OK, it's time for another GH comparative analysis with states.

The source for the contiguous 48 was this site: http://www.gc.cuny.edu/faculty/research ... ndings.htm, and I used Wikipedia for the freak states.

We begin with the percentages of Christians in each state (this includes the LDS church):



You'll notice that in general, the West and the Northeast have lower percentages than the Midwest and the South. Nothing surprising there.

Next up are the percentages of Catholics:



Border states and the Northeast have the most, as you'd expect.

Then we have the percentages of Protestants:



Anyone shocked by this? Didn't think so.

Now it starts to get a little interesting: the percentages of people that identify themselves as non-religious:



I never would have guessed North Dakota to by far be the most religious state. On the other hand, Washington being the least religious isn't a shocker.

The most interesting thing here is that out of the to 16 least religious, they include all 13 Western states (even Mormon-dominated Utah).

Now, here's the one I was really curious about. I wanted to know what the dominant denomination was in each state. I ran into a little problem here, as that the majority of states have a Catholic plurality, but there are more Protestants than Catholics when you combine their denominations. Therefore, in this next map I made a note of this with the pastel colors denoting a "Catholic semi-plurality", with the second-most dominant denomination denoted.

By doing this, there was quite a surprise here:



Look at that sea of Baptist red!

Now, I wasn't expecting to count "non-religious" as a "denomination". But how about that Northwest? Furthermore, several of those "Catholic semi-minority" states, especially in the Midwest, had non-religious folk as the next largest "denomination". I'd be real curious to see if that would have held 10 years prior to this survey (this one was done in 2001), as there was a dramatic rise in non-religious people in that span.

I'm also curious if Baptists (and to a lesser extent, Lutherans) are more eager to clearly state out their faith as opposed to other Protestant denominations.

Speaking of Lutherans, I never knew they were so dominant in the Minnesota/Dakota area. You learn something new every day.

We end with the percentage of the dominant denomination in each state, to get a feel for how dominant it is:



Not too surprising how big the Baptists are in the South, and the Catholics in the Northeast. But how about Idaho tying Ohio for the least dominant denominations? The other Idaho shocker: although it has the second-largest percentage of LDS members in the nation (14%), the Catholics edged them out at 15%, and non-religious people make up 19%.

*blows chunks everywhere*

i guess if i HAD to visit USA, id visit Washington.

Ok I have a stupid question. Whats the LDS church?

this was the most intersting to me:



i had no idea that there were so many catholics in this country. further, the plurality of catholics is almost as high in the NE as the baptist plurality in the south. i would have guessed catholics would be be off the map (hehehe), not have any plurality in any state. but it seems the godless NE is not really so godless, just catholic, and to some devout protestants, that is worse than no religion at all.

this is a true story:

about 10 years ago i had a new roomie, she was lutheran and went to church every sunday. she did not know my denomination, and we were chatting about her new boyfriend who was a methodist minister and what they would do if they got serious:

i said: "at least he's not catholic"

she rolled her eyes and said: "oh, totally"

i laughed my ass off and then when i finally got air into my lungs i told her i was catholic. she was mortified.

Latter Day Saints. Also known as Mormons. Utah is full of them.

*loonies

*far from all of them

*but certainly the ones who try to convert you. And I thought the Jehovah's Witnesses were bad.

Here's a story a friend from Park City told me in college. She and her cousin saw the unmistakeable presence of two young men in black ties on bikes approach their door. Prior to their arrival, they set out a bunch of beer, weed, and porn on their coffee table. When the missionaries arrived, my friend and her cousin were doing their best to be even more friendly than your typical missionary, gladly offering them in and the "supplies" they had on hand. The missionaries just had a mortified look, like they were shocked to see this kind of thing, and tried the best they could do to leave politely. I wish I could have been there to witness that.

You know what I saw in the middle of Hyde Park in Sydney on my first visit there? Yep, a pair of Mormon missionaries.

All that said, I've known several LDS families, and they were excellent childhood acquaintances and the like. I don't even have a huge problem with the missionary program, as I know a lot of them have gotten a different perspective on the world by going to some drastically different overseas realm, especially in Latin America.

utah aka morman-land has the highest volunteer rate in the country at 48%. they may have strange beliefs, but what the hell? no stranger than the old and new testament, and mormonos tend to be quite kind and caring.

that is what religion is supposed to do. not fill you with hate.

I just realized there is one subtle flaw I made in my coloring. Alaska does not have a Catholic plurality--there are more non-religious folk in that state, but there is also a sizeable Protestant majority. Wikipedia couldn't give me a good breakdown on Protestant denominations, though, so I can't tell you what specific one is most dominant.

Other interesting facts that all make sense: New York has the highest Jewish population at 5%. Alaska is the only state with a notable Eastern Orthodox population (8%), no doubt due to the proximity of Russia. Hawaii also has a 9% Buddhist population.

I don’t know know much about that area of the country. Did a lot of Scandinavians settle there? I'm a Lutheran and our congregation is filled with people of Scandinavian heritage. It seems like everybody has a last name ending in sen or son.

I am glad I'm from the PNW.

Why, because there's something wrong with being from a religious area?

No, to each his own. I know for me I would hate to have religion engulfing me in all directions.

Yes. The upper midwest/plains was settled largely by Swedes and Norwegians.

See: Little House on the Prairie and A Prairie Home Companion

I always see maps showing the counties of Northern Ireland with their religious denominations so its refreshing to see the US map. Thanks for posting

BTW, Nick, awesome work. I love maps, and demographic statistics.

You don't happen to have the raw data you used in an Excel sheet or something, do you?

What did you use to create those maps?

Something interesting that I noticed was that North Dakota has a Christian population of around 85% (max) and a religious population of 97%. So that means that at least 12% of their population considers themsleves religious but NOT Christian. How can that be? Native Americans?