A study from Harvard University reveals a significant trend between religion and education. Old anticlerical myths fall, but if religion becomes elite, the evangelical message is at risk.

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Is Christianity becoming an elite religion?

This is what an interesting analysis by Ryan Burge, Professor of Political Science at Eastern Illinois University, suggests after summarizing the results of a massive survey that lasted 15 years and collected over 570,000 responses.

The study was conducted in the United States by Harvard University’s Cooperative Election Study from 2008 to 2022, and it debunks an old legend claiming there is a negative relationship between education and religious affiliation.

 

Less education and more irreligion

Looking at the charts summarizing Burge’s findings, a general trend emerges.

First, people with a higher level of education (right side of the charts below) are less likely to identify as atheist, agnostic, or among the “nones.” This relationship is especially strong for the latter category.

In the image below, we focus only on data from 2019 to 2022, and even within this range the group with the highest likelihood of being atheist is consistently made up of those with the lowest educational level (shown as “No HS” in the chart, meaning no high school diploma).

 

More education and more religion

But there is also a reverse effect.

People with higher education levels are more likely to report a religious affiliation, as seen in the upward trend in the charts below.

Those most likely to attend religious services, on the other hand, are individuals who hold a graduate degree, a master’s, or a doctorate (shown as “Post-Grad” in the chart on the right).

“In recent years,” Burge writes, “there has been an almost 10 percentage point gap in attendance between the lowest and highest levels of education.”

 

Income level and marital status

When the variable of income level is added, it becomes clear that in nearly every income bracket, people with a college education attend church at a higher percentage than those with a high school diploma or less.

At this point, the American researcher also introduces marital status, concluding that married individuals are far more likely to attend religious services than those who are divorced, separated, or have never married.

 

Anticlerical myths and new risks

The conclusion of this analysis, while debunking some anticlerical myths, is not as positive as it might seem.

In fact, Burge writes, “Religion has increasingly become an enclave for those who have a ‘normal’ life: a college degree, middle income, married with children. If you fit all these criteria, your likelihood of regularly attending church is about twice as high as those who do not.”

But if Christianity turns into a religion for the educated and wealthy middle class, then what happens to the words of Jesus: “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but the sick do. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:31–32).

The recent exhortation by Pope Leo XIV on seeing the face of Christ in the poor certainly helps prevent those with financial, cultural, and family stability from losing touch with the part of humanity most in need of His message.