You may already know Washington isn't a particularly religious state. Many surveys over the years have shown a high percentage of adults have no religious affiliation or don't attend services.
Of course, it's possible to be spiritual without being religious. But no, we're not that either. According to a new report from the Pew Research Center, Washington is among the least religious and least spiritual states in the nation.
The Pew 2023-24 Religious Landscape Study surveyed around 37,000 adults nationally on their religious beliefs and practices, and also included questions on spirituality distinct from religion. The survey was conducted in English and Spanish from July 17, 2023, to March 4, 2024.
The study's authors categorized respondents as highly religious or not based on their answers to four surveys questions on religious beliefs and practices. The report includes the share of the population in each state deemed highly religious, and based on these numbers, the states are ranked from most to least religious.
The four questions from the survey used to determine if respondents were highly religious asked about the importance of religion in their lives, attendance at services, daily prayer and belief in God.
Washington ranked 37th, tied with New York, with 25% categorized as highly religious.
Among Washington adults, 30% felt religion was important in their lives, 27% attended services at least once a month, 35% prayed daily, and 44% believed in God or a universal spirit with absolute certainty. All those responses ranked in the bottom third among the states.
Oregon was even less religious than Washington, ranking 46th, with only 19% of the population categorized as highly religious.
The nation's most religious state was Mississippi, with 50% of the population being highly religious. Vermont was the least religious state, at 17%.
The survey included seven questions specifically about spirituality, but did not produce a separate ranking of the most and least spiritual states. But Washington was clearly one of the least spiritual, ranking among the bottom 5 states for five of the seven questions.
Among Washington adults, 80% believe in a soul or spirit, which was the second lowest response rate — Oregon was lowest at 79%.
Washington was also in the bottom five for the share of adults who: believe in something spiritual beyond the natural world, even if we cannot see it (71%); believe in an afterlife (53%); engage in spiritual activities, such as walking in nature or practicing yoga or meditation (54%); consider one's self very spiritual (25%).
Washington ranked higher for the other two questions on spirituality, but was still in the bottom third. Thirty-four percent of Washington adults had feelings of spiritual well-being, and 28% felt the presence of something from beyond this world.
While spirituality and religiosity can be seen as distinct things, there is obviously some overlap. The most spiritual states were also the most religious ones. For example, in Mississippi, which ranked as the most religious state, 47% of adults consider themselves spiritual, the highest of any state.
The report also includes a breakout of religious affiliation for each state. In Washington, Evangelical Protestants were the single largest group, representing 23% of adults, followed by Catholics at 14% and mainline Protestants at 9%. In total, 51% of Washington adults were Christian. Mormons and Buddhists each made up 3% of the adult population, Muslims were 2%, Hindus and Jews were each 1%. Other religious groups were less than 1%.
Thirty-eight percent of Washington adults were unaffiliated with any religion. The breakout for unaffiliated shows 17% of adults described themselves as nothing in particular, 11% were agnostic and 9% were atheists (these numbers don't total to 38% due to rounding).
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