Religion: Pulpits & the War

Do Americans want U.S. participation in the war discussed from the pulpit? No say 55%, yes say 34%, with 11% undecided, the Gallup Poll reported last week. Church members (36%) are more inclined to favor war talk in the pulpit than non-members (25%) and Protestants (37%) are “slightly more in favor of open discussion” than Catholics (31%).

“The primary reason” advanced by those who don’t want war discussed in church, reported Pollster George Horace Gallup, “is that the church is a place for ‘spiritual escape,’ a place for ‘peace and comfort’ away from the storms of life, and not a place for controversy.”

Results of two other Gallup religious polls released last week:

1) Thirty-one percent of Americans (22% of the farmers, 27% of small-towners, 37% of urbanites) think that interest in religion has increased since the war began, 57% think it has not, 12% “don’t know.” 2) Forty-nine percent think that young people are less interested in religion than the young people of ten years ago, only 18% that they are more interested. Of the rest, 24% think the interest is “about the same” and 9% “don’t know.”