We were always told not to discuss politics or religion, but here we have both. We can’t help but be interested how the religious believers and elections may or may not influence an election.
Professor Ryan P. Burge of Eastern Illinois University, has been using 2018 data from the General Social Survey to show the latest faith-related trends in the United States.
He has posted the change in the religious makeup of the two major political parties.
Burge shows who made up the parties every 10 years beginning in 1978.
Here are the Democrats:
You will notice the evangelicals (blue, on the left) are shrinking, from 22% of the party in 1978 to 14% today. Mainline Protestants are cut in half. Catholics have lost some numbers as well.
The biggest increase over the past 50 years is that Americans with no organized religion have tripled in numbers, from 9% in 1978 to 28% today.
“Nones” are the largest single group in the Democratic Party.
How about the Republicans?
You might think there would be a decline in “Nones” as time passed and there would be a wild increase of growth for evangelicals.
It’s surprising, the evangelical growth is only slight… 25% (in 1978) to 33% today.
Evangelicals make up only a third of the GOP today.
The Mainline Protestants are becoming something of an endangered species, bordering on extinction.
As for the “Nones”, they became a bigger number over time, going from 5% of GOP voters to 14%.
We might want to mention, the “Nones” simply might mean they don’t belong to organized religion, or maybe they are Atheists or Agnostic.
Overall, Church membership has decreased over the years as illustrated below:
