11:00 A.M. EDT
Real Audio of Briefing 
MS. ARCHIBEQUE: Good morning, and welcome to the Washington Foreign Press Center. Today we have with us Mr. John Zogby, CEO -- President and CEO of Zogby International, and Professor William Green from the University of Rochester. They're here today to present to you the first global poll on major religions.
Mr. Zogby.
MR. ZOGBY: Hi. What I would like to do right at the outset is just ask you what nations you are from. And so if we could start with the woman over here in the second row, who -- what press?
QUESTION: Japanese press.
QUESTION: I'm from India.
MR. ZOGBY: Yes. I recognize you.
QUESTION: (Inaudible).
MR. ZOGBY: Okay.
QUESTION: South Africa.
MR. ZOGBY: Ah, great.
QUESTION: Korea.
QUESTION: Philippines.
QUESTION: Japan, also.
QUESTION: Russia.
MR. ZOGBY: Okay.
QUESTION: I'm with the Japanese press.
MR. ZOGBY: Okay, that's terrific.
Let me begin by saying that this is a great project and the first of its kind and the first in a series. And what it does is it represents the joining of two forces from upstate New York -- the University of Rochester, a very prominent academic institution, and Zogby International, a humble political polling outfit in upstate New York.
This idea was born over a lunch just a little over a year ago. And let me tell you a few things that would be in the preface, which I don't have in front of me, but you can sort of picture the document in your mind.
Too often, when religion is discussed, assumptions are made by people who feel that they know all about religion, when in reality what have discovered is that most of us know very little about our own religion, let alone the religion of others.
And so the reason why this project is so vital is that really, for the first time worldwide, we are beginning to collect hard, empirical data on the attitudes, the beliefs, the ethical framework, the politics and the behavior of several of the world's great religions.
So this study, then, is thus an effort to fill in a major gap. I will explain the methodology in a minute, after I get through some of the high points of the preface. But there are several aspects of the methodology that we need to understand.
First of all, we could not do, budget-wise, every country and every religious group. And so we selected religious groups not only because they were of particular interest, but also because they represented some of the specialties of the wonderful Religion Department at the University of Rochester.
Secondly, I have a saying when I talk about polling in areas that are difficult to conduct polls, and I quote from "The Wizard of Oz," by suggesting that, "We're not in Kansas anymore." And so very simply, our people were arrested in the streets of Moscow as they were conducting the poll for vagrancy.
In addition to that, we opted for what we call, "convenience samples." And so while the polls in the United States were conducted nationwide, and in Israel were conducted nationwide, we opted for major urban centers in all the other countries. And so we polled Russian Orthodox in Moscow. We polled Catholics in Lima, Peru. We polled Saudi Muslims in Riyadh and Jeddah.
In India, we polled Indian Muslims and Indian Hindus in the Delhi area. In Korea we opted for the city of Seoul where we polled both Christians and Buddhists. Am I leaving out a country? In Israel, as I said -- nationwide.
These are some of the major findings that we discovered: Number one, that as a personal goal, religion is far more important to people than politics. Number two, very importantly, and we'll underscore this throughout, religious leaders are not necessarily the most important source of religious teaching, as you'll see. Number three, most groups polled acknowledged the possibility of multiple paths to religious truth and the equality of practitioners of other religions, although as we'll see, there are exceptions among South Korean Christians and Saudis -- Saudi Muslims.
American Catholics and mainstream Protestants in the U.S. are almost identical in their views, and on this view, they're also the most flexible in accepting religious truths and other paths among other religions. And number four; the majority of the communities -- religious communities surveyed -- do not associate religion with trouble and unrest or with violence in their own countries. The exceptions, possibly, are Israeli Jews and Indian Hindus who are most likely to see a relationship between unrest and religion, but even their position is not anywhere near a majority position.
And so in conclusion in this preface, religion remains a significant force in the lives of most people, but its role varies across cultures, as we'll see. Religion is one of the few activities that separate human beings from our mammal cousins. It offers us a source of strength in time of trouble. It offers us a broader purpose to our lives on earth. It offers us an ethical framework upon which to guide our lives. But maybe even more than that, religious -- or religion offers us a set of goals against which we can measure, assess and grasp the meaning of our daily lives.
Above all, religion defines much of what we are and much of who we are. Too often, I think, we focus on religion as a source of what separates us from each other, when often, as we'll see; religion can really define our commonalities.
Students of religion have always been struck by the frequent, overlapping symbols, historical myths and ethical codes that the world's great religions share. Religion, as we'll see, can build bridges among people as much as it can create chasms.
