Survey: Barna releases year-end observations for 2009

CA – The Barna Group has just released four themes they see from their research in 2009.  Barna Research Group was founded by George and Nancy Barna in 1984. As a marketing research firm, it primarily served Christian ministries, non-profit organizations and various media and financial corporations. During its quarter century of service, TBG has carefully and strategically tracked the role of faith in America, developing the nation’s most comprehensive database on spiritual indicators.

Theme 1: Increasingly, Americans are more interested in faith and spirituality than in Christianity.
“Faith remains a hot topic in America these days,” George Barna commented, expanding on the theme. “Politicians, athletes, cultural philosophers, teachers, entertainers, musicians – nearly everyone has something to say about faith, religion, spirituality, morality, and belief these days. But as the fundamental values and assumptions of our nation continue to shift, so do our ideas about faith and spirituality. Many of our basic assumptions are no longer firm or predictable.

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“Our studies consistently demonstrate – as explained in unChristian, the book by my colleague, David Kinnaman – that being a Christian or associating with the Christian faith is not as attractive to Americans as it used to be…

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Some of the related survey results Barna cited from this year’s studies included:

• Just 50% of adults contend that Christianity is still the automatic faith of choice in the US
• Nearly nine out of every ten adults (88%) agreed either strongly or somewhat that their religious faith is very important in their life
• 74% said their faith is becoming more important in their life
• Substantive awareness of other faith groups is minimal; even simple name awareness of some groups, such as Wicca, is tiny (only 45% have heard of Wicca)
• Most self-identified Christians are comfortable with the idea that the Bible and the sacred books from non-Christian religions all teach the same truths and principles
• Half of all adults (50%) argue that a growing number of people they know are tired of having the same church experience

Theme 2: Faith in the American context is now individual and customized. Americans are comfortable with an altered spiritual experience as long as they can participate in the shaping of that faith experience.

“Now that we are comfortable with the idea of being spiritual as opposed to devoutly Christian,” Barna pointed out, “Americans typically draw from a broad treasury of moral, spiritual and ethical sources of thought to concoct a uniquely personal brand of faith. Feeling freed from the boundaries established by the Christian faith, and immersed in a postmodern society which revels in participation, personal expression, satisfying relationships, and authentic experiences, we become our own unchallenged spiritual authorities, defining truth and reality as we see fit.”

Some of the survey findings that related to this theme included:

• About half of all adults (45%) say they are willing to try a new church or even a new form of church
• 71% say they will develop their own slate of religious beliefs rather than accept a package of beliefs promoted by a church or denomination
• Barely one-third of self-identified Christians (36%) strongly agree that it is important for followers of Christ to maintain positive relationships with people who are not Christians
• Two-thirds of adults (64%) are willing to experience and express their faith in new or different environments or structures than they have in the past
• Only one-third (34%) believe in absolute moral truth

Theme 3: Biblical literacy is neither a current reality nor a goal in the U.S.

Barna’s findings related to Bible knowledge and application indicate that little progress, if any, is being made toward assisting people to become more biblically literate.

“Bible reading has become the religious equivalent of sound-bite journalism. When people read from the Bible they typically open it, read a brief passage without much regard for the context, and consider the primary thought or feeling that the passage provided. If they are comfortable with it, they accept it; otherwise, they deem it interesting but irrelevant to their life, and move on. There is shockingly little growth evident in people’s understanding of the fundamental themes of the scriptures and amazingly little interest in deepening their knowledge and application of biblical principles.

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Some of the survey-based results that led Barna to his conclusions included the following:

• Less than one out of every five born again adults (19%) has a biblical worldview, which is unchanged in the past 15 years
• Just half of all self-identified Christians firmly believe that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles (not the facts, just the principles) that it teaches
• Barely one-quarter of adults (27%) are confident that Satan exists
• An overwhelming majority of self-identified Christians (81%) contend that spiritual maturity is achieved by following the rules in the Bible

Theme 4: Effective and periodic measurement of spirituality – conducted personally or through a church – is not common at this time and it is not likely to become common in the near future.

“There are two levels on which evaluation of where we stand spiritually can take place,” noted the California-based author. “There can be external measurement, such as that conducted by pastors, teachers, coaches or peers, and there can be self-evaluation. At the moment, we’re seeing very little of either form of review related to a person’s spiritual condition.

