Although religious ‘Nones’ doesn’t necessarily mean atheist, anti-theist or agnostic, I’ve got to say, never in my wildest dreams did I think this milestone would be achieved during my lifetime.

Nice. We won the war on Xmas.

I wonder what the results would be if "Christian, but too embarrassed by those that claim the label to apply it to myself" was an option

About time they get some service, too. I've had it up to here with the theists, especially radical xtian evangelicals, constantly swinging their weight around, saying and doing outrageous things, thinking their little book club should rule over others, and thinking that's normal.

i wonder why

Trouble is, 10,000 Nones who aren't politically organized have less power than one Church with fifty voters that politicians know they can count on.

Christians and Catholics permanently steered me away from being religious before I was even in high school.

Great. Now, my younger atheist self can see that it's not only religious that leads to unnecessary suffering at the population scale. The economics of profit maximization can do it, too. No god required.

Does anyone else say "myself" when asked on a form or in person what they believe in?

I've got to believe that a huge reason for that these days is because of how the republican party has deliberately and openly declared themselves the party of jesus and then go do the most inhumane and cruel things to other people. how preachers are openly declaring democrats ungodly and satanic from the pulpit.

I saw nones and thought that was a new religion I was OOTL on. It makes sense that agnostics would see a boost eventually. I wonder - why now?

This is the best summary I could come up with:

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.

Back in 2007, Nones made up just 16% of Americans, but Pew's new survey of more than 3,300 U.S. adults shows that number has now risen dramatically.

Gregory Smith at Pew was the lead researcher on the study, titled "Religious 'Nones' in America: Who They Are and What They Believe."

"And huge numbers say the desire to avoid hurting other people factors prominently in how they think about right and wrong," says Smith.

People of faith also say they use logic and the avoidance of harm to make decisions, but those factors are in concert with religious tradition and scripture.

But digging deeper into the data shows that men are significantly more likely to say they're atheist or agnostic whereas women are more likely to describe their religion as 'nothing in particular.'

The original article contains 690 words, the summary contains 169 words. Saved 76%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

I'm proud of that.

Sister Margaret will be delighted to hear this