Let me end with just two thoughts that are in the preface. The first is a thought by a British historian, eminent historian, named Theodore Zeldin who has written an incredible book over the last few years entitled -- in the last few years entitled, "The Hidden History of Humankind." And in his book, what he displays is the fact that all of us who populate this planet are really, culturally, the sons and daughters of everyone who has preceded us. All of us, in some way, share the traditions of all of the cultures and philosophies that have populated this planet from the beginning. That's Zeldin's book.
Another important book along this vein is the recent book by Steve Olson entitled, "Mapping Human History," where he talks about the results, early results of the human genome project and states, categorically, consistent with Theodore Zeldin, that genetically, we are all the sons and daughters of all of the people in all of the cultures that have populated this planet.
I recommend the book, and I suggest to you that you read his conclusion, in particular, where he tells a very moving story relevant to that point. There is much in our global religion background that bonds us together.
On the other hand, understand, please, it's politics, nationalism, demagoguery, greed, fanaticism -- these are the forces that tear us apart, not religion. We hope that this first survey will not only be used by scholars yearning for hard data, but also will provide helpful information for those who wish to create common ground with our neighbors worldwide. This preface was co-authored by the Dean of the college at the University of Rochester, Bill Green.
Let me tell you that Bill and I conceived this project together and implemented it with no problems, whatsoever. But the enthusiasm and the scholarship that Bill, in addition to being Dean, is also Professor of Judaism at the University of Rochester, I think is emblematic of the kind of great institution for higher learning that the University of Rochester represents and presents to its students. And so it is an honor for me, not only to work with the University of Rochester, but to introduce my colleague, Bill Green.
MR. GREEN: I need to echo John's words. This has been a very productive and interesting and exciting collaboration. Not every polling organization has strong intellectual interests. Zogby International does. And we think we've been able to do some very good work together.
I also want to stress, you have a list in your packet of my colleagues in the Department of Religion and Classics, who really worked on the religions and the countries they know best. And I encourage you to e-mail them and call them if you want to talk about responses on particular religions or in particular, particular countries.
I can -- I want to go over some of these results very generally with you. But if there are specific, specific country questions, I think -- I think you want to call them. Let's first, if you would, if you have your charts with you, which I think are in your packet, what I'd like to do is run through them very quickly. And we might start with the first table, Table One, which lists the importance of personal goals. And I think you can see that there are some very interesting differences.
For Korean Christians, for instance, among all of the groups surveyed, religion is the highest of the personal goals. And you can see it ranked lower, I think. It's -- for Israeli Jews, being actively religious is eighth; and for Russian Orthodox being actively religious is ninth, so that there is quite a span of opinion. For all of the other groups, aside from the Korean Christians, being actively religious is a lower priority than both being well educated and spending time with family so that education and family rank higher. Family, you'll see, is a theme that runs throughout. We really are very family-oriented as a species and you can see it running through all these results. For all groups except South Korean Christians and American Born Again Christians, achieving economic security is more important than being actively religious.
The one thing I would just urge you to, just urge you to read this results with some caution. We have ranked them in terms of the numbers of responses, but some of these numbers cluster very closely together. So, for example, if you look at the Born Again Protestant, American Born Again Protestant figure, although religion is ranked number six in terms of high priority with 56 percent, it's -- excuse me, although -- yeah, religion is ranked fourth -- sorry -- at 84 percent, it clusters very closely with education at 85 percent and achieving a skill at 87, so it's very much in the same range and is well within the margin of error.
Same is true for Indian Muslims, where religion is 86th, but giving charity is 84 percent, achieving a skill is 87, being with family is 88 -- again within the margin of error, so it's virtually number three. For Hindus, it's virtually number four; for Israeli Muslims, it's virtually four, and for Saudis, it's virtually two, even though the percentage is lower, is lower than 60 percent.
Among Peruvian Catholics and Russian Orthodox, American Catholics, Israeli Jews, mainstream Protestants and South Korean Buddhists, the difference between religion and the more highly ranked is much -- is a much, is a much greater difference. I mean, so the lower ranking means more among those groups, the number, than it does among the -- than it does among the groups that I just mentioned.
We, we asked folks, we asked people about their frequency of worship. And if you look at Table Two, you can get a very quick scan of that and you can see interesting and significant differences. A majority of Muslims and Hindus and South Korean Christians say that they engage in religious practices, including worship, more than once a week. Muslims, Hindus, American Born Again Christians and South Korean Christians worship once a week -- 84 percent of them say they worship once a week or more.
Those figures change for Peruvian Catholics, where it's 47; South Korean Buddhists, 20; Russian Orthodox, 26; and Israeli Jews, 36 percent; so that you get, also, a continuum and a range of how active people are in terms of practicing their religion on a weekly basis.
