The General Social Survey asked respondents if it is true that: "I sometimes try to get even rather than forgive and forget." Below you see the answers by religious affiliation.
All groups have higher rates of vengefulness than Christians, including the "nones." This makes sense since Christianity stresses forgiveness.
Among Christians, those that attend church all the time are the most forgiving.
And nowadays many of the people with no religion like to accuse devout Christians of being the haters.
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ReplyDeleteOf course, answers to pollsters may not reflect actual behavior. Christians know that they are supposed to 'forgive'. What would be interesting would be some experiment to see if they really do 'forgive' more than other groups, as opposed to giving the right answer to a poll-taker.
ReplyDeleteAnd: is it actually the case that this data was based on polling 19 Jews and 7 Muslims? Sample size?
Yes, that's the correct numbers for Jews and Muslims. Generally speaking, attitudes are correlated with behavior.
DeleteActions speak louder than words, I'm afraid.
ReplyDelete