44% have switched affiliations? Good, er, lord. Catholics bleed the worst, with roughly 1 in 10 adults describing him- or herself as lapsed, but overall numbers are holding steady thanks in part to John McCain: Illegals, it seems, are doing the jobs American ex-Catholics won’t do.
Biggest gainers? Unaffiliated, although about half of that number is comprised of people who consider themselves religious but subscribe to no particular denomination. Atheists + agnostics + secular unaffiliated (people to whom religion doesn’t much matter) = 10.3%, good for third place behind Protestants and Catholics and larger than all other faith groups combined.
Be sure to scroll down to the end for factoids about religious communities. The data on those with the biggest families and the highest degree of education is interesting, if only because it’s so unsurprising.
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