How Religious Was America in 1776?

Were Americans more religious in 1776? Is America a Christian nation? Was America founded on Judeo-Christian values? Here’s what we know about religious affiliation in 1776 America.

The United States had a religious affiliation rate of about 17% in 1776, according to The Churching of America 1776-2005 by Roger Finke and Rodney Stark.

Hang out with me in Austin, Texas on October 20th!

SUPPORT

Non-sectarian Biblical Studies Courses by Dr. Bart Ehrman (affiliate link):

FOLLOW

Resources for atheists in need

Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:54 How religious was America? 17%*
2:52 How slavery affects these statistics
6:16 Why so low? Reason 1
07:19 Why so low? - Reason 2
14:34 Why did America become more religious?
16:37 Why Christian Nationalists are wrong
17:33 Live event announcement

This video contains 100% therapeutic grade skepticism.*

*This statement has not been evaluated by the FDA

[GeneticallyModifiedSkeptic]

Correction: I neglected to mention that the data behind the map I showed utilized modern borders of Vermont and Maine to divide populations by religious adherence rate. This is why Vermont and Maine are on the map as such, even though they were not in 1776.

[TheBitPianist]

0:17 Drew has this tendency of changing the colors when he could be clipped out of context while illustrating the views of others. This is the best edit he has done on this channel so far!

[morganwhaley]

I feel like it's a pretty big misconception that the western world was consistently religious until recently when it started to decline. In reality religiosity has waxed and waned throughout history.

[David-tzuz]

Temperance, Moderation, and Zealotry is my new Warhammer 40k themed metal band.

[juliee]

When people say they want to go back to "the old days", inevitably someone tells them that "the old days" include countless human right violations. But the nostalgic person will often reply "b-but come on, you know I didn't mean the bad parts! You know I didn't mean the slavery and sexism and ignorance and death!"

For some reason they don't seem to understand that all those horrendous violations of human rights were an integral part of everyday life in those days, and that all the things they like about "the old days" like the clothes, the lifestyle, the religiosity, the language, the manners, the lack of technology, were all so so deeply connected to the worst aspects that they are basically impossible to separate. The clothes were deeply linked to sexism. The religiosity was deeply linked with the blood of colonialism, slavery, sexism. The manners were grounded in disdain for the poor. The lack of technology was directly responsible for deadly injuries and illnesses. The lifestyle was based on stealing land. The language that was documented seemed sophisticated because only the most educated elite could write and have their words printed and preserved.

To make it simple, you can't be nostalgic of 1776 america without being nostalgic of slavery because those things are inseparable.

[sapientia]

Yessss! In addition to being a nonbeliever nerd, I'm literally right now reading all the American history books I can find! This video is perfect timing

[Enots-hkyt]

I honestly wish that religious studies were taught in school. There’s so much religious illiteracy in this country. But #1. The groups advocating for this don’t want religious studies and education, they want church in school. #2. Good religious studies would make literally *everyone* mad. Like, can you imagine trying to teach historical context to a fundamentalist of any stripe.

[mizzenmax]

I didn’t realize y’all were in Austin! You should consider hosting a Sunday Assembly. I’ve mourned the lack of any science-based Sunday meeting in central Texas for years.

[annaairahala]

I like to remind people that the political christianity seen today is something that came about in the mid-1900s

[surrelljr]

OUTSTANDING!!! You included the Native American angle on this, most people miss it, at least in this country. Thank you 😊.

[jasonGamesMaster]

Ah, the Enlightenment. If only we could have kept that train going

[aluxt]

I love sharing about this topic. Like in 1816, some couple dozen people showed up for Christmas mass at St. Paul's in London. Within 30 years it was so packed that they had people spoiling out of the building (I may have the years slightly off). Victorian's were 8 times more prudish than their grandparents—plays from the late 1700s were often very raunchy.

[pineapple.]

slave owners loved preaching the bible

[lucideandre]

I wonder if the lower rates in the north had to do with the tendency in the enlightenment towards anticlericalism

[AliBreee]

17:31 OKAY..that transition lol 😂 I wasn’t done processing that sick bar you just dropped. Thanks for sharing this super helpful and important information!

[joelmccoy]

Some historical context to Drew's comment around 5:37 that it "isn't hard to imagine religion and slavery going together".

I read a few of the "Causes of Cessation" documents written by the Confederate States at the start of the Civil War a while back in order to have some historical ammunition for the next time my father tried to tell me that the Civil War was really about states rights. It was a tough read from a moral perspective but I am glad I read them as it was not only very obvious that it was all about Slavery, but to get back to the subject, the document for Texas also made it quite clear that some people in Texas, at least, thought that slavery was a "Good and Christian" thing.

So at least some historical documents agree with Drew. Slavery and religion can and have gone together.

[jonmeador]

Our winning the war in 1783 is one of the most important reasons for low church affiliation. We defeated not only the King of England but the Church of England, which was headed by the man we just beat in the war. The Church of England, though, did not die or go away. It just changed it's name.

Our early, religious-related legal cases involve the Episcopal Church trying to retain church property by incorporating. Communities were selling church property because it really wasn't church property since the property was acquired using public funds. By incorporating, the church could retain the property. James Madison thought legal incorporation was "an establishment" because the act of incorporation required state recognition of religion, which he thought was "an establishment."

While the Founders cut religion out of the Constitution like a surgeon would cut cancer out of a patient, the cancer always returns.

[t.j.webster]

3:50 "Racism making them bad at their own religion" Yup, Religion in a nutshell

[tweak]

I think a big part of the religious misconception about early America comes from our shitty teaching of American history, many people don't know/believe that the majority of the early immigrants from Europe were actually workers in company towns. Despite that SO MANY are raised with the pilgrim story that. Even on the Mayflower only 35 people onboard were religious pilgrims the rest were either the crew (30 ppl) or the merchant employees (67 ppl). Even the pilgrims in that story were indentured servants, they paid their passage by agreeing to work for the merchant company for 7 years.. But in most classrooms, we only really hear about the religious pilgrims.

[__-tnhw]

This makes sense looking back at history (as a religious person), as a lot of the churches that originally tried having these state churches believed in a "church state" (an idea inherited from the RCC), the only ones that thrived were the ones that had more strict adherence to scripture and the church as a spiritual institution rather than a highly physical one. Note that this included the beliefs such as this meaning the state was "saved" in a certain sense and it had the idea that Christianization happened through politics more-so than genuine human connection.