Christianity in the United States

The largest religion in the US is Christianity, practiced by nearly 78.5% of the total population. Roughly 52% are Protestants, 24.5% are Catholics, and 2% are Mormons. Christianity was introduced during the period of European colonization.

French brought Catholicism, while Northern European peoples introduced Protestantism. Among Protestants, adherents to Anglicanism, Baptism, Calvinism, Puritanism, Presbyterianism, Lutheranism, Quakerism, Amish and Moravian Church were the first to settle to the US spreading their faith in the new country.

Since then, American Christians developed in their own path. During the Great Awakenings interdenominational evangelicalism, Pentecostalism and Christian fundamentalism emerged, along with new Protestant denominations such as Adventism, and new branches of Restorationism, particularly Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormonism. Today, with 16.3 million adherents (5.3% of the total population), Southern Baptism is the largest Protestant religion. Evangelicals play an important part in contemporary life of US citizens. Evangelicals compromise over 26.3% of the total population.

Despite its status as the most widespread and influential religion of the US, Christianity is undergoing a continuous decline. Number of Christians drops roughly 1% per year, 10% each decade (in 1990 Christians were 88.3% of the population, in 2001 their number was dropped to 78.5%).