We can look quickly at Table Three, which we thought was -- produced some interesting results. We asked people about their view as to the consequences of disobeying their -- the teachings of their religion. And here the results are interesting across the board. More than 60 percent of American Born Again Christians, American Catholics and Korean Christians, and more than 80 percent of Peruvian Catholics and Hindus, and over 95 percent of all the Muslims surveyed say they will suffer negative consequences if they disobey their religion, either in this life or the next life, or both.
By contrast, 48 percent of American mainstream Protestants, 45 percent of South Korean Buddhists and 32 percent of Israeli Jews hold this position. And if you go -- if you take the bottom two registers on Table Three -- about there being no consequences and people saying they're not sure, if you assume that the "not sure" means that this is not a doubt, it's not "I don't know, but this isn't an issue on which I have a -- on which I'm worried or have a strong opinion," the South Korean Buddhists and the Israeli Jews register very strongly on the side of not being too terribly concerned about the consequences of disobedience. And this might help explain how religion works as a motivator.
Table Four tells us that for almost everywhere, reinforcing the notion of the importance of family, parents are the most important teachers of religion or transmitters of religion within a family, except for the Russian Orthodox, where grandparents were slightly higher, reflecting part of the history of the development of religion in Russia.
Table Five, which talks about people who are outside the family, you need to do two pages there. The top one is categorized by nation, but the bottom two -- the bottom two surveys will show you the difference. The -- you can see that religious leaders -- okay -- for more than -- if you go outside the family, 61 percent of South Korean Christians see religious leaders as their primary source of religious instruction, and a substantial minority of American Protestants and American Catholics also regard leaders as the most important source of religious instruction outside the family.
What we found is for Christians in general, institutional religion seems to be more important and religious leaders play the leading role, although not necessarily the majority role, as a source of religious instruction. But for South Korean Buddhists and Saudis and Russian Orthodox Christians, friends are the most important. 42 percent of Saudis say friends are the most important source of religious instruction outside their family. And Peruvian Catholics, Indian and Israeli Muslims, Hindus and Israeli Jews -- teachers are the most important source outside the family.
So it suggests that the way religion is transmitted varies from culture to culture. It's not necessarily powerfully institutional, and religious leaders can't automatically be assumed to be the primary sources of information, and perhaps not to also speak comprehensively for the people among their -- among their religious communities.
Interestingly, among Israeli Jews and Russian Orthodox, over 25 percent either don't know or say there is no one outside their family who is a source of religious instruction for them.
If you look at Tables Six and Seven, these we thought were very instructive. These have to do with how religious communities regard their own teachings and the -- and people of other religions. And here the results are clear. If you ask about whether you consider people of other religious faiths to be equal to you, the vast majority in all communities, with the exception of South Korean Christians and Saudis, say that they do regard other people of other religions as equal.
And then if you look at -- I think it's Table Six -- is that the "Evaluating the True Path to God?" Table Six is very interesting because here we get into questions about, do you think your religion is the only way to achieve that ultimate result? And the majority, except in the same two groups, except for the Saudis and the South Koreans, the majority hold a position, in principle, that acknowledges the possibility of the effectiveness of other, of other religions besides their own, which shows a general view among all these groups of an acknowledgement of religious pluralism and the viability of different religions, at least in principle.
It's very instructive that American Catholics and mainstream Protestants, the majority in both of those, hold a strictly -- I mean, a very strongly pluralistic position. In fact, it's the most pluralistic in the world.
However -- and I don't know whether this will surprise you or not -- those -- the view that other people, people of different religions, are equal to you and that other religions may be religious efficacious, does not correlate with attitudes about interfaith marriage. And as you can see from Table Eight, the majority of South Korean Christians and Hindus and Israelis Jews and Muslims disapprove of marriage outside their religion. And since not all these groups are religious, I think there are probably powerful communal factors at work in shaping their attitudes about who they want to bring into their -- into their families.
I think one of the things we are learning is that it's possible for people to believe that there are different religions in the world besides theirs that work, that -- and to respect practitioners of other religions as equal, but not necessarily to want them as in-laws. And I can tell there are -- I've been in many situations where you can get precisely into this kind of discussion where people are happy to do business and be friends, but are -- but family issues come to the fore on questions of marriage. And you can see that, too, as a strong strain of family interest as it runs across all these different groups.
Finally, in Table Ten, interesting, interesting results. Actually, you can take Ten and Eleven together, I think. Or maybe Ten has both of these on them, but the majority of the groups surveyed do not associate religion with trouble and unrest in their own country.
And likewise, on the question of violence, when people are given the choice between asking whether violence is to be associated with -- violence in their own countries -- associated with religion or associated with politics, the majority say that religion is, that violence is to be associated with politics rather than religion. And that we think that's a very interesting correlation -- and this is from India and from Israel both, where there is violence, and which people often associate with religion.
