Catholics and the religiously unaffiliated outnumber Protestants of all stripes in many of America’s largest cities, the Public Religion Research Institute reports.
In Boston, for example, the top religious group is Catholicism at 36 percent, while 24 percent claim no religious affiliation. Combined, those two groups account for 60 percent of the population, leaving just 40 percent to be shared among all varieties of Protestantism—mainline, evangelical, black, and Hispanic.
Protestantism suffers a similar minority status in San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, Portland, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Miami, Phoenix, and Denver, the PRRI study found.
Catholics and the religiously unaffiliated dominate most U.S. cities, with “none” taking the top spot in eight of the 30 Metro areas studied and Catholicism leading in 13. The two groups tied in Phoenix and Orlando.
White evangelical Protestants are the largest single religious group in six of the 30 cities: Nashville, Tennessee; Charlotte, North Carolina; Cincinnati; Indianapolis; Kansas City, Missouri; and Dallas. In Atlanta, black Protestantism ranks first.
Mainline Protestantism does not take the top spot in any of the 30 cities.
