Maine Officially Ranks as the Least Religious State in the Nation

I assume it's a generational thing.

My mom used to go to church all the time when she was a kid. Her parents went often when they were kids as well. My grandfather was an alter boy, and my grandmother used to be very active in church in her younger days. We went to church for a while when I was a kid, but eventually stopped.

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Why, you ask? Probably because I complained so much about going. We went pretty often when I was in middle school. But by the time junior high and high school came around, I was done. I had no use for Sunday school, and I didn't find the sermons much fun either. So eventually, we stopped.

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It would seem most Mainers feel the same way.

A recent survey released by SmileHub.org, showed that Mainers are the absolute least religious people in all of the country. In almost every category of the survey, Maine was pretty much in last place. Apparently, we're running super low on churches. We don't have enough congregations... We got nothing.

The only thing we placed fairly high in was Religious Studies degrees. Apparently we're 19th in the nation for that. It seems people like to come to Maine to go to school here and learn all about being religious, but we stop short on the actual practice of doing so. I suppose we could be in 19th place for worse things...

It shouldn't be something anyone takes personally.

It's hard to say what the real reason is. But I will say geography plays a role too. All the New England states are in the Top 10. Or Bottom 10, depending on how you want to look at it. The states where church and religion are held with higher importance, are southern states. That probably surprises no one.

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Will it ever change in Maine? Probably not. It seems you hear about churches closing far more often than you hear about new ones opening. But remember, just because Mainers may not go to church, but we live in such a nature soaked environment, we have a pretty good handle on being spiritual. Is it possible that's enough?

This is probably where all my church clothes are...