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Two-thirds of Americans (66%) believe that Jesus Christ’s physical resurrection as described in the Bible is “completely accurate,” as Lifeway Research’s 2020 State of Theology study explains.
20% of U.S. adults don’t believe in the resurrection while 14% are unsure of their belief on this matter.
The study also found that 29% of people “who do not attend religious services at least monthly” do not believe in the resurrection, while only 8% of people who do attend religious services express the same lack of belief.
A Rasmussen report reveals that the percentage of Americans who believed in the resurrection in 2013 was close to the percentage of Americans who believed the same in 2020. Eight years ago, 64% of U.S. adults stated that they believed in the resurrection. 19% did not believe, and 17% were unsure.
In Great Britain, the statistics tell a very different story. According to a 2017 survey commissioned by the BBC, 17% of all British adults believe the Bible version of the resurrection as described word-for-word, while only 31% of British adults who describe themselves as Christian believe the same.
Conversely, 50% of British adults do not believe in Christ’s resurrection. For Christian British adults, that percentage drops to 25%. It is surprising that one in four Britons who describe themselves as Christians do not believe in the resurrection since it is one of the core tenets of Christian faith.
As for non-religious adults in Britain, just 9% believe in the resurrection.
Professor Linda Woodhead, who works for the Department of Politics, Philosophy and Religion at Lancaster University, told BBC News, “This polling confirms that Britain is now split down the middle between those who call themselves Christian and those who say no religion, but this is not a simple division between religious and secular.”
The Right Reverend David Walker also commented on the survey, telling BBC News, "This important and welcome survey proves that many British people, despite not being regular churchgoers, hold core Christian beliefs. Alongside them it finds surprisingly high levels of religious belief among those who follow no specific religion, often erroneously referred to as secularists or atheists.”
The statistics in the BBC’s survey show that Christian beliefs are widespread in British society, just as they are in American society. Furthermore, some adults who describe themselves as nonreligious hold religious beliefs, while some adults who describe themselves as Christian hold secular views.
