Pew Research Survey Finds Most Americans Don’t Believe They Need God to be Good

A majority of Americans do not believe they need God to be moral or have good values, but most with politically conservative leanings still do, according to a global survey by the Pew Research Center.

The nonpartisan polling firm recently published a survey that measures the connection between people’s beliefs about God and morality. The survey, conducted between late June and early October 2019, is based on responses from 38,426 people in 34 countries.

The research also explored the importance of God and prayer in the lives of respondents. The data suggest multiple factors correlate with the belief that God is “necessary to be moral and have good values.” Those factors include an individual’s level of wealth, education and age.

While 70% of Americans still believe that religion is either “somewhat important” or “very important” in their lives, more than half (54%) of Americans said they believe God is “not necessary to be moral or have good values.”

Meanwhile, 44% of American respondents said they believe God is necessary to “be moral and have good values.”

Respondents on the ideological right were found to be significantly more likely to say it is necessary to believe in God to be a moral person and have good values compared to those on the political left in 15 of the 34 countries surveyed.

The largest gap between the ideological right and left exists in the United States.

While only 24% of American respondents who identified themselves as leaning more to the left politically said it is necessary to believe in God to be moral and have good values, 37% of centrists agreed.

But when it comes to respondents who lean to the right politically, more than twice the percentage of those on the left (63%) agreed that it is necessary to believe in God to be moral and have good values.

In addition to respondents in the U.S., the majority of those who identify with the political right in Greece, Argentina and Israel also said that belief in God is necessary for morality and values compared to less than half of respondents on the left in those countries.

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SOURCE: Christian Post, Leonardo Blair