Earlier this
year, the prestigious Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life released the
results of its U.S. Religious Landscape Survey. This massive survey interviewed
more than 35,000 people and created an important portrait of religious
adherence for the nation.
Unfortunately, this survey failed the
states of Wyoming and Montana. Because it surveyed only 272 people from the two
states, it had to analyze them together to create a statistically valid sample.
Since the two states have quite different religious characters, both
historically and presently, the survey reveals little useful information about
the religious nature of these two states. This is clear both for Catholicism
and Mormonism.
The Pew survey indicates that 23 percent
of the two states are presently Catholic. The number not only hides the
difference between the two states, but seems rather high in comparison to
surveys taken during the last decade. While the 2001 American Religious
Identification Survey (ARIS) puts Montana Catholic members at 22 percent, it
numbers Wyoming's Catholics at only 18 percent. The North American Religion
Atlas (from the late 1990s) puts the numbers even lower: Montana at 19 percent
and Wyoming at 16 percent.
The imbalance between the two states is
historic, for immigrants from Catholic countries such as Ireland and Italy came
to work in Montana's mines or settle along its railroads. Although a similar
trend occurred in Wyoming, it had fewer mines and miles of train lines. So not
only is the Pew percentage somewhat high, but there should be at least a 3 or 4
percent difference between the two states.
Or perhaps not. According to the 2000
United States census, Wyoming has a Hispanic population of 6.5 percent (and
growing), while Hispanics comprise only 2 percent of Montana's citizens. Given
that Hispanics in general belong to the Roman Catholic Church, perhaps they
account for an increase (previously unnoticed by the surveys) in Catholic
adherence in Wyoming and hence raise the Catholic proportion of the population
to the number indicated by the Pew Survey. It is a shame the survey cannot help
us resolve this question.
With regard to adherents of The Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, combining the two states also skews the
data. Wyoming, particularly in the western regions, was closely aligned with
Mormon growth. Part of the present-day state belonged to Utah Territory, and a
larger part was encompassed by the State of Deseret envisioned by the Mormon
leadership.
More significantly, many Mormons migrated
into Wyoming in the late 1800s and early 1900s, some encouraged by Wyoming
governors and others by Wyoming leaders such as Buffalo Bill Cody. Montana had
no significant Mormon population until after World War I, when families began
to enter the state to clear new farms.
This difference in the two states'
histories with respect to Mormonism casts suspicion on the reliability of
figures reported by the Pew survey. The survey indicated that just 5 percent of
the population of the two states are Mormon, but this hides their differences.
The 2001 ARIS survey put Wyoming's population at 7 percent Mormon while
Montana's stood at only 3 percent.
The Religion Atlas indicated an even
larger difference: Wyoming rose to nearly 10 percent, while Montana remained at
3 percent. My own experience around the state suggests the percentage may be
even higher, but I have no hard data to back that up.
In the end, the Pew Survey of America's
Religious Landscape has done a good job for the nation and for the more
populous states, but it has failed to give a clear picture of the religious
character of Wyoming and Montana. Since the three surveys cited have all been
sponsored by institutions located in large cities of the eastern United States,
maybe the solution is for western entities to sponsor their own survey. Perhaps
the universities of Wyoming and Montana should take the lead. This would be
just the kind of action that UW's proposed Center for the Study and Teaching of
Religion in the American West could carry out.