Americans view religion as an important part of their daily lives, even if most don’t regularly attend services.
WHY IT MATTERS – Religion helps build values such as love, empathy, respect, and harmony. Consequently, religion is a necessary and vital part of people’s lives.
RELIGION IMPORTANCE, BY THE NUMBERS – A Scott Rasmussen national survey asked voters about the importance of religion and some aspects of how they practice it.
When voters were asked, “In terms of your daily life, how important is your faith or religion?” they responded,
- 44 percent- Very important
- 27 percent – Somewhat important
- 14 percent – Not at all important
- 13 percent – Not very important
- 2 percent – Not sure
When respondents were asked, “How often do you attend church, synagogue, or other religious services?” The results were as follows,
- 48 percent – Rarely or never
- 23 percent – Once a week
- 12 percent – A couple of times a month
- 8 percent – More than once a week
- 8 percent – Once a month
- 2 percent – Not sure
The final question was, “In a typical week, how often do you pray?” As a result,
- 42 percent – Every day or nearly every day
- 20 – Several times a week
- 20 percent – Rarely or never
- 9 percent – About once a week
- 7 percent – Less than once a week
- 1 percent- Not sure
THE BOTTOM LINE – Religious service attendance may be down, but most Americans still pray at least several times a week and consider religion to be an important part of their daily lives.
GO DEEPER –
Scott Rasmussen – Scott Rasmussen’s Number of the Day for April 17, 2023
The survey of 1,000 registered voters was conducted online by Scott Rasmussen on March 30-31, 2023. Field work for the survey was conducted by RMG Research, Inc. Certain quotas were applied, and the sample was lightly weighted by geography, gender, age, race, education, internet usage, and political party to reasonably reflect the nation’s population of registered voters. Other variables were reviewed to ensure that the final sample is representative of that population.