Decade after decade, the Gallup Organization reported some of the most familiar numbers in American religion.
More than 90 percent of Americans said, “yes” when asked if they believe in God — a number that has changed little since the 1940s. Nearly 80 percent insisted they are “Christians,” in some sense of that word.
How many claimed to have attended a worship service in the previous week or so? That number hovered between 41 and 46 percent.
These are the kinds of numbers religious leaders love to quote when trying to intimidate politicians, educators, journalists and Hollywood producers.
Nevertheless, these poll numbers consistently failed to impress one significant authority — George Gallup Jr.
“We revere the Bible, but don’t read it,” warned the famous pollster, in an address to the Evangelical Press Association. “We believe the Ten Commandments to be valid rules for living, although we can’t name them. We believe in God, but this God is a totally affirming one, not a demanding one. He does not command our total allegiance. We have other gods before him.”
The bottom line, he said, in an interview after that 1990 address, is that most American believers simply “want the fruits of religion, but not the obligations.”

“You got the sense that, however valuable those general numbers were in earlier polls, he was showing that you could experiment and try to find the realities inside all those numbers,” said Green.

Gallup didn’t enjoy punching holes in comforting statistics, in part because he sincerely believed that religious faith played a powerful, and for many decades overlooked, role in American life. This conviction was both professional and personal, since Gallup seriously considered becoming an Episcopal priest and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in religion at Princeton University before joining the family business.
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