Most Americans believe in karma, hell and devil; organised religion finds few takers: Poll
The number of people identifying themselves as only Christian has also significantly dropped
A recent poll has revealed that a third of Americans now don’t prefer to associate themselves with any religion.
Meanwhile, the number of people identifying themselves as only Christian has also significantly dropped,in comparison to previous such polls.
The poll was conducted by Associated Press-NORC between May 11 and 15.
The poll found that 30 per cent of Americans said they were agnostic, atheist or “nothing in particular,” and have no religious affiliation. This was 8 per cent higher than observed in a 2021 poll which pegged the figure at 22 per cent.
Confidence in organised religion on the decline
According to the data, the percentage of Americans identifying as "Just Christian" decreased from 21 per cent in October 2021 to 18 per cent in May 2023. Similarly, the number of Americans identifying as Protestant declined from 26 per cent to 25 per cent during the same period.
The May 2023 AP-NORC poll also revealed a rise in the percentage of Americans who have "hardly any confidence at all" in individuals leading organised religion, increasing from 37 per cent in 2020 to 44 per cent in 2023. These figures are even higher than those recorded in 2017 (32 per cent) and 2016 (24 per cent).
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Other findings from the survey include 55 per cent of respondents stating they do not consider themselves religious due to their dislike of organised religion.
Majority believe in karma
Moreover, a significant 63 per cent expressed belief in karma, the concept that one's actions have consequences in this life or the next.
Furthermore, a majority of respondents believed in hell (58 per cent) and the devil (56 per cent). Additionally, 33 per cent of participants did not identify as religious because they do not believe in God, while 55 per cent cited their disagreement with the political or social stances of religious faiths as the reason for not considering themselves religious.
The May 2023 poll collected responses from 1,680 adults representing all 50 US states and the District of Columbia, with a margin of sampling error of 3.4 percentage points.
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