And, finally, we asked people about the impact of a more religious society on their country. And as you can see, except for the Buddhists in South Korea, if you look at Table Eleven, all of the groups, the majority, say that a more religious society would help their country. This may correlate with the view that religion is a more important personal goal than politics, but it certainly suggests that the people we surveyed are not afraid of religion and don't see religion as a negative factor in shaping their collective national life, even if they, themselves, are not overwhelmingly religious.
I mean, a 51 percent figure among Israeli Jews, who are very, very secular suggest that even there, there's not a fear that more religious sensibility might produce advantages [sic] to, to society. So I think in the end we've gotten a -- we sort of can paint a picture, start with these personal goals, and see the way -- different ways religion plays out, but certainly learn that religion is not to be associated with attitudes of exclusivism or superiority over others, necessarily; it doesn't automatically connect to violence, even though it's a very popular conception that religion breeds violence; and religion is massively more important than politics. In fact, one of the things that's worth doing on this chart is to just chart -- plot the difference in percentages between those who think religion is important and those who think politics is important, and the difference is really extraordinary across the board.
Politics is the lowest value, personal goal, for all groups except American Christians, for whom it's the second lowest goal -- and American Christians, the lowest goal is traveling outside the United States. And you can speculate on the reasons for that position.
So, now we're open to questions and comments, and refutations, rebuttals, whatever is on your mind.
QUESTION: I'm Parasuram from the Press Trust of India. I was wondering, on the basis of your poll, what lesson does it have for the political leaders of religious countries?
MR. ZOGBY: That religion should be respected, instead of used for political purposes; that too often some political leaders exploit the symbols of religious groups in order to mobilize a constituency for their own purposes when, at least in this seminal study, we have found that religion is a very personal, very familial, in many ways a very private sort of thing that people respect.
MR. GREEN: I think another way to say that -- granted, we, we frame the questions in terms of religion or politics. But the respondents answered the questions. And I think it's -- another lesson for political leaders is that religious practitioners are maybe more subtle than people are giving them credit for in being able to distinguish between religious activity and political, and political activity.
I think the lack of an association with violence, where it would be easy to do, is very telling. And I think what you're hearing is that people do not -- minimally, that may suggest that people do not see the seeds of violence in their own religion. And that's a very -- that's an important result, I think. And the low level of interest of politics -- I mean, there are lots of -- I don't want to over-interpret that without lots of other data, but it may suggest that people don't see politics as a way of solving problems.
They're not -- they're certainly not rushing to get involved according to this poll, anyway.
Yes.
QUESTION: Thank you. Mahmoud Saughay from South Africa, and I'm with a Muslim newspaper. Very interesting results. There are two questions I have. Firstly, John, in your preface you mentioned two parts of the world, or two countries in which the relationship between violence and religion was drawn, and you mentioned Israel and India. I was sort of puzzled because there was no reference to Islam or Muslims or any Muslim country. Can you just contextualize that?
MR. GREEN: I think what he said is according -- if you look at the surveys, the largest -- let's go to the chart. I think, is the easiest way to do that. If you go to the chart, I think all John was doing was describing --
MR.ZOGBY: Yes, the very last -- the second one to the last.
MR. GREEN: Yes.
QUESTION: Well, that same chart has no result for Saudi Arabia, which --
MR. ZOGBY: One in '99.
QUESTION: One in '99?
MR. GREEN: Right.
QUESTION: So --
MR. GREEN: Right.
MR. ZOGBY: (Inaudible) is part of Religion in '99. You're right. It's not written in. I'm just giving that to you now.
QUESTION: Okay.
MR. ZOGBY: Yeah. One said that it was part religion, in '99 said that it was not.
MR. GREEN: Okay. I think, actually, that the -- that was the -- what he was referring to, if you go to the table on Religion as a Source of Trouble and Unrest -- all right -- as opposed to the violence one.
MR. ZOGBY: Table Nine.
QUESTION: Okay.
MR. GREEN: Table Nine, where you see that -- actually, if we had been more accurate, we would have said, Table Nine, 46 percent of Israeli Jews think that religion is a source of trouble and unrest, 44 percent of mainstream Protestants, and 40 percent of Indian Hindus. That's the large -- those are the largest minorities, but those still remain minority positions. I think that was the point he was trying to make. And there are probably reasons for that. I think -- again, extrapolating -- if you talk to Israelis about religion being a source of trouble and unrest, what that may symbolize is not only talking about religions outside of Judaism, but also within Israel there is lots of religious strife between very religious people and less religious people, so that religion is a touchtone there.
It may be that mainstream Protestants also see lots of issues on -- with the so-called Religious Right and some -- and issues in the Roman Catholic Church, so they will associate religion with trouble and unrest. It doesn't mean violence, particularly, but -- so what we were pointing out is the higher minorities are there, but they're still the minority view, and that's what was interesting.
