Do Church Goers Want To Hear More Politics From the Pews?

Abstract

Using 2022 PRRI survey data, Burge examines what topics clergy discuss during worship and how congregants feel about political content from the pulpit. Poverty and racism come up more than partisan topics, and most churchgoers prefer worship stay apolitical. LDS members perceive more political division in their congregations than evangelicals do.

Findings for Latter-day Saints

• Only 2% of churchgoers say their pastor "often" discusses Trump or voter fraud; 70% say never.
• 43% of congregants hear about abortion at least sometimes; 44% hear about racism regularly.
• Poverty and inequality are the most-discussed topics: 20% "often" and 46% "sometimes."
• 25% of LDS members feel their congregation is more politically divided than five years ago — 10 points higher than evangelicals (9%).
• 40–50% of congregants believe clergy should completely avoid discussing political division.

Limitations in methodology

Substack blog analysis; PRRI 2022 data is cross-sectional and self-reported; perception of "division" is subjective.

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Cite this study

Burge, R. (2025). Do Church Goers Want To Hear More Politics From the Pews?. Graphs About Religion (Substack). https://www.graphsaboutreligion.com/p/do-church-goers-want-to-hear-more

Ryan Burge. "Do Church Goers Want To Hear More Politics From the Pews?." Graphs About Religion (Substack), 2025. https://www.graphsaboutreligion.com/p/do-church-goers-want-to-hear-more.

@article{burge_2025_church_goers_politics_from_pews,
  title = {Do Church Goers Want To Hear More Politics From the Pews?},
  author = {Ryan Burge},
  year = {2025},
  journal = {Graphs About Religion (Substack)},
  url = {https://www.graphsaboutreligion.com/p/do-church-goers-want-to-hear-more},
}