Election Day is here and, if you’ve been following the news, you know that staggering numbers of Americans have already cast their votes. Once again, journalists face the challenge of covering the many religion-news angles that have played major roles in this drama.

During the final days of the campaign, a new poll showed that — as common in recent decades — approximately four in 10 Americans say that they factor in personal religious beliefs into their voting decisions.

The survey, conducted by the Saint Leo University Polling Institute, asked 1,500 people — 500 of those voters in the battleground state of Florida — about the role of faith in American political life. Despite a growing number of Americans who no longer belong to an organized religion, faith continue to be a big factor in voting.  

The religious affiliations of Americans have been of particular interest during this election cycle since former Vice President Joe Biden is only the fourth major-party nominee in U.S. history to be Roman Catholic.

Highlighting the importance of faith is President Donald Trump’s continued courting of evangelical and devout Catholic voters across the country and particularly in battleground states he desperately needs to win. As a result, both Biden and Trump campaigns have been aggressively courting faith communities, especially Catholics across the Rust Belt states of Ohio and Pennsylvania.

“Even though some argue that religion is fading from public life, the private religious conviction of a large part of the electorate informs their vote choice,” said Frank Orlando, who serves as director of the Saint Leo University Polling Institute. “As long as this is the case, politicians will try to woo these voters using whatever means necessary.”

In terms of the presidential race, 51% of Catholics said they will support Biden, according to the poll released Wednesday, similar to 50.7% of overall respondents who will support the Democratic nominee. Those results mirror a recent EWTN News/RealClear Opinion Research poll that found 53% of Catholics favor Biden.

There are, of course, divisions among Catholics on political matters — often linked to the degree to which they practice their faith and defend the church teachings on, especially on moral theology. Click here for a GetReligion “typology” post — in use throughout the past decade — on the four basic kinds of Catholic voters.

The Saint Leo University poll also found:

* Those who identified as Protestant or non-denominational Christians, 57.4% agreed that many of their religious beliefs informs their voting — more than 14 percentage points higher than the overall sample.

* The percentage is slightly higher for Roman Catholics who were polled, of whom 44.4% said they rely on their religious beliefs before voting.

* Along party lines, roughly 58% of Republicans said religious beliefs informs their vote. Of Democrats, only 39.4% responded the same way.

* In terms of overall attitudes, 50% of respondents say America is largely a secular nation. Only 30% said the United States is a Christian country.

CONTINUE READING “For Many Americans, Religion Will Play A Major Role On Election Day,” by Clemente Lisi at Religion Unplugged.