MR. ZOGBY: If I could just add a point -- if I could add a point that's somewhat relevant, you'll notice throughout here, in several of the tables, an interesting divergence among the three different faces of Islam that we tested: that the views are rather different among Israeli Muslims, Indian Muslims, and Saudi Muslims, which leads, I think, to the possible conclusion that Islam, like Catholicism and other religions, adjusts itself to its national environment and surroundings.
MR. GREEN: For example, on the issues of equality, and particularly on the questions of religious exclusivism -- excuse me -- on the questions on religious exclusivism, there is a big difference between the Saudi responses and the responses of the Israeli and Indian Muslims, who are living in a pluralistic environment.
The only thing I would caution is that pluralism by itself may not be the only -- may not breed that because you can see that the South Korean Christians share a, the perspective -- they're much more likely to have an exclusivist answer, but South Korea is a country of more than one religion, too. So it's -- there are interesting local things to be examined in terms of the national culture that produced these two different results.
QUESTION: Yeah. I'm Hiro Aida with Kyodo News, Japan's Kyodo News. The first question, a small question, is what's the definition of this USA Born Again, you know, the by profession -- they just said they are Born Again Christians?
MR. ZOGBY: Yeah. Understand that what we did is we based this on self-identification. And so very simply, when we poll in the United States, normally we will ask religious affiliation, including no affiliation at all. And then, there is a follow-up question to those who identify themselves as "Protestant" or "Christian denomination other than Catholic." We then ask them, "Do you consider yourself to be a Born Again or Evangelical Christian?" It's asked among a subgroup of Protestants. In this poll, because we were only screening for Roman Catholics and for Protestants, this subgroup is a subgroup among those who identified themselves as Protestants. And it's purely self-identification.
QUESTION: My other question is a little bit -- well, maybe an analytical type, but -- well, here in the Table Six, you said that -- well, USA Catholic and USA mainstream people said -- well, it's 63 percent and 61 percent of a so-called "pluralistic attitudes of Americans," but don't you think this has something to do with the individualistic attitudes of the American people?
MR. GREEN: Absolutely. I think we're both in agreement on this that, as I said earlier about Islam, Christianity -- look at the difference between USA Catholics and Peruvian Catholics. Religious groups do tend to adopt the national traditions of and, you know, and beliefs of the society in which they live.
MR. ZOGBY: But one of the issues of this survey is to show, also, where religions -- when they resist. So the, I mean, the comparison between American Catholics and Peruvian Catholics is interesting, but the comparison between mainstream Protestants and Born Again is equally interesting. And there you see the percentages are very different although, maybe to underscore your point -- I think this is more relevant for an American audience than maybe for anybody else -- but the Born Again Protestants are a lot more tolerant, I think, than a lot of people would expect them to be.
I mean, you've still got only 41 percent saying, "My religion offers the only true path," so that the percentages are higher and you'll see that there are also differences in attitudes toward inter-marriage. The Born Again Protestants are -- is a higher percent that disapproves than for mainstream Protestants and Catholics.
There is a very interesting convergence between mainstream Protestants and Catholics almost throughout this, this poll, except on the attitude of trouble and unrest where the mainstream Protestants think religion makes more trouble than Catholics and Born Again think it does.
MR.GREEN: See, I think that we shatter some myths. And I can tell you in, in all other surveys that we've done over the years, when we take out that and examine closely that group that identifies themselves in the United States as Born Again Christians, approximately one-third of them also identify themselves as political liberals. So they are not necessarily what they appear to be on television when their loudest voices speak.
QUESTION: Sharma from Decca Herald. I was wondering whether you have commented on this before, but how do you interpret these two figures -- "frequency of worship" and "consequences of disobedience to faith?" If one was to look at the figures, it will appear as if the more homogenous, the more conservative Muslim society of Saudi Arabia is much more liberal than the Indian Muslims --
MR. GREEN: Yes.
QUESTION: -- which, I don't know whether they were fooling you, or what were they saying?
MR. GREEN: No, I -- I'm going to -- I should just be quiet because I don't really know. I mean, I'm not an expert on Saudi Arabia, but I would encourage you to call my colleague, Imo Homran (ph), who will talk about this, but it may -- I should be quiet, I'm going to get way out of --
MR. ZOGBY: I'll punch you if it's --
MR. GREEN: It may be that the homogeneity is that what you see in Saudi Arabia is a kind of cultural Islam, so that Islam is the norm, and people are comfortable with, they're comfortable with the religious -- because it's so pervasive in their lives -- sort of the way you see Catholicism among the Peruvians -- where it's sort of the way things are and so although religion is a -- is an important priority for Saudis, it's only 58 percent -- I mean, it's the smallest percentage among the Muslims who rank it with that, with that percentage. And that's one of the anomalies.
