America, a Christian Nation?

From Barna’s newest study, but click the link to see the whole report:

David Kinnaman, who directed the research project for Barna Group, mentioned that the study “confirmed many spiritual assumptions about various regions of the country. The South hosts many of the nation’s Christians, while the West and Northeast play to more secular stereotypes.

“However, one of the underlying stories is the remarkably resilient and mainstream nature of Christianity in America.  Nearly three out of four people call themselves Christians, even among the least ‘Christianized’ cities.  Furthermore, a majority of U.S. residents, regardless of location, engage in a church at some level in a typical six-month period. The real differences spiritually between various regions are not so much what they call themselves; the faith gaps are more likely to be issues of belief, practice, politics and spiritual emphasis – how people think about, prioritize and express their faith.”

Kinnaman also pointed out that the Barna study used the definitions of media markets, which look broadly at the households within the reach of the predominant media of the region. Sometimes localized community studies of specific areas (such as those defined by a zip code) can exhibit unique faith patterns among residents.