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The Shockingly Few Americans With A Christian Worldview
A new report on the measly percentage of biblical theists in America, the first scientific society, how to memorize Scripture, and much more.
Anthony Langer
February 22, 2025
It’s Saturday, February 22, 2025.
Today’s edition covers a new report on the measly percentage of biblical theists in America, the first scientific society, how to memorize Scripture, and much more.
“Let not your heart envy sinners, but continue in the fear of the Lord all the day.” (Proverbs 23:17)
Of Christian Concern
ONLY 4% OF AMERICANS HAVE A CHRISTIAN WORLDVIEW, NEW REPORT FINDS
Only 4 percent of Americans have a biblical worldview, called Biblical Theism, according to a recent report from George Barna’s American Worldview Inventory 2025.
This paltry figure is second only to Syncretism, ”the blending of elements from multiple worldviews into a customized individual philosophy of life,” which claims an extraordinary 92 percent of the population.
“Two out of three American adults describe themselves as Christians and the most common houses of worship are Christian churches,” the report notes. However, when questioned, many professing Christians do not maintain beliefs consistent with the Bible, the researchers from Arizona Christian University’s Cultural Research Center found.
“Much of this worldview confusion flows from American adults redefining the nature and existence of God,” the report states. Only seven in ten Americans believe in “a supernatural deity or spiritual authority,” down from over nine in ten in the early 1990s. Of those who believe in one or more higher powers or deities, only 40 percent “identified the God of the Bible as one of those entities,” down from 73 percent three decades ago.
Some readers may recall what the apostle Paul reminded his Roman audience, citing the words of the prophet Elijah:
“Lord, they have killed your prophets, they have demolished your altars, and I alone am left, and they seek my life.” But what is God’s reply to him? “I have kept for myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.”
(Romans 11:3-4)
Read Barna’s full report here.
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Also Noteworthy
Screenshot from Kash Patel’s swearing-in ceremony (FOX 4 Dallas-Forth Worth / YouTube)
→ A new morality police force in Muslim-majority Libya may pose a threat to Christians.
→ Ne Zha 2, a Chinese animated film about a demon child, has set a new Imax record, grossing over $1.6 billion.
→ Valerie Kloosterman, a Christian physician assistant fired by the University of Michigan Health System for refusing to use false pronouns, is fighting back.
→ Veterans Affairs (VA) chaplain Rusty Trubey, allegedly fired for preaching on Romans 1, has appealed to the new U.S. Secretary of Veterans Affairs, Doug Collins, “to eliminate a speech code being imposed” by the VA.
→ On Friday, Kash Patel was sworn in as FBI Director on the Bhagavad Gita (Hindu scripture) instead of the Bible.
→ Pardoned pro-life activists celebrate their release thanks to President Donald Trump, The Daily Signal reports.
→ President Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday to expand access to in-vitro fertilization (IVF), a procedure that often involves the dehumanization and destruction of human embryos.
→ Abortion legislation news:
An equal protection bill to abolish abortion was voted down 6-2 in Oklahoma’s Senate Judiciary Committee. The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Dusty Deevers, is far from discouraged, citing evidence that support for the measure is growing.
Kentucky’s equal protection bill (reported in Project 18:15 last week) was assigned to the House Judiciary Committee on Friday, taking it one step further than the state’s previous abolition bill in 2023. Although the bill faces an uphill battle, it has found support from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary president, Albert Mohler, and ethics professor Andrew Walker, among others.
Georgia’s equal protection bill has 22 Republican sponsors—a record number for any abortion abolition bill in the United States. Pastor Jeff Durbin, head of End Abortion Now, made a plea on Friday for Christians to support the bill.
→ President Trump signed an executive order earlier this month creating “the Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias” to combat “the anti-Christian weaponization of government and unlawful conduct targeting Christians.”
Content Catch-Up
Recent, notable content of Christian interest.*
Screenshot of the intro page to X’s latest artificial intelligence model, Grok 3.