We noticed this all the way through, that there were areas in where they -- where the Saudis seemed to be more open in some ways than people expected. And it may, it may be part of that. But it -- I would, I would encourage you to call my colleague or e-mail him, because he's thought about this and can, can make some -- much better generalizations that I can.
QUESTION: Could it be that they were under great psychological pressure to say something to the country because American interviewers were interviewing them?
MR. ZOGBY: No, these were not American interviewers, all of the interviews were done by nationals, and people that we've used before. One thing that we need to understand about Saudi Arabia, for example, is that we have polled Saudi Arabia 13, 14, 15 times now in the last four or five years, and there are nuanced results -- enough nuances in the results of the economic polls, political polls, polls about religion, to suggest that we are getting honest answers.
If I saw all answers as 99-1 or 95-5, then I would certainly question the credibility of the survey, but they're -- the answers are all over the place, which is a good sign of the honesty of the respondents.
QUESTION: You don't suspect the figures, like Saudi Arabian Muslims saying, "I will be punished in this life," only 8 percent saying that? I would think if you were to poll Christians in America, many more will be saying that "I will be punished."
MR. ZOGBY: They think they're going to be punished afterwards. Right?
QUESTION: In this life, yeah.
MR. ZOGBY: But more so say they'll be punished afterwards.
QUESTION: Well, that's 14. It's still less. Nothing much compared to 34 in India and 15 is that --
MR. GREEN: Well, I don't -- I mean, I don't have any -- is, what John is saying is he hasn't got any reason to be suspicious of these figures is what I'm hearing you. Right?
MR. ZOGBY: Yeah.
MR. GREEN: I'll go back and --
FPC DIRECTOR: It’s 76 in this lifetime or the next. It’s the highest figure.
MR. ZOGBY: Pardon?
MR. GREEN: Yeah. 76, right.
MR. ZOGBY: -- say that they'll be punished in this life or the next. That's the -- those are the figures that I saw.
MR. GREEN: Right. Yeah. And that's consistent with Koranic teaching, as I understand it. And so the, I mean, idea is that there are consequences for religious disobedience is disobedience is what Islam teaches. And therefore, it's just the question is, "How many people are willing to say they think that," and then you'd get this, you know, this very interesting spread. What table was that again?
MR. GREEN: We'll get it. Here it is. Yeah, for the Saudis, it's 98 percent altogether. "We punish/suffer in both this world and the next." It's 76 percent. It's actually the highest. They're much more -- they're, I mean, they think it's -- they're going to get it twice, whereas, the others have separated it out. I think the interesting -- for me, the interesting figure, the more interesting figure is the, "There will be no consequences." And there you see really huge -- I mean, those differences are very stark. There are -- on this poll, none of the Muslim groups polled thinks that nothing will happen, compared to others where there is at least 10 percent or more in all the other groups who are sure nothing is going to happen.
QUESTION: Kiyon with Segye Times, Korea. I'd like to ask about the methodology. You said that you interviewed 600 Korean Christian and Buddhists. How did you select the people, the churchgoer and temple goers?
MR. GREEN: How did we --
QUESTION: Select the people, you know, you interviewed.
MR. ZOGBY: Yeah. These were all done within the city of Seoul. And every one of these surveys were prescreened, but we had quotas. So if we were polling for 600, we were looking for 300 self-identified Christians and 300 self-identified Buddhists. They were -- the surveys were done randomly, but if people did not identify themselves with either religious grouping, we did not poll them.
Okay. Sir.
QUESTION: From the perspective of a scholar of religions, what was the biggest surprise, if you saw this survey?
MR. GREEN: Well, there were lots of interesting things. I mean, there are -- certainly, the convergence of American Catholics and mainstream Protestants was interesting. The relative importance of religion over politics was very telling. And the fact that it was ubiquitous ought to cause all of us to pay attention. And I also think that people tend to associate religion with exclusivism and superiority over others. This says that that's a rash judgment to make. And we are -- we have been very quick, especially since September 11th, to immediately -- I mean, to connect religion and violence.
And here you see that people themselves don't make that association quickly, although there is a level of uncertainty about that. And I think that because religious ideas, as John said in "Symbols," are used often for political purposes that have nothing to do with advancing the goals of the religion. That's how you know it's being used for a political purpose. But, still, people are not willing to make that association.
And as I said at the outset, in the end, if you ask people, "Would a more religious society do your country harm or do your country ill [sic]?" There you get a religious question and a national question together. People are not afraid of their own religious heritages. I mean, they're not afraid that something awful will happen. They think, actually, it might make things better, which may correlate with what looks to be a certain lack of engagement with politics, or a lack of offense that politics -- I mean, it's hard to extrapolate why is politics such a low goal?
