Religious People Are More Generous

The results of a Gallup Poll released last week confirm that those who attend religious services are more likely to be generous in how they use their resources and time. The research discovered the difference in generosity, not only among Christians in the U.S., but also among all the major world religions. Those who attend religious services, even if they do not identify with any religion, have a higher rate of generosity.

Of those who had attended a religious service in the last seven days:

• Donated money to a charity (34%).
• Volunteered their time to an organization (26%).
• Helped a stranger (50%).

Of those who had not attended a religious service in the last seven days:

• Donated money to a charity (26%).
• Volunteered their time to an organization (18%).
• Helped a stranger (41%).

In 90 percent of the countries surveyed, Gallup found a statistically significant positive relationship between religious attendance and donations.

The results of the study are based on telephone and face-to-face interviews with more than 240,000 adults, aged 15 and older, conducted between 2005 and 2009 in 145 countries. Those who were interviewed were asked to report their generous behavior only from the past month. For the complete report, visit the Gallup Poll Web site.