Less than a quarter of all U.S. adults say they could tell the biblical Christmas story accurately, according to a LifeWay Research report published in early December.
Just over 1,000 adults were asked to respond to the question, “How much of the Christmas story found in the Bible could you tell from memory?” Only 22% said, “I could tell it accurately.”
By comparison, 31% said, “I could tell it, but some details might be missing or wrong,” 25% said, “I could only give a quick overview,” 17% said, “I couldn’t tell any of it,” and 5% didn’t answer.
Evangelical respondents (46%) were more likely than non-evangelicals (15%) to say they could tell the story accurately, while those who attend worship services four or more times each month (45%) were far more likely than those who attend 1-3 times (24%) or less than once a month (13%) to say they could do so.
Despite the limited number of respondents who could accurately share the Christmas narrative, a strong majority (91%) plan to celebrate Christmas this year.
Nearly all Catholics (99%) and Protestants (97%) will observe Christmas, while 82% of the religiously unaffiliated and 74% of respondents from other faith traditions plan to do so.
Evangelicals (95%) were slightly more likely than non-evangelicals (90%) to say they’ll celebrate Christmas.
The margin of error is plus-or-minus 3.3%. The full report is available here.
Managing editor for news and opinion at Good Faith Media.
