The narrative about Christianity in the U.S. is shifting, with a recent Pew Research Center survey revealing the Christian population has stabilized after years of decline, particularly among young adults. While 62% of American adults identify as Christians, this is down from 90% in the early 1990s. The growth of religiously unaffiliated individuals, previously a steady trend, has also leveled off. Researchers suggest that the current data indicate a potential ceiling for nonreligiosity, as many who might leave organized religion have already done so. Additionally, a significant majority believe in a soul or a higher power, indicating a complex spiritual landscape.
For many years, social scientists, demographers, and Christians have repeated a well-known narrative regarding Christianity in the United States: the nation was undergoing a swift secularization process. The Christian demographic was diminishing, on the verge of becoming a minority faith. While America may have been trailing Europe in this transition, its churches were increasingly emptying.
However, this narrative may be undergoing a transformation.
Following years of decline, recent data suggests that the Christian population in the United States has stabilized, a change partly driven by young adults, as noted in a significant new survey from the Pew Research Center. Additionally, the rise in religiously unaffiliated Americans, previously observed for years, has also plateaued.
“We are entering a new phase of the American religious landscape,” commented Ryan Burge, a political scientist at Eastern Illinois University who was not part of the Pew survey. The “nones” — individuals in the American population who report having no religious affiliation — have been increasing for decades. “Now that growth has either slowed or completely halted,” Dr. Burge remarked, “and that’s a significant development.”
These findings stem from the Religious Landscape Survey, which gathered data from over 35,000 randomly selected adults across the nation during 2023 and 2024. The last survey was released in 2014, making this new iteration a substantial update in understanding American spiritual beliefs and practices.
The survey reveals that 62 percent of adults in the United States self-identify as Christians, with 40 percent identifying as Protestant and 19 percent as Catholic.
Overall, this indicates a decrease in the proportion of Christians since the survey’s initial publication in 2007. As recently as the early 1990s, nine out of ten adults identified as Christian. Nearly 30 percent of adults participating in the new survey classify themselves as religiously unaffiliated, while 7 percent associate with a religion other than Christianity.
“In the long run, it’s a narrative of decline in American religion,” remarked Gregory Smith, a senior associate director of research at Pew. “However, the short-term tells a different story, one of stability over the past four or five years.”
The scenario of this stabilization is complex, but one contributing factor is the youngest group of adults surveyed. The initial two editions of the survey indicated that each successive age group has become increasingly less Christian than the one before it. For instance, 80 percent of those born in the 1940s and earlier now identify as Christians, compared to 75 percent of those born in the 1950s and 73 percent of those born in the 1960s.
Interestingly, participants in the youngest cohort of the new survey, born between 2000 and 2006, seem to defy this trend. Though they are still less likely than average to identify as Christian, and significantly less so than older Americans, they appear no less religious than those in the next oldest group, born in the 1990s.
Additionally, the youngest survey participants exhibited other noteworthy characteristics. The disparity in religiosity between men and women is much smaller than in older generations. Typically, women demonstrate higher levels of religiosity than men across various metrics. This pattern is so persistent across time, geography, and culture that some scholars view it as a fundamental aspect of human experience. In Pew’s older cohorts, for instance, women are 20 percentage points more likely than men to report praying daily.
However, among 18- to 24-year-olds in Pew’s survey, the gender gap is minimal or entirely absent when it comes to daily prayer, religious identification, and belief in God.
“It’s not a complete reversal, but the fact that it’s narrowing is significant,” stated David Campbell, a political scientist at the University of Notre Dame who did not participate in the survey.
Dr. Campbell speculated that this convergence may have political roots. With Christianity becoming increasingly associated with conservative political movements, identifying as a Christian has also come to symbolize conservative identity.
“If you’re a young white male today and identify as conservative, then being religious is part of that self-image,” he remarked.
The survey was conducted prior to President Trump’s re-election and the ensuing “vibe shift” noted by numerous religious conservatives, marking a rightward shift that incorporates celebrity conversions and a backlash from Silicon Valley against progressivism. Nevertheless, the Pew survey confirms that politically conservative and liberal individuals are on significantly different religious paths. The proportion of self-identified liberals who identify as Christian has decreased by 25 points since 2007. Just over a third of liberals now call themselves Christians, while more than half report having no religious affiliation.
In contrast, among conservatives, the decline in Christian identity has been much less pronounced, decreasing from 89 percent to 82 percent.
The Census Bureau does not inquire about religious affiliation, making Pew’s extensive and rigorous survey an essential tool for academics, journalists, and the public. This latest survey is the largest of the three that have been conducted to date.
“It’s challenging to overstate the significance” of this survey to understanding American religious dynamics, Dr. Campbell emphasized.
Researchers remind us that this data does not indicate a genuine reversal in the decline of Christianity, nor does it guarantee that the plateau will persist. Young adults are still notably less religious than older generations, suggesting that they will likely lower the average religiosity over time. There is little likelihood that the current cohort of young adults will become more religious as they age.
Yet, some experts argue that most individuals inclined to leave a religion have likely already done so, hinting at a potential upper limit of nonreligiosity in the United States.
“The ‘nones’ have explored the easiest portions of the market, and now they are reaching the foundational level of committed evangelicals” and theological traditionalists from other faiths, said Dr. Burge, who also served as a pastor in an American Baptist church for 17 years. Moving forward, “if you wish to make strides, advancements must occur among conservatives.”
Regardless of how many Americans claim affiliation with specific religions or none in the future, the survey illustrates a fundamentally spiritual populace. Over 80 percent of participants believe that humans possess a soul or spirit in addition to their physical form and have faith in God or a universal spirit.
Most journeys toward faith are deeply personal.
Justin Springhart, 32, began attending Orlando Grace Church in Florida, a non-denominational church, a few years back after having distanced himself from religion. Following his brother’s death due to a drug overdose, he realized he was so emotionally shut off that he couldn’t even cry during the funeral.
When his personal trainer invited him to a church service, he felt an immediate sense of belonging upon entering.
“It just felt like this is where I need to be to grow as a man, to grow in Christ, and to develop as a leader,” Mr. Springhart expressed. “As someone who couldn’t weep at his own brother’s funeral, I find myself weeping over the depth of my God’s love for me.”