iranian scholar
I am afraid that I did not have the time to read every article yet. I read three of them, though, and I found it to be very interesting. Tomorrow I will have more time to read the articles and comment on it in length, but I wanted to share it immediately with you all.
From the article Secular Americans: Freethinkers in a Free Market of Religion:
The actual size of the secular population is open to interpretation according to the criteria one considers relevant for measuring or identifying secularity among the public. It can be claimed to be anywhere from 1 percent to 46 percent of Americans according to whether the criteria are strict and limited to atheists and agnostics or inclusive of anyone unaffiliated with a religious congregation.
One obvious social manifestation of secularity is being distant from or out of touch with religion. This can be measured by a lack of affiliation with organized religion. The causes or reasons for this unwillingness or inability to “belong� can vary widely from ideological attitudes to physical access issues. Nevertheless, the actual population of those who do not presently “belong� to a religious congregation or institution is very large. ARIS found that 46 percent of American adults or nearly 100 million people did not regard themselves as or claim to be members of a religious group in 2001.
An alternative measure of “belonging� with which to identify the non-religious population is the response to the key ARIS question on religious identification, what is your religion, if any? The responses that we categorized as “No Religion� amounted to 14 percent of the national adult population or 29.5 million people. The most common “secular� response, given by 13 percent of the population, was “None.� An additional 1 percent offered a “positive secular� response. The actual estimates were 991,000 Agnostics, 902,000 Atheists, 53,000 Secular (so stated), and 49,000 Humanists. In addition, over 5 percent of the sample, amounting to over 11 million adults, refused to answer the question. As we state in our book, there are indications to show that this group was mainly irreligious; certainly it did not feel a compelling need to assert a religious identity. This means we can identify a “No Faith� population of adults who either professed no religion or refused to answer the question amounting to 19 percent of adult Americans or over 40 million persons. The accompanying map clearly illustrates that there is a regional dimension to this social phenomenon.
The map:
More information:
If one counts as seculars those who have a secular or somewhat secular outlook and say they have no religion, then more than one in five adult Americans can be included. That amounts to around 46 million individuals. Interestingly, some corroborating statistics for the size of the secular population have recently appeared in a Gallup Poll on attitudes to the Bible. It found that 19 percent of Americans thought the Bible was a “collection of fables.”
Ariela Keysar and Barry Kosmin go on to write that ‘the seculars’ are highly independent: not just religion-wise, but also regarding politics. They are reluctant to join institutions, whether those institutions are religious or political. If the secular part of America’s population continues to grow, it will make it more and more difficult for either political party to focus on its own ‘base’, since ‘the base’ would be a too small part of the entire population.
Again, go check it out for yourself: I will read more articles tomorrow and I will comment on it then.
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5 Responses to “Who is Secular in the World Today?”
It seems from the map that the West is the most secular part of the country. I wonder if that correlates with the more libertarian character of the western states.
Kind of interesting to see Colorado a black state in a sea of gray and white. I’m currently reading “the God delusion”, a book that states that many Atheists are “closet” atheists because of all the negative feelings that are mounted upon the term. That is, they may not have faith, but they refuse to call themselves “atheists” because it’s a dirty word. And it is a dirty word. Let’s assume that there are millions of atheists in the US, not a crazy thing to think. I’ll bet you they outnumber Jews. And yet Jews have elected representatives, Jews are elected in places where much of the electorate isn’t even Jewish. How many openly non-religious representatives or senators do we have? (hint: none).
Even a persons stated religious faith is not necessarily indicative of being a practicing religious person. Spain for instance is considered 80% catholic, and yet 60% approve of gay marriage, an even greater percentage support keeping abortion legal and the vast majority of young people have no plans to stay virgins until marriage if they can help it. A very common thing I hear from other young people is “I believe in God, but not in the Church” this basically translates to “I believe in God, but have no plans on following the traditional rules”. They are more theists than Catholics, but if you ask them, they’ll probably say their Catholic.
Very good point Lynx.
I just find it intersting that, according to the map, less than 20% of the folks living in lake Michigan are religious. If I was living in the lake this winter I’d sure be praying for divine intervention.
A lot of people that I know belong to a church, not because they are serious about each and every church teaching, but because they wish to belong to a community that stresses spirituality. The material world can seem like a cold and empty place.
It’s also a help in child rearing to have the preacher back up what mon and dad are saying about ‘right’ and ‘wrong’.
In cases like mine, when many generations of our family have been of the same faith, attending church and observing the rites is as much about honoring and enjoying family traditions as it is about deep felt beliefs.
I can see that the questions in a questionnaire would mean different things to different people.