Undeserved Trust Award: US Citizens have four times more confidence in their pastors than in their congressmen

The results of this Gallup poll are fascinating. It is indeed remarkable that Nancy Pelosi and company have the trust of only 12% of the population; the President, of only 26%; the Supreme Court, of just 32%. These are historical lows. Meanwhile, trust in the military is very high, at 72%. This is a credit to Petraeus and Odierno and to every grunt on the front line.

I’m not amazed that “church / organized religion” garners more trust, at 48%, than do doctors (35%) or teachers (33%). Doctors and teachers are not the saints some people make them out to be. But do pastors really deserve to be trusted so much by so many people? These high numbers are possible only because people answer the question with their own rabbi, priest, or pastor in mind, not the televangelists that dominate the airwaves.

Comments

[Iyov]

"church/organized religion" ≠ "priest/minister/rabbi"

[Iyov]

From the web page you link to:

"From 1973 through 1985, organized religion was the top rated institution. Today, just 48% of Americans are confident in organized religion, one of its lowest ratings ever. The lowest score for religion to date was 45% in 2002 at the height of the Catholic Church's priest sex abuse scandal."

[JohnFH]

Good eye, Iyov. It is of course reductive to conflate Congressmen with Congress, the President with the Presidency, and so on. But the correlations are probably very strong.

The poll caught my attention because, if I had to answer the generic question, "do you trust organized religion," I would answer, w/o hesitation, "No."