2026-06-27T10:30:26.640Z / 美国有线电视新闻网（CNN）
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美国有组织宗教的信众占比持续下滑，但宗教右翼的捍卫者在特朗普政府的权力架构中却日益占据上风。
特朗普总统任命的宗教自由委员会周五发布的一份报告建议，实质上拆除美国政教分离的壁垒，为宗教组织提供更多公共资金，让教会在政治中发挥更直接的作用。
但特朗普政府官员所称的美国是“基督教国家”的论调，与左翼基督徒的价值观相悖——左翼基督徒认为政府应采取更多行动帮助有需要的民众。
两本新书分别诠释了这两种对立的基于信仰的政治理念：副总统JD·万斯的中年天主教皈依故事《圣餐》，以及参议员（同时也是牧师）拉斐尔·沃诺克的《曲径通坦》。
据CNN记者史蒂夫·孔托诺报道，万斯在其皈依经历的视角下“主张将家庭置于国内生产总值之上，限制移民，拒绝全民基本收入，并通过改善新生儿母亲和幼儿的生活环境来减少堕胎行为”。
我们可以将万斯的保守天主教信仰，与国防部长皮特·赫格斯在特朗普政府内政外交政策中毫不掩饰的福音派信仰放在一起对照。
和众多宗教右翼人士一样，万斯对美国左翼持对抗态度。
“几十年来，左翼一直试图将基督教挤出国家公共生活，”万斯去年在查理·柯克的凤凰城纪念活动上表示，“他们把基督教赶出了学校、职场，赶出了公共广场的核心领域。宗教自由已经演变成‘脱离宗教的自由’。”
在同一场活动中，他还提出了特朗普政府中流行的观点：尽管美国建国文件中并未明确体现宗教色彩，但“蒙上帝恩典，我们将永远是一个基督教国家”。
值得注意的是，万斯主张让宗教介入政治，但他也曾批评美国出生的首位教皇——其所在教会的精神领袖——公开指责特朗普政府的移民镇压政策和对伊朗战争过于强硬。
而沃诺克则不同，他除了是佐治亚州联邦参议员外，还担任埃比尼泽浸信会的高级牧师——这个教堂因马丁·路德·金牧师而闻名于世。
他公开质疑，右翼领导人一边标榜自己的基督教信仰，一边为特朗普政府移民海关执法局的大规模驱逐行动，以及旨在削减医疗补助和食品援助的减税及开支法案背书，这究竟是何用意。
“我不禁要问，这种宗教信仰究竟是流于形式，还是发自内心？”沃诺克在为自己的新书巡回宣传接受《纽约时报》的首次采访时说道。
去年12月，他在接受CNN记者劳拉·科茨采访时也表达了类似观点，称民主党需要夺回信仰的道德高地。
“我认为我们应该坦然拥抱信仰，”沃诺克说，“我们不应将信仰和价值观的讨论拱手让给那些推动了美国历史上规模最大的财富转移的人——也就是那部‘史上最棒的大规模法案’。”
对沃诺克而言，这是一场道德辩论，但对民主党来说，在佐治亚州这样的南方州，争取宗教选民是关乎生存的策略。
特朗普2.0竞选纲领的一大核心主题是，美国人需要在生活中更多地接触宗教——尤其是基督教。
唐纳德·特朗普总统本人并非以虔诚著称，但他在入主白宫的过程中赢得了宗教右翼的支持，部分原因是他宣称自己的政治重生和躲过暗杀都得益于神的干预。
加之赫格斯在战争新闻发布会上使用圣经语言，特朗普政府官员呼吁让宗教更多地融入公共生活，以及司法部被用于对抗他们眼中的反基督教偏见，这一切都加剧了这一趋势。
与美国政府日益强化基督教色彩相伴的，是自称基督徒的选民比例持续下降。
根据出口民调数据，在首次将特朗普送上权力宝座的2016年大选中，23%的选民自称天主教徒，52%的选民自称新教徒或其他基督教教派信徒。2024年大选时，自称新教徒或其他基督教教派信徒的选民比例降至43%，天主教徒占比为21%。白人福音派选民占比从2016年的26%微降至2024年的23%，变化并不显著，但无宗教信仰的选民占比从2016年的15%升至2024年的24%，接近四分之一。
我就万斯和沃诺克的对立观点，以及美国宗教界的整体趋势，采访了公共宗教研究机构（PRRI）首席执行官梅利莎·德克曼。
“宗教与政治的交融程度在近代美国历史上达到了前所未有的高度，”她表示，尽管此前的现代共和党总统也曾在口头上向宗教右翼示好，但特朗普在政策层面和最高法院提名方面，为宗教右翼做了更多实事。
“当前共和党内部的格局正在发生变化——‘让美国再次伟大’（MAGA）运动接管了共和党，”她说。
“MAGA运动中的许多人，以及共和党内部的许多人，都设想美国应该更明确地成为一个基督教国家，并奉行保守的基督教目标，”她说。
这与更具争议的基督教民族主义理念不谋而合。这一意识形态的核心信念是，美国从建国起就是基督教国家，其法律和制度应体现基督教价值观。
公共宗教研究机构近期发布了一系列关于美国身份认同研究的最新报告，其中揭示了一些有趣的趋势：
► 共和党人对“基督教民族主义”一词的接受度越来越高
报告显示：
仅有25%的美国人对“基督教民族主义”一词持正面看法，与之相比……近半数共和党人（48%）……21%的无党派人士和仅10%的民主党人持正面看法。尽管无党派人士和民主党人的支持率自2022年以来基本保持稳定，但共和党人对该词的接受度日益提高，正面看法从36%上升至48%，涨幅达12个百分点。
据德克曼介绍，公共宗教研究机构通过一系列五个问题进行调查，根据受访者的回答将其分为基督教民族主义的信徒、同情者、怀疑者和反对者四类。
► 民主党人更不认同美国是受神眷顾的特殊国家
报告显示：共和党人认同“上帝赋予美国特殊使命”的比例基本保持稳定——从2012年的75%降至2022年的63%，目前约有七成受访者持此观点；而民主党人的支持率则大幅下滑，从60%降至仅27%。无党派人士的支持率也有所下降，2020年跌至35%的低点，2026年小幅回升至40%。
“民主党在很多方面都更不依赖宗教，”德克曼说，“同时他们的宗教多样性也更高。与共和党相比，民主党内部的非基督徒比例要高得多，但我们也能看到大量不同族裔的基督徒，”她说。
► 大多数美国人仍然偏好宗教多样性
报告显示：近三分之二的美国人（64%）更希望“美国成为一个拥有多种宗教信仰人群的国家”，而34%的人更希望“美国成为一个主要由基督教信徒组成的国家”。这一数据较2022年有所下降——2022年是公共宗教研究机构首次提出该问题的年份，当时有73%的受访者表示偏好多元宗教。如今，60%的共和党人明确支持美国以基督徒为主，较2022年的52%有所上升。
当被问及对未来十年美国宗教发展趋势的看法时，德克曼指出，无宗教信仰人群的数量正在上升，尤其是女性群体。
“年轻女性正在摆脱宗教标签，原因有很多，”德克曼说，她补充道，许多放弃有组织宗教的女性对宗教在 LGBTQ 议题上的立场，以及众多宗教传统对女性的看法感到不满。
美国历史上曾出现过宗教复兴时期，但她观察到的数据显示，当前并未出现这种情况，部分原因是多代人逐渐远离有组织宗教的趋势。
“如果你不是在宗教传统中长大的，那么你在晚年皈依宗教的可能性并不大，”她说，并补充道万斯是这种情况的例外。
尽管数据并未显示宗教复兴，但她认为美国人可能正需要有组织宗教所能提供的那种联结感。
“我确实认为美国人渴望真实的面对面交流，”她说，“随着我们变得更加孤立，花更多时间在网上，教堂似乎可能成为人们进行有意义互动的场所，而信仰社区能带来许多积极的东西。”
