What we do with our money tells us something about what sort of people we are, including our values in life. From this perspective, the findings of a recent YouGov poll would seem to indicate that religion does not feature high on our rank order of priorities.
YouGov interviewed online a representative sample of 1,903 adult Britons aged 18 and over on 6 and 7 October. They were asked a couple of questions about how they would donate £10 for charitable purposes.
Given thirteen options for donating this money, and being invited to select up to three, charities for the advancement of religion came bottom of the list, chosen by a mere 2%. This proportion did not vary across demographic sub-groups.
The only other option to mention religion (albeit peripherally) was ‘the advancement of human rights, conflict resolution or reconciliation or the promotion of religious or racial harmony or equality and diversity’. This scored 5% overall but was significantly more popular with Labour and Liberal Democrat voters than Conservatives.
Top of the list came charities for the advancement of health or the saving of lives (44%), for the assistance of those in need (32%), for the prevention or relief of poverty (19%), for animal welfare (19%), and for the promotion of the armed forces or emergency services (13%). Some of these charities will naturally have religious links or roots.
Full data tables from this poll are available at:
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