The Times Poll : Believers' Views Differ on Doctrine, Sex, Afterlife, Public Policy

By RUSSELL CHANDLER

July 26, 1986 12 AM PT

Times Religion Writer

Americans who are religious tend to give consistent answers to key questions about doctrine, sexual issues, belief in the afterlife and public policy, the Los Angeles Times Poll has found.

Christian fundamentalists, for example, tend to be conservative in all four areas. Roman Catholics, on the other hand, tend to be slightly liberal in their responses to questions about doctrine, sex and life after death, but somewhat conservative on matters of public policy where religion is involved.

The Times’ survey also found clear leanings by different Protestant denominations toward conservatism or liberalism in these specific areas. Roughly nine out of 10 people interviewed said they were Christian.

In the survey, 2,405 adults were interviewed by telephone from July 9 to July 14. The overall margin of error for the survey was 3% in either direction.

Literal Interpretation

Christian fundamentalists--as identified by Times Poll director I. A. Lewis--made up 17% of the national sample. These people all said they believe that “the Bible is the actual word of God and is to be taken literally, word for word”; that they have “tried to encourage someone to believe in Jesus Christ or to accept Him as their Savior,” and that they “have been ‘born again’ or have had a ‘born-again’ experience.”

By a 2-1 margin, the fundamentalists are more likely than other Christians to believe in the creation of all living creatures in their present form within the last 10,000 years, rather than to believe in the evolution of life forms over millions of years.

The Christian fundamentalists are also very likely to say that “there is a devil who tempts you to evil and a hell to which sinners are condemned,” and that religion “can answer all or most of today’s problems.”

Bible Answers All

Baptists, who made up one-fifth of all respondents in the survey, are three times more likely to say that religion can answer all of life’s problems than are Roman Catholics, who made up 26% of the respondents.

Baptists are also the most likely to believe in hell and the devil, with 82% believing in them, while Presbyterians are the least likely: 52% answered positively while 39% said they do not believe in hell and the devil.

Differences between Baptists and several other denominations are even more striking on the matter of interpreting the Bible. While 55% of Baptists take a literal view of the Scriptures, only 22% of Lutherans and 19% of Presbyterians believe in an inerrant, literal Bible. Almost 40% of all other Protestants take that view, as do 24% of Catholics, according to the survey.

Divinity of Jesus

Catholics are nearly 2 1/2 times less likely to have tried to encourage someone to accept Jesus as Savior as are Baptists, 71% of whom said they have made such a witness. And while only one-fifth of Catholics and 22% of Lutherans say they are “born again,” 45% of Methodists and 69% of Baptists make this claim.

While 92% of Baptists and 84% of Catholics believe in the divinity of Jesus Christ--followed by 81% of Lutherans and 80% of Methodists--only two-thirds of Presbyterians hold this view. Four-fifths of other Protestants and 84% of people of all other Christian faiths think Jesus Christ was God.

Respondents who identified with a particular religious persuasion tended to answer a second set of questions about sexual issues with consistent conservative or liberal answers, the Poll found.

Almost 40% of fundamentalists--a higher ratio than other Christians--believe that acquired immune deficiency syndrome “is a punishment God has given homosexuals for the way they live.” They also are more likely than other Christians to favor the quarantining and isolation of AIDS patients.

Anti-Homosexual View

Fundamentalists believe by a margin of more than 2 to 1 over other Christians that homosexual acts between consenting adults in private should be illegal. While 64% of fundamentalists hold that view, only 29% of other Christians do; in fact, 59% of the latter believe that such sex acts should be legal.

While only 19% of Catholics believe that AIDS is a sign of God’s wrath, 28% of Presbyterians--who generally gave liberal answers to the poll--think so, the highest such response among major denominations surveyed.

Poll director Lewis also found a correlation between answers to these questions about sex and respondents’ opinions of the equal rights amendment; fundamentalists are more than 1 1/2 times more likely to oppose the ERA as are other Christians (30% to 17%).

Pornography Laws

Fundamentalists are also almost twice as likely as other Christians to approve of laws against the distribution of pornography to people of all ages; 61% of fundamentalists take that view. However, 56% of all other Christians would ban pornography for children under age 18.

Catholics are the least likely of the religious groups to approve of laws against pornography for all ages, with 35% choosing that response, contrasted with 45% of Baptists and 39% of Lutherans. A number of Catholic bishops, including Archbishop Roger Mahony of Los Angeles, recently have been outspoken in their condemnation of pornography.