In Trump’s America, two very different views of Christianity in politics emerge
2026-06-27T10:30:26.640Z / CNN
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Adherence to organized religion is falling in the United States, but defenders of the religious right are ascendant in positions of power in the Trump administration.
A report released Friday by the Religious Liberty Commission empaneled by President Donald Trump suggests effectively tearing down the wall between church and state in the United States by providing more public money to religious organizations, giving churches a more direct role in politics.
But argument from Trump officials that the US as a “Christian nation” is at odds with the views of the values of Christians on the left, who think government should do more to help people who need it.
Two new books – Vice President JD Vance’s midlife Catholic conversion story, “Communion,” and Senator (and Reverend) Raphael Warnock’s “The Crooked Places Made Straight” – preach these opposing views of faith-based politics.
Through the lens of his conversion, Vance “argues for prioritizing families over gross domestic product, limiting migration, rejecting universal basic income, and discouraging abortions by improving conditions for new mothers and young children,” CNN’s Steve Contorno writes.
You can put Vance’s conservative Catholicism alongside the Evangelical faith that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth wears on his sleeve when it comes to matters of politics and policy in the Trump administration.
Like many on the religious right, Vance has taken an adversarial view to the American left.
“For decades, the left has labored to push Christianity out of national life,” Vance said at the Phoenix memorial for Charlie Kirk last year. “They’ve kicked it out of the schools, out of the workplace, out of the fundamental parts of the public square. Freedom of religion transformed into freedom from religion.”
At the same event, he pushed the idea, popular in the Trump administration, that despite the lack of overt religiosity in the nation’s founding documents, “By the grace of God, we always will be a Christian nation.”
Vance notably wants to involve religion in politics at times, but he has also criticized the first American-born Pope, his church’s spiritual leader, for calling out the heavy handedness of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown and war on Iran.
Warnock, on the other hand, in addition to being a US Senator from Georgia, is also senior pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church, the pulpit made famous by Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
He has wondered aloud how leaders on the right can point to their Christian faith while also blessing the mass deportation efforts of Trump’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency and Trump’s tax and spending cuts bill, which anticipates cuts to Medicaid and food assistance.
