While most Americans remain distrustful of the church, a growing number say they have confidence in the institution. Currently, 36% say they trust the church, according to Gallup’s annual tracking poll.
For the past three years, the percentage of U.S. adults who said they had a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the church or organized religion has hovered near record lows. In 2022, trust fell to 31% of Americans and has been at 32% the last two years.
For the first time since 2020, however, the church has experienced a significant jump in trust. In 2025, 36% say they have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the church as an institution. The church was last that high in 2021 (37%).
Historic trends
Gallup began tracking U.S. adults’ confidence in the church as an institution in 1973. In 1975, 68% expressed a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the church.
After a downward trend, the church experienced a boost of confidence in 2001, as did most other national institutions after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The church rebounded to 60% for the first time since 1987. That year marked the last time at least 3 in 5 Americans had confidence in the church.
Most U.S. adults (52%) said they had a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the church as an institution in 2019, the last year a majority held that belief. In 2018, confidence levels fell below 40% for the first time. They edged above that mark in 2020, only to drop back below in 2021 and even further in 2022. Despite the 1-point increase in 2023 and the steady percentage in 2024, those years still marked the second-lowest percentages ever.
Political motivations
The increase since last year was driven primarily by a jump among Republicans. Compared to 2024, Republicans’ trust in the church increased by 15 points, from 49% to 64% this year.
With the election of President Donald Trump, Republicans grew in their trust of every institution measured in 2024 and 2025, except for the Supreme Court, which remained statistically flat by falling 1 percentage point.
Trust of the church among political independents grew by 2 percentage points – 28% to 30%. Democrats’ confidence in the church hovered around 1 in 5, falling 1 point to 21%.
As churchgoers increasingly say they prefer to be part of a congregation that shares their politics and non-Republicans are most likely to never attend church, congregations may grow politically segregated and struggle to reach those who aren’t Republican voters.
Low and growing trust areas
In addition to Democrats and independents, other demographics also report lower levels of confidence in the church.
Black (31%) and Hispanic Americans (33%) are less likely than white Americans (37%) to express a great deal or quite a lot of trust in the church or organized religion. Last year, however, just 30% of all non-white Americans said they trusted the church. Many groups that have previously had low levels of trust in the church grew in their confidence in 2025.
While Americans 55 and older are the most likely to express high trust in the church, all age demographics increased in their confidence. Older Americans grew from 39% to 42%, those 38 to 54 increased from 28% to 31%, and young adults had the highest jump, moving from 26% to 32%.
Other segments that saw increases since last year are those who attended some college but didn’t graduate (25% to 36%), those with annual household income of $50,000 or less (31% to 39%), and those with household incomes more than $100,000 (29% to 36%).
Also, men stayed statistically the same (36% in 2024 and 37% in 2025), but women jumped from 28% to 36%.
Institutional decline
In the most recent findings, only three institutions — small businesses (70%), the military (62%) and science (61%) — have the trust of a majority of Americans. The church is among the next tier, including the police (45%), higher education (42%), the medical system (32%), the presidency (30%) and banks (30%).
Fewer Americans say they trust the public schools (29%), the Supreme Court (27%), large tech companies (24%), newspapers (17%), the criminal justice system (17%) or big business (15%). The least trusted institutions are television news (11%) and Congress (10%).
In general, Americans have grown less trusting of institutions. The increases in confidence among Republicans have been largely offset by declines among Democrats. “The significant party shifts in confidence this year largely cancel each other out in the aggregate, and thus, Americans’ confidence in most institutions is unchanged or statistically similar to last year,” according to Gallup.
For example, while confidence in the presidency grew 73 points among Republicans since last year, trust in the institution fell 58 points among Democrats. Overall, trust in the presidency grew slightly from 26% in 2024 to 30% in 2025.
“While the loss of faith in key U.S. institutions may be hard to ever recover among political independents, partisans’ confidence is easily restored when their political party controls the institution. The flip side, of course, is that the confidence of the other party’s supporters declines when their party loses power,” wrote Megan Brenan in Gallup’s report.
“This suggests that confidence in U.S. institutions may be less about how well the institution performs its societal functions and more about who has the power to influence what the institution can do.”
The public’s average confidence level in the 14 institutions rated each year by Gallup since 1993 remains near historic lows. On average, 28% of U.S. adults currently have high levels of trust in those institutions, the same as 2024.
(EDITOR’S NOTE — Aaron Earls is a writer for LifeWay Christian Resources. This article originally appeared at research.lifeway.com.)
