Barna Group statistics describe religious belief and practice across generations, denominations and regions of the United States. The figures below cover studies with different populations and measurement periods, so each result is kept with its original group and source label.
Contents
- Gen Z faith and uncertainty
- Deconstruction and spiritual openness
- Evangelical belief and practice
- Evangelizers and born-again Christians
- Young adults and Christian identity
- Mainline churches and long-term change
- Protestant and Catholic patterns
Gen Z faith and uncertainty
Barna’s 2022 study of Gen Z used a national sample of 2,000 respondents ages 13 to 24. The results show both active Christian practices and substantial anxiety about the future. In the last seven days, 64% of Gen Z respondents said they had prayed to God, 37% had read from the Bible and 36% had attended a church service. Another 33% had read a book on a topic intended to help them grow in their Christian faith. These measures refer to the previous week, not to a general identity statement. (Barna Group, [“5 Things You Need to Know About Gen Z”])
The same generation also reported uncertainty and fear. In Generation Anxious, 39% of Gen Z said they always feel uncertain about the future and anxious about important decisions. A separate 39% said they are anxious about important decisions, while 38% said they are afraid to fail. Because the source reports these as separate findings, they should not be added together or treated as mutually exclusive groups. (Barna Group, [“Generation Anxious”])
The combination is important for readers working with young people: the measures show weekly religious activity alongside reported emotional pressure. The statistics do not establish why either pattern exists, and they do not predict how an individual respondent will behave.
Deconstruction and spiritual openness
Barna’s 2023 deconstruction survey included 2,003 U.S. adults ages 18 and older. In that study, 42% of U.S. adults said they had deconstructed the faith of their youth. Among today’s Christians, the figure was 37%. The breakdown was 36% among practicing Christians and 37% among nonpracticing Christians. (Barna Group, [“Ex-Christians Aren’t the Only Ones Deconstructing Faith”])
These percentages describe respondents’ own reports and the categories used by Barna. They do not mean that every person used “deconstruction” in exactly the same way, nor do they measure a single national timeline of religious change.
Other Barna measures point to continuing religious interest. In a 2022 spiritually open project involving 2,005 U.S. adults and teenagers ages 13 to 17, Barna reported the sample size as part of its research context. Across a separate 2023 year-in-review summary, 74% of U.S. adults said they wanted to grow spiritually, 77% said they believed in a higher power and 44% said they were more open to God than before the pandemic. (Barna Group, [“The Importance of Resilient Faith in a Spiritually Open Culture”]; [“Year in Review: Barna’s Top 10 Releases of 2023”])
The same year-in-review figures found that 27% of U.S. adults identified past experiences with a religious institution as the cause of their doubt about Christianity. In a separate measure, 63% of U.S. teens and adults said they had made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that remained important to them. Seventy-one percent viewed Jesus positively. (Barna Group, [“Openness to Jesus Isn’t the Problem”]; [“Year in Review: Barna’s Top 10 Releases of 2023”])
Evangelical belief and practice
Barna defines evangelical identity in its own way. By that definition, evangelicals represented 6% of the U.S. adult population in the source’s account. (Barna Group, [“How We Got Here”])
Within the evangelical group reported in American Faith is Diverse, 100% said they had prayed in the past week and 90% said they had read the Bible in a typical week. Eighty percent attended church services, 56% attended religious education classes and 42% participated in a small group for religious purposes. Forty-five percent volunteered at their church, while 75% said they had shared their faith in Christ with a non-Christian during the past year. (Barna Group, [“American Faith is Diverse”])
These figures measure different activities and timeframes. A typical week, the past week and the past year are not interchangeable, and participation in one activity does not imply participation in all the others.