“Not surprisingly,” he continued, “our research found that a majority of churchgoing adults are uncertain as to what their church would define as a ‘healthy, spiritually mature follower of Christ’ and they were no more likely to have personally developed a clear notion of such a life.

“It may well be that spiritual evaluation is so uncommon because people fear that the results might suggest the need for different growth strategies or for more aggressive engagement in the growth process. No matter what the underlying reason is, the bottom line among both the clergy and laity was indifference toward their acknowledged lack of evaluation. That suggests there is not likely to be much change in this dimension in the immediate future. In other words, as we examine the discipleship landscape, what we see is what we get – and what we will keep getting for some time.”

(Source: The Barna Group – The Barna Group (which includes its research division, Barna Research Group) was started in 1984 by George Barna. It is a private, non-partisan, for-profit organization that conducts primary research on a wide range of issues and products, produces resources pertaining to cultural change, leadership and spiritual development, and facilitates the healthy spiritual growth of leaders, children, families and Christian ministries. Located in Ventura, California, Barna conducts and analyzes primary research to understand cultural trends related to values, beliefs, attitudes and behaviors. If you would like to receive free e-mail notification of the release of each new, bi-monthly update on the latest research findings from The Barna Group, you may subscribe to this free service at the Barna website (www.barna.org). Additional research-based resources, both free and at discounted prices, are also available through that website.)

Study: The State of religion…

WASHINGTON - Mississippi is the America’s most religious state, according to a Pew Forum study on the levels of devotion in America, which asked respondents whether religion is important in their lives. Eighty-two percent of Mississipians said ‘yes’ compared to 47% of Wisconsinites. The combined populations of New Hampshire/Vermont ranked last in the survey.

“That is not too surprising,” said William F. Lawhead, chairman of the religion and philosophy department at the University of Mississippi. “This is the Bible Belt. We are primarily made up of small towns . . . so most of the people are homegrown.”

The state is overwhelmingly Christian, he added, although an influx of Vietnamese immigrants who are involved in the state’s coastal fishing industry has brought in Buddhist adherents.

Alabama and Arkansas (both at 74 percent), Louisiana (72 percent), Tennessee (71 percent) and South Carolina (70 percent) follow. Noted among the least-religious with New Hampshire and Vermont are Alaska (37 percent) and Massachusetts (40 percent), which confirms other recent surveys that say New England is the “new Northwest” in terms of unchurched multitudes.

The Pacific Northwest used to be the country’s least-churched sector, but Oregon (seventh from the bottom at 46 percent) and Washington (11th from the bottom at 48 percent), have risen in the rankings.

The poll was released Monday (Dec 21, 2009) with data drawn from the Forum’s 2007 U.S. Religious Landscape Survey of 35,556 U.S. residents. It has an error margin of 0.6 percent.

The Survey

Respondents were asked four questions about:

1.  the importance of religion in their lives
2. their frequency of attendance at worship services
3. frequency of daily prayer
4. and absolute certainty of belief in God.

Mississippi polled highest on all four questions.  On the attendance question, 33% of Wisconsinites stated that they attend religious services weekly.   Mississippians polled at 60 percent.  Heavily Mormon Utah (57 percent) placed second with South Carolina (54 percent) rounding the top three.

Alaska is at the bottom of this list, with only 22 percent of respondents saying they attend weekly. New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine polled next highest at 23 percent.

Ed Vatagliano, research director for the American Family Association in Tupelo, pointed out that Mississippi’s 3 million residents are more likely to have been raised in church.  “Part of it is tradition,” he said. “My kids and all their friends are in church on Sunday. That’s the expectation. If you are a politician down here, you’re expected to have a church track record.”

On the question about frequency of daily prayer, Wisconsin ranked 38th with 49% indicating tha they pray at least once daily.  Mississippi occupied the top spot at 77 percent, followed by Louisiana at 76 percent and Alabama at 73 percent. Maine, at 40 percent, occupied the lowest rung, followed by Massachusetts and Alaska, each at 41 percent.

The fourth question, measuring percentage of those who believe in God, had Wisconsin at 34 with 68% answering ‘yes’ when asked whether they had absolute certainty in their beliefe in God.  Mississipians again ranked at the top at 91 percent, followed by South Carolina and Alabama at 86 percent. States with the lowest belief in God are New Hampshire and Vermont at 54 percent and Connecticut and Rhode Island at 57 percent.

