Study: 14 Percent of U.S. Christians Left Their Churches after Trump was Elected

Amanda Casanova | ChristianHeadlines.com Contributor | Updated: Apr 12, 2017

Study: 14 Percent of U.S. Christians Left Their Churches after Trump was Elected

Research from The Washington Post found that about 14 percent of Christians left their churches after Donald Trump was elected president.

The survey followed up with 957 people before and after the presidential election. According to the results, by mid-November, 14 percent of those surveyed had left their particular church.

While Trump secured 81 percent of the white evangelical vote, the research shows that Trump seems to have “relatively low support” among evangelicals right now.

The change comes from how American politics has become divisive in the church (about 15 percent said that’s what’s dividing the church).

The report said that people who are leaving the church are usually leaving because division in the church has spurred debate.

“On the one hand, if people are leaving houses of worship because of political disagreements, they may not be learning the skills needed to talk across differences and participate in politics,” the report said.

“On the other hand, as congregations become more engaged with politics, worshipers learn to connect their values with their political options. And the members most likely to leave over political disagreements tend to be marginal, infrequent attendees anyway.”

The people who are leaving their churches self-identified and responded as 10 percent evangelicals, 18 percent mainline Protestants and 11 percent Catholics.

 

Photo courtesy: Thinkstockphotos.com

Publication date: April 12, 2017



Study: 14 Percent of U.S. Christians Left Their Churches after Trump was Elected