Barna’s comparison of born-again and non-born-again adults also found differences in strongly held views. Seventy-seven percent of born-again adults strongly said the Bible is totally accurate in all its teachings, compared with 57% of non-born-again adults. Sixty-seven percent of born-again adults strongly said they have a personal responsibility to share their religious beliefs, compared with 38% of non-born-again adults. (Barna Group, [“49 Million Born Again Adults Shared Their Faith in Jesus in the Past Year”])
Evangelizers and born-again Christians
In the same Barna report, 74% of evangelizers said they were absolutely committed to the Christian faith, compared with 55% of non-evangelizers. Seventy-nine percent of evangelizers said they were deeply spiritual, compared with 67% of non-evangelizers. Evangelizers were also more likely to describe themselves as evangelical: 78%, compared with 51% of non-evangelizers. (Barna Group, [“49 Million Born Again Adults Shared Their Faith in Jesus in the Past Year”])
The report also supplied counts and church-group comparisons. Nearly 16 million adult evangelizers were aligned with Baptist churches, about 6 million were associated with non-denominational Christian churches and about 5.3 million born-again Catholics shared their faith during the past year. Among adults in Assemblies of God churches, 67% met both the born-again and shared-faith criteria. The corresponding figures were 51% of regular attenders at non-denominational Christian churches and 50% of people in Pentecostal churches other than Assemblies of God. (Barna Group, [“49 Million Born Again Adults Shared Their Faith in Jesus in the Past Year”])
In a 1991-to-2011 comparison study, 48% of self-identified Christians met Barna’s born-again criteria. Among born-again Christians, 26% attended adult Sunday school, 29% volunteered at church and 59% attended church services in a given week. Another Barna annual study reported that born-again Christians who were unchurched totaled more than 10 million people. (Barna Group, [“Barna Study of Religious Change Since 1991 Shows Significant Changes by Faith Group”]; [“Annual Study Reveals America Is Spiritually Stagnant”])
Young adults and Christian identity
Barna’s account of young adults separates Christian identification from ongoing spiritual activity. Sixty-one percent of today’s young adults had been churched at some point during their teen years but were then spiritually disengaged. Twenty percent maintained spiritual activity consistent with their high school years, while 19% of teens were never significantly reached by a Christian community of faith and remained disconnected. (Barna Group, [“Most Twentysomethings Put Christianity on the Shelf”])
At the same time, 78% of twentysomethings said they were Christians, compared with 83% of teenagers. The contrast indicates why identity and participation should be reported separately: a self-description does not by itself specify attendance, prayer, Bible reading or other activity.
Mainline churches and long-term change
Barna reported that 15% of all American adults associated with a mainline church. Across the decade covered by the report, median mainline weekend attendance was 99 adults, and congregations ranged from 89 to 100 adults on a typical weekend. (Barna Group, [“Report Examines the State of Mainline Protestant Churches”])
The report also described demographic change. The share of mainline attenders with children under 18 at home dropped by 22% over the decade. Thirty-nine percent of adult mainline attenders were single, 2% were age 25 or younger and 35% were age 60 or older. These are descriptive results for the report’s population and period; they are not forecasts of future attendance. (Barna Group, [“Report Examines the State of Mainline Protestant Churches”])
The following compact comparison keeps the reported measures together without combining unlike denominational definitions:
| Mainline measure | Reported result |
|---|---|
| Association among American adults | 15% |
| Median weekend attendance across the decade | 99 adults |
| Typical weekend congregation range | 89–100 adults |
| Single adult attenders | 39% |
| Attenders age 25 or younger | 2% |
| Attenders age 60 or older | 35% |
| Change in attenders with children under 18 at home | −22% |
Protestant and Catholic patterns
An annual Barna study compared reported practices among Protestants and Catholics. Protestants were more likely than Catholics to say they read the Bible in a typical week, 47% versus 25%; attended Sunday school, 28% versus 3%; participated in a small group, 22% versus 9%; and had a quiet time, 58% versus 46%.
The same comparison found that 25% of Protestants volunteered at church, compared with 15% of Catholics. Fifty-three percent of Protestants said they were absolutely committed to the Christian faith, compared with 39% of Catholics. Fifty-six percent of Protestants said they had shared their faith in Jesus Christ with a non-Christian during the previous year, compared with 44% of Catholics. (Barna Group, [“Annual Study Reveals America Is Spiritually Stagnant”])
Reported gender differences appeared across several measures in that study. Females were 10 percentage points more likely than males to say they were absolutely committed to Christianity and 10 points more likely to read the Bible. Females were 11 points more likely to attend church, 13 points more likely to pray to God, 7 points more likely to participate in a small group and 14 points more likely to have a quiet time. These are percentage-point differences, not percentage increases. (Barna Group, [“Annual Study Reveals America Is Spiritually Stagnant”])
Regional results also differed. In the South, 50% were born again, compared with 39% in the rest of the nation. Ten percent in the South were evangelicals, compared with 5% in the rest of the country. (Barna Group, [“Annual Study Reveals America Is Spiritually Stagnant”])
Barna said it had conducted more than two million interviews since 1984. That cumulative figure describes the organization’s research history and should not be confused with the sample size of any one survey. (Barna Group, [“The Importance of Resilient Faith in a Spiritually Open Culture”])