For more details and information on this survey and the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life, visit http://pewforum.org/docs/?DocID=504.

(Soource: Pew Reserach Center)

STUDY: Prayer boosts forgiveness

CANADA - The power of prayer has long been controversial, but a new study in a leading psychological journal finds some of the first scientific evidence that it truly works – at least on the person doing the praying.

Study: Mapping the global Muslim population

WASH DC — A comprehensive demographic study of more than 200 countries finds that there are 1.57 billion Muslims of all ages living in the world today, representing 23% of an estimated 2009 world population of 6.8 billion.

While Muslims are found on all five inhabited continents, more than 60% of the global Muslim population is in Asia and about 20% is in the Middle East and North Africa. However, the Middle East-North Africa region has the highest percentage of Muslim-majority countries. Indeed, more than half of the 20 countries and territories¹ in that region have populations that are approximately 95% Muslim or greater.

More than 300 million Muslims, or one-fifth of the world’s Muslim population, live in countries where Islam is not the majority religion. These minority Muslim populations are often quite large. India, for example, has the third-largest population of Muslims worldwide. China has more Muslims than Syria, while Russia is home to more Muslims than Jordan and Libya combined.

Of the total Muslim population, 10-13% are Shia Muslims and 87-90% are Sunni Muslims. Most Shias (between 68% and 80%) live in just four countries: Iran, Pakistan, India and Iraq.

These are some of the key findings of Mapping the Global Muslim Population: A Report on the Size and Distribution of the World’s Muslim Population, a new study by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life. The report offers the most up-to-date and fully sourced estimates of the size and distribution of the worldwide Muslim population, including sectarian identity.

Previously published estimates of the size of the global Muslim population have ranged widely, from 1 billion to 1.8 billion.² But these commonly quoted estimates often have appeared without citations to specific sources or explanations of how the figures were generated.

The Pew Forum report is based on the best available data for 232 countries and territories. Pew Forum researchers, in consultation with nearly 50 demographers and social scientists at universities and research centers around the world, acquired and analyzed about 1,500 sources, including census reports, demographic studies and general population surveys, to arrive at these figures – the largest project of its kind to date. (See Methodology for more detail.)

The Pew Forum’s estimate of the Shia population (10-13%) is in keeping with previous estimates, which generally have been in the range of 10-15%. Some previous estimates, however, have placed the number of Shias at nearly 20% of the world’s Muslim population.³ Readers should bear in mind that the figures given in this report for the Sunni and Shia populations are less precise than the figures for the overall Muslim population. Data on sectarian affiliation have been infrequently collected or, in many countries, not collected at all. Therefore, the Sunni and Shia numbers reported here are expressed as broad ranges and should be treated as approximate.

These findings on the world Muslim population lay the foundation for a forthcoming study by the Pew Forum, scheduled to be released in 2010, that will estimate growth rates among Muslim populations worldwide and project Muslim populations into the future. The Pew Forum plans to launch a similar study of global Christianity in 2010 as well. The Pew Forum also plans to conduct in-depth public opinion surveys on the intersection of religion and public life around the world, starting with a 19-country survey of sub-Saharan Africa scheduled to be released later this year. These forthcoming studies are part of a larger effort – the Global Religious Futures Project, jointly funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts and the John Templeton Foundation – that aims to increase people’s understanding of religion around the world.

Download the full report PDF (62 pages, 10MB)

(Source: The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life)

Study: Megachurch Attendees Tend to Be Younger

Conducted by the Hartford Institute for Religion Research at Hartford Seminary and Leadership Network, the survey of nearly 25,000 people who attend 12 U.S. megachurches was conducted from January through August 2008. It is billed as the largest representative national study of that religious demographic to date.

An estimated 5 million Americans a week attend roughly 1,300 U.S. megachurches, defined in the study as Protestant churches with attendance of 2,000 or more.

To compare the megachurch data to Protestant churches of all sizes, the study relied on the U.S. Congregational Life Study of 2001.

Comparing results with typical Protestant churches (PC), among the megachurch report’s highlights:

* averaage age of member: 40

(53 in PC)

*1/3 are single (1/10 in PC)

* 98% describe self as “committed follower of Jesus Christ”

* 65% has grown spiritually in past year

* 45% never volunteered

* 32% give little or no money to the congregation