It may be because it doesn't offer us as much hope as religion does. That's a -- we'd have to ask that to find it out. But it’s a very -- it's very interesting that it is the lowest or the second lowest across the board by huge numbers. It's not just a little bit. It's really consistent.
MR. ZOGBY: For me, it's the divergence between what we tend to identify as the loudest voices among the religious leaders -- the most intense voices and the most intense followers -- the divergence between them and everyone else within that religious grouping. I recall Iran was a secular society, perhaps the most secular society in the region in 1970s. And I always recall that while tens of thousands were marching and demonstrating daily outside the U.S. Embassy, that it was also reported three or four blocks away in every direction, vendors vended, children went to school, and people went on with life normally.
I think what we have here is a reality check -- that there is a divergence between those who would utilize religion most intensively to generate some sort of political goal versus ordinary people who conduct their lives and treat their religion as a very private, familial sort of thing.
QUESTION: I'm really surprised at the results you have in Table Three for "Disobedience to Faith." Judaism and Israel -- there are 40 percent of Jews who believe there will be no consequences in this life?
MR. ZOGBY: Yes. That's what they said, "No consequences, period."
QUESTION: Yeah, "No consequences, period." Is that consistent with Jewish teachings?
MR. GREEN: Well, I think there's a wide diversity, even within Judaism. Very traditional Judaism certainly sees -- has an attitude of reward and punishment. But more liberal Judaism has long ago abandoned that idea. I think what you've got here is that there's a very strong secular trend in Israeli society, as there appears to be among South Korean Buddhists as well.
And so if people are -- people are not -- if they're observing, they're not necessarily observing because they're worried that there's going to be -- that there's going to be some kind of negative consequence. But there's a wide -- there's a wide -- I mean, the standard liturgy, if you read the liturgy, the liturgy says, "If I did the wrong things I need to repent, and there are consequences, and the wages of sin is death." The Bible says that, Judaism says that, Christianity says that. I'm not sure quite if Islam says that, but if it doesn't, it gets close. So there are consequences. Here, they're not worried about it.
QUESTION: It surprise me that Islam, Judaism and Christianity are regarded as the Abrahamic faiths, and there is a remarkable consistency in that particular aspect of the beliefs.
MR. GREEN: Yes.
QUESTION: But this seems to be a very liberal --
MR. ZOGBY: But look at mainstream Protestants. They're not that far behind. They're only 9 percent behind. And the American Catholics, almost 30 percent say there will be no consequences. So, I mean, it may be that the Israeli Jews are a little ahead on that trend but I think it's very interesting that you see -- these are pretty high -- those are pretty high figures across the board.
QUESTION: My point is precisely this. Are these indicators of doctrine or diversity, or just perceptions of the actual believers in the various religions?
MR. ZOGBY: Oh, well, we didn't test doctrine in this poll. What you got here is what ordinary people asked an ordinary question, if you ask them, "Do you think something is going to happen to you if you don't go to church often? Do you think something bad is going to happen to you if you don't observe the dietary laws or don't observe the Sabbath?" People said either -- they said yes or no. And large numbers of them -- the Israeli Jews are the highest, but the American Catholics, mainstream Protestants and Catholics also have a substantial percentage who are -- who don't think anything will happen.
It may just be a trend towards secularization among them and although, I guess it's interesting. American Catholics will say, "I'm a Catholic, but I don't think anything is going to happen to me if I disobey." Protestants will say, "Yes, I'm a Protestant. I go to church, but I'm not going because I'm worried that something is going to happen." That idea is just not working, even though they'll hear about in church and they'll hear about in synagogue and a prayer book; it doesn't connect. It doesn't resonate with them is how I'd read that.
Do you want to comment?
FPC DIRECTOR: I just think it correlates exactly with the willingness to accept all the other faiths as being equal.
MR. ZOGBY: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. That's a very good -- that's a good question, though. That's a little scary, actually, because it shows -- well, it shows some shifts, okay? And I think the religions will then adapt and the context in which people observe them may change.
QUESTION: Does your poll show what percentage in any country that doesn't believe in any religion whatsoever?
MR. ZOGBY: No, we can't extrapolate for entire countries. First of all, we didn't ask the question. But secondly, the sample in each country was narrowly broken down into those who identified with a religious grouping or the religious grouping that we were looking for.
MR. GREEN: And I think also, there is -- there's a little bit of an ambiguity, which was pointed out to us by others. The terms -- the term "religious" means -- may carry different meanings in different -- in different societies, so that when we polled Israel, people who said they were Jews were included, and there are certainly some secular -- there are some secularists who may not be religious who are in that sample.