“I have to ask whether the religion is more performative than substantive,” Warnock told The New York Times in a kickoff interview for his own book tour.
He told CNN’s Laura Coates something similar in December, when he argued Democrats need to reclaim the moral ground of faith.
“I think we ought to lean into faith,” Warnock said. “We ought not see the conversation around faith and values to people who are responsible for the largest transfer of wealth we saw with the One Big Beautiful Bill in American history.”
This is a moral argument for Warnock, but appealing to religious voters is a survival tactic for Democrats in a Southern state like his Georgia.
A major theme of Trump 2.0 is that Americans need more religion – and specifically Christianity – in their lives.
President Donald Trump is not known to be very religious, although he won over the religious right on his way to the White House in part by pushing the idea that his political rebirth and survival of assassination attempts were due to divine intervention.
And that’s added to that the biblical language in Hegseth’s war press conferences, the calls by Trump officials to bring religion more into public life, and the use of the Department of Justice to defend against what they see as anti-Christian bias.
Alongside the rise of a US government so focused on Christianity is a drop in the number of voters who describe themselves as Christian.
In the 2016 election that first brought Trump to power, 23% of voters described themselves as Catholic and 52% described themselves as Protestant or another Christian denomination, according to exit polls. The portion of voters describing themselves as Protestant or another Christian denomination fell in 2024, when just 43% of voters described themselves that way, according to exit polls, while 21% said they were Catholic in 2024. The portion of voters who are White evangelicals went from 26% in 2016 to 23% in 2024, which is not a meaningful shift, but the portion with no religious affiliation went from 15% in 2016 to 24%, nearly a quarter, in 2024.
I asked Melissa Deckman, who is CEO of the Public Religion Research Institute, PRRI about the competing messages of Vance and Warnock and the larger trends in American religion.
“The intermixing of religion and politics is really at an unprecedented level in recent American history,” she said, arguing that while previous modern Republican presidents have paid some lip service to the religious right, Trump has done more to act on their behalf in their policies and with his Supreme Court nominations.
“There’s something going on within the current makeup of the Republican Party – the MAGA takeover,” she said.
“Many people within the MAGA movement, within the GOP, envision a world that the US should be identified more as a Christian nation with conservative Christian goals,” she said.
That’s in line with the more controversial idea of Christian nationalism, an ideology rooted in the belief that the United States was founded as a Christian nation and that its laws and institutions should reflect Christian values.
PRRI recently released the latest in a series of studies on American identity and it includes some interesting trends:
► Republicans are getting more comfortable with the term Christian nationalism.
From the report:
Just 25% of Americans hold favorable views of the term Christian nationalism, compared with… Nearly half of Republicans (48%) … 21% of independents and only 10% of Democrats. While support among independents and Democrats has remained relatively stable since 2022, Republicans are increasingly embracing the term, with favorable views rising 12 points, from 36% to 48%.
PRRI asked people a series of five questions and, depending on those answers, classified people as either adherent, sympathizer, skeptic or rejecter of Christian nationalism, according to Deckman.
► Democrats are less likely to see a divine American exceptionalism.
From the report: While Republican agreement that God has granted America a special role has remained relatively stable — dipping from 75% in 2012 to 63% in 2022, with about seven in ten agreeing today — Democratic support has collapsed, falling from 60% to just 27%. Independents declined as well, hitting a low of 35% in 2020 before a modest recovery to 40% in 2026.
“The Democratic Party, in many ways, is less religious,” Deckman said. “It’s also more religiously diverse. You tend to have many more non-Christians within the Democratic Party compared to the GOP, but you tend to have a very big cross section of Christians of color,” she said.
► Most Americans still prefer religious diversity
From the report: Nearly two-thirds of Americans (64%) would prefer “the US to be a nation made up of people belonging to a wide variety of religions,” compared with 34% who prefer “the US to be a nation primarily made up of people who follow the Christian faith. That’s a decline for pluralism since 2022, the first year the question was asked, by PRRI, and when 73% said they preferred a wide variety of religions. Today, a clear majority of Republicans, 60%, prefer the US to be made up of Christians, up from 52% in 2022.
When I asked Deckman what she sees happening with religion in American over the next ten years, she pointed to the rise in the number of people, particularly women, who do not practice a religion.
“Young women are really shedding religious labels for a lot of reasons,” Deckman said, adding that many women who leave organized religion are unhappy with their faiths’ approach to LGBTQ issues and how many religious traditions view women.
There have been periods of religious reawakening in US history, but the data she sees does not suggest that is happening at the moment, in part because of a multi-generational shift away from organized religion.
“If you haven’t grown up in a faith tradition, the odds are that you’re not going to necessarily become religious later in life,” said, adding that Vance is an exception to that rule.
While the data does not show a religious reawakening, she argued Americans could be in need of the kind of connection that organized religion offers.
“I do think Americans are craving an authentic face-to-face experience,” she said. “As we become more isolated and spending more time online, it seems that houses of worship might be that kind of place where people could actually have meaningful interaction, and there are lots of positive things that, you know, being part of a faith community provides.”
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