A story of a Protestant landscape
What the map and the survey tell together.
How Americans identify (Pew Research, 2023-24)
Religiously unaffiliated~29%
Christian identity fell from 78% (2007) to 62%, but Pew finds the decline has leveled off since ~2019. Source: Pew Research Center, 2023-24 Religious Landscape Study.
The churches on the ground (EI map)
Christian / non-denom.60.7%
Baptist15.5%
Methodist5.9%
Catholic5.6%
Lutheran3.2%
Other9.1%
Catholics are 19% of Americans but Catholic parishes are only 5.6% of the church buildings on the map — because Catholic parishes are fewer and larger. Protestant and non-denominational congregations, by contrast, are many, smaller and spread across the whole country — which is why they dominate the physical landscape of American faith.