→ Grok 3 on Calvinism vs. Arminianism: Canadian pastor Tim Stephens of Fairview Baptist Church in Calgary, Alberta, tested the new “deep reasoning” feature on social media platform X’s artificial intelligence model, Grok 3, by asking it whether Calvinism or Arminianism is better represented in the Bible. (Post)
→ “JD Vance SLAMS European Leaders in Epic Speech”: Christian apologist David Wood and ex-Muslim atheist Apostate Prophet react to U.S. Vice President JD Vance’s speech at the Munich Security Conference. (Video)
→ Kristan Hawkins Controversy: Abolish Abortion Kentucky summarizes the recent controversy surrounding Students for Life of America’s president, Kristan Hawkins. (Post)
*Not necessarily an endorsement
Church History Tidbit
The Royal Society
The frontispiece of Thomas Sprat’s The History of the Royal Society (1667)
“The Royal Society,” Dan Graves writes for Christian History Institute, “was the first scientific society known to history and several of its most notable members were devout Christians.”
This prestigious company of men, who had met and corresponded informally for some years as “the invisible college,” founded their society on November 28, 1660, following a lecture by Christopher Wren. The group aimed to pursue “natural philosophy,” the contemporary term for science.
The Royal Society, which exists today, reports that these first members would “observe the natural world, conduct experiments, discuss their outcomes, and eventually publish the results.” Their commitment to understand the natural world through empirical data, even contrary to popular opinion or so-called authorities—a very Protestant sentiment—was encapsulated in their motto, Nullius in Verba (“take nobody's word for it“).
Graves writes:
The real driver behind the society was John Wilkins, who later became an Anglican bishop. Among the founding members were Christopher Wren, a man of solid religious convictions, John Willis, a staunch Church of England man, and Robert Boyle, well known for his faith and faith-based charities. Boyle had begun to study science to relieve the tension he saw between the natural philosophy of his day and his faith. He reasoned, “If the omniscient author of nature knew that the study of his works tends to make men disbelieve his Being or Attributes, he would not have given them so many invitations to study and contemplate Nature.” . . .
Its journal established the practices of scientific priority and peer review, all while guided by men of both faith and scientific acumen.
The Bible, Briefly
Memorizing Scripture
My scribbles to help me memorize Proverbs 1:20-22
“Incline your ear, and hear the words of the wise,
and apply your heart to my knowledge,
for it will be pleasant if you keep them within you,
if all of them are ready on your lips.”
(Proverbs 22:17-18)
These verses challenge the reader in at least a few ways.
1. Hear
“Incline your ear, and hear the words of the wise…”
Keep your ear out for wisdom. When there’s an opportunity to hear sound advice about how to live well, take it. When someone with a track record of making good decisions is speaking, pay attention. Listen carefully and consider what you hear. Do your ears perk up when wisdom is spoken?
2. Apply
“…and apply your heart to my knowledge…”
Upon actively and intentionally listening to wisdom, set your inner being to embrace it. Apply it practically in your life. Embody it and live it. In the words of Bruce K. Waltke, “The ear is the exterior organ that receives the information and the heart is the interior organ that directs the whole body.” When you hear something wise, ask: How specifically should I implement this? Then, do it.
3. Memorize
“…for it will be pleasant if you keep them within you, if all of them are ready on your lips.”
These two phrases constitute a challenge to memorize words of wisdom—in particular, the book of Proverbs.
Far-fetched as it may seem, imagine having the entire book of Proverbs memorized (“all of them”). Wouldn’t you have wisdom for every occasion? It would be “ready on your lips.”
In the era of Google and AI, we can get by without memorizing much of anything, so we don’t often exercise this muscle. But, truthfully, we can commit to memory much more than we realize.
Some tips for memorizing:
Read and re-read the verse(s).
Take strategic notes. Use this technique (← video link) to “memorize lines instantly” in tandem with sketching images you associate with the words. (See the image above for how I do this—but find whatever way works for you.)
Use active recall. Recite the verse from memory without reading it or looking at any notes. In the words of Francis Bacon (whose influence inspired the Royal Society!), “If you read a piece of text through twenty times, you will not learn it by heart so easily as if you read it ten times while attempting to recite from time to time and consulting the text when your memory fails.”
Use spaced repetition, an evidence-based technique, to cement material into your long-term memory. This involves actively recalling the material at strategic intervals just before you forget it (adjusting as needed for the material you struggle with). For example:
Immediately after learning it
24 hours later
1 week after that
3 months after that
6 months after that
Once yearly after that
Maybe you won’t memorize the entire book of Proverbs (though you probably could), but any Scripture you memorize is good. More is better than less, and some is better than none. Commit to a routine of memorization.
Verse 18 tells us the result: “it will be pleasant.” Hearing wisdom, applying it, and having it ready on your lips is a joy. As another proverb says, “[Wisdom’s] ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace” (Proverbs 3:17).
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