When Americans are asked to check a box indicating their religious affiliation, 28% now check ‘none.’
A new study from Pew Research finds that the religiously unaffiliated – a group comprised of atheists, agnostic and those who say their religion is “nothing in particular” – is now the largest cohort in the U.S. They’re more prevalent among American adults than Catholics (23%) or evangelical Protestants (24%).
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“We know politically for example,” [Gregory Smith at Pew] says, “that religious Nones are very distinctive. They are among the most strongly and consistently liberal and Democratic constituencies in the United States.”
Well, it’s just faith. And people can have whatever faith they want to. I have no problem with that whatsoever. The problem arises when they attempt to force that faith down people’s throats through politics. That’s when people stop listening and find community and beliefs elsewhere.
I guess my point is that faith is something you can have in anything. Faith never leads to correctness. Anytime it does, it does so completely by coincidence and has nothing to demonstrate why it’s correct. This is why religion leads people to hold factually incorrect ideas as truth, and why reality is arbitrary and unimportant to people who have been led to think that faith is valuable.
Sure, people have different ideas about faith and its effectiveness. In theory, it also leads to community and cohesion and a lot of good public service and charity. That’s all good, whereever it comes from. Faith or no faith. Doesn’t matter to me.
My problem is the attempts at forced faith through politics. And that’s what we’re seeing in the US at the moment. It will never lead to actual faith, it only leads to dismissal and anger.