Predictably, 98% of all respondents who said they are religious believe in “God or a universal spirit,” and almost 90% of respondents in all religious groups said religion is important in their personal lives. (Presbyterians are lowest at 83%.)

Life After Death

Although fewer respondents answered as positively regarding their belief in life after death, there was little difference between Lutherans, 79%, Presbyterians, 78%, Methodists 77%, Baptists, 75%, and Catholics, 74%. And nearly half of all respondents who identified with non-Christian religions or no religion said they believe in life after death.

Except for Baptists, a majority of members of all major religious faiths do not regularly watch television preachers. Two-thirds of Catholics, the highest non-watching group, gave that response. The televangelist who is most apt to be viewed by all religious groups is Billy Graham. Among the other television preachers, Jerry Falwell has no greater a percentage of followers among Christians than he does of non-Christians, the poll found.

More than half of all respondents in the poll were not aware enough of Pat Robertson, the Virginia Beach, Va., Christian television talk-show host who is running as a Republican candidate in the 1988 presidential race, to express an opinion of him. No more than one-third of the members of any religious group in the Times survey have a favorable impression of the Baptist minister.

Clergy in Politics

Indeed, 20% of Lutherans and 18% of Baptists have an unfavorable impression of Robertson, and only 14% of Baptists and a scant 4% of Lutherans and 4% of Presbyterians said they would be inclined to vote for him.

In every religious grouping--except for Methodists, who are split--more respondents disapprove than approve of clergy taking public political stands, and each of the groups feels even more strongly against clergy who preach politics from the pulpit. Most denominational groups tend to disapprove of clergy running for public office, but both Baptists and Presbyterians are split evenly over the issue.

Interestingly, nearly half of the Roman Catholics surveyed oppose their bishops taking public stands on political issues, such as the hierarchy’s recent letters on arms limitations and a nuclear freeze, and only 36% said they approve of such statements.

Public Policy

In fact, a smaller percentage of Baptists than of Catholics oppose the issue, but 35% of the Baptists said they didn’t know about the Catholic bishops’ statements, or have no opinion on the subject.

The category of respondents most in favor of Catholic bishops taking political stands, at 41%, is made up of Jews and people of non-Christian faiths.

While a number of questions were asked about public policy, the important cluster of issues that underlie the religious respondents’ answers in this area concerns birth control, capital punishment and federal aid for abortions.

From 57% (Catholics) to 74% (Lutherans) of all religious groups favor artificial means of birth control. At least 72% of each group (Lutherans are highest at 86%) favor the death penalty for people convicted of murder. And no more than 42% (Presbyterians) of any group favor a law that would prohibit the use of federal funds for abortions. Only a third of Catholics approve of such a law, according to the poll.

Defense Spending

Catholics are highest (18%) on favoring more government spending for national defense as well as more for domestic programs (48%), while Presbyterians at 8% are lowest on more defense spending and Baptists are lowest on more domestic spending (38%). A majority of all groups favor a mutually verifiable nuclear freeze.

Nearly a third of fundamentalists favor making Christianity the official religion of the land, while only 11% of other Christians favor such a move. Presbyterians and Lutherans oppose the idea the most.

While slightly more than half of the Catholics surveyed favor federal aid to parochial schools, less than a majority of all other religious groups approve of the measure. Presbyterians are the most in disagreement, by more than a 2-1 margin.

Public-School Prayer

Public-school prayer is favored, however. Baptists lead with an 85% favorable response, and even the Presbyterians and Lutherans, the two groups that oppose the measure the most, still have a 70% favorable response.

All religious groups approve of continued separation of church and state. But Baptists, despite a strong history of approving separation, agree with the provision by the lowest margin of any major denomination. Presbyterians responded favorably by the highest margin--more than 5 to 1.

But people of non-Christian religions agree with the policy almost 9 to 1--the most decisively of all--with 86% favoring the traditional wall between government and religion.

RELIGIOUS IDENTITY

These are Los Angeles Times Poll results of a nationwide survey of 2,405 adults. Here is how respondents identified their religion:

No Religion 6%

Roman Catholic 26%

Baptist 20%

Methodist 9%

Lutheran 7%

Presbyterian 4%

Episcopal 2%

United Church of Christ 2%

Christian (Disciples) 2%

Other Protestant 8%