But we got very similar kinds of answers. You look at Peru, we just talked to Peruvian Catholics, people who self-identified, and you get a sense exactly of sort of what the spread is within people who are prepared to use this identification as to how many of them are actively religious and how many are not, how many think being religious is important and how many don't. So we got a sort of nice national cross-section for this first probe.
QUESTION: You emphasized that many of the respondents said that there's no connection between religion and violence. Did you expect another kind of answer? I mean, technically speaking, if you ask somebody, "Are you going to set up, do something bad tonight," he will always say -- so a person who believes, belonging to any faith, is never going to admit that there is a connection between violence and faith.
MR. GREEN: Thanks. No, I mean -- I don't -- I guess this -- I wasn't so much thinking about the respondents as I was thinking about the attitude that I think is quite prevalent in American society, that the violence that we are experiencing across the world, starting with September 11th, is all religiously motivated. And I -- you can see that a little bit if you look at the American Christian response to that question. A much higher percentage there than you might think, see religion in violence.
And so, from that perspective, from an American perspective, to have people say, "No," you know what I mean? It's not that it hasn't been said. It's been said.
But the point that John is making -- and now there's some empirical evidence to show that, I mean, the most dangerous sort of suicide, a violent suicide-bombing, is always primarily political. That it's -- the largest, according to the study done at the University of Chicago, the largest percentage of suicide-bombers are the Tamil Tigers; not even the Palestinians and the Tamil Tigers are Marxist-Leninist. So it's not a -- it's not, I mean, they're not doing that -- it's a strategy to solve a political problem, according to this study aimed at democratic societies, which is the only place you can do that kind of terror because you've got to be able to get in -- you've got to be able to walk freely and get into places in order to blow up the center of town.
MR. ZOGBY: I don't believe we asked "Your religion in violence." I think we said, "Religion."
MR. GREEN: Right. If we had said, "What religion?" there you might have expected -- I mean, I'm way off, I'm beyond the plank now -- but you might have expected maybe Hindus and Muslims in India to say, "Yeah, well, yeah, their religion causes it." And you might have expected Jews and Muslims in Israel to say that. It's a higher percentage of Jews who think that than there are Israeli Muslims who are sure this is a political problem. And I think that's probably right. I mean, these are really national -- these are problems about territory and nationality much more than they are about the religions.
I mean, these -- we have evidences in the past where, where all of our religions have managed to coexist to their mutual benefit. So in principle, it's not impossible.
MR. ZOGBY: Which makes us then reread those Islamic numbers as our respect for mainly the Abrahamic tradition, the respect for other religions by saying, "Other religions are not responsible. All religions, no religions are responsible."
QUESTION: What conclusion do you draw from this belief that there should be a greater convergence between governance and faith? Does it not undermine modernity, secularism or those faith traditions, which do not subscribe to this theory?
MR. GREEN: Well, that's a really complicated question, which I can answer in a nutshell. In principle, The Bible does make a distinction between religion and government. It makes it very early on. It's very deeply written into Judaism and to Christianity. Part of the reason Christianity historically has always had a trouble with Christian polity is because there aren't any clear religious sources.
There's -- it's a lot easier in Hinduism and Buddhism where there is an idea of a sacred king who -- in the texts -- so that you can -- an enlightened religious leader will be the best political leader precisely because he's carrying out the best of the religious principles, which has a lot to do with charity and generosity, and so on, and so forth.
And Islam is distinctive because it developed, I mean, the religion developed and Mohammed ran the country for ten years so that -- there's a wide range of traditions on the relationship between religion and politics coming from within the religions themselves.
What I read, and I, again, it was a very simple question -- it may be that this answer about more religion as an issue is a question about values. And it may be that the sort of negativity about politics sees politics as valueless and religion as/or capturing all the things John talked about: greed and demagoguery and so on. And religion seems to be an antidote.
I don't know. That's my speculation.
MR. ZOGBY: Yeah, I, in concurrence, I did not see that response as in any way a mandate for extremism. Rather, what's evident here, I think, in all the results is that people on the ground view religion as a positive thing. Hence, bringing religious values to government is not denying a separation of church and state, it's bringing something positive into the political world because they see it as a positive thing.
I think, one more question, I guess. One more question.
Well, we haven't heard from her yet.
QUESTION: Okay, hi. Hanan Elbadry, Egyptian Television and Rose El Youssef Magazine. I'm wondering, what about to be regarding also the Islam or the religion and the politics. Did you ever try to have the Administration, whether the recent Administration or the American policy in general has been so far these recent days on the religious view to decide their policy?
MR. ZOGBY: No. We did not get into religious specifics like that or the crossover between religion and specific policies. We just didn't do that. And that would have been a very difficult thing for us to have executed.
MR. GREEN: Thank you very much.
