Washington,D.C. — In a new surveyby the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life, most evangelicalProtestant leaders who live in the Global South (58%) say that evangelicalChristians are gaining influence on life in their countries. By contrast, most leaders who live in the Global North (66%)say that, in the societies in which they live, evangelicals are losinginfluence. U.S. evangelical leaders are especially downbeat about the prospectsfor evangelical Christianity in their society; 82% say evangelicals are losinginfluence in the United States today, while only 17% think evangelicals aregaining influence.

Ingeneral, evangelical leaders who live in the Global South (sub-Saharan Africa,the Middle East/North Africa, Latin America and most of Asia) are optimisticabout the prospects for evangelicalism in their countries, while those who livein the Global North (Europe, North America, Japan, Australia and New Zealand) tendto be more pessimistic. Seven-in-ten evangelical leaders who live in the GlobalSouth (71%) expect that five years from now the state of evangelicalism intheir countries will be better than it is today. But a majority of evangelicalleaders in the Global North expect that the state of evangelicalism in theircountries will either stay about the same (21%) or worsen (33%) over the nextfive years.

These are among thekey findings of the GlobalSurvey of Evangelical Protestant Leaders, which offers a detailed portraitof 2,196 evangelical leaders from 166 countries and territories who wereinvited to attend the Third Lausanne Congress on WorldEvangelization (alsoknown as “Cape Town 2010”) held in October 2010 in Cape Town, South Africa. ThePew Forum conducted the survey with the assistance of the LausanneMovement as part of Cape Town 2010. It is the latest report of the Pew-Templeton Global ReligiousFutures project,an effort funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts and the John Templeton Foundation to analyze religious change andits impact on societies around the world.

Othermajor findings include:

EvangelicalBeliefs and Practices 

• Morethan nine-in-ten (96%) of the evangelical leaders surveyed say thatChristianity is the one, true faith leading to eternal life, and 95% say thatbelieving otherwise — taking the position that “Jesus Christ is NOT the onlypath to salvation” — is incompatible with being a good evangelical.
• Virtuallyall the leaders (98%) agree that the Bible is the word of God. But they arealmost evenly divided between those who say the Bible should be read literally,word for word (50%), and those who do not think that everything in the Bibleshould be taken literally (48%). They are similarly split on whether it isnecessary to believe in God in order to be a moral person (49% yes, 49% no).
• Aboutfour-in-ten (42%) of the evangelical leaders say the consumption of alcohol iscompatible with being a good evangelical, while 52% say it is incompatible.
• Ina number of ways, leaders in the Global South are more conservative than thosein the Global North. For instance, leaders in the Global South are more likelythan those in the Global North to read the Bible literally (58% vs. 40%) and tofavor making the Bible the official law of the land in their countries (58% vs.28%). Leaders in the Global South are also much more inclined than those in theGlobal North to say that consuming alcohol is incompatible with being a goodevangelical (75% vs. 23%).

Tensions withSecularism and Modernity 

• Overall,evangelical leaders around the world view secularism, consumerism and popularculture as the greatest threats they face today. More of the leaders expressconcern about these aspects of modern life than express concern about otherreligions, internal disagreements among evangelicals or government restrictionson religion.
• Aboutseven-in-ten (71%) see the influence of secularism as a major threat to evangelicalChristianity in the countries where they live. Two-thirds (67%) also cite “toomuch emphasis on consumerism and material goods” as a major threat, whilenearly six-in-ten (59%) put “sex and violence in popular culture” into the samecategory. Nearly two-thirds (64%) say there is a “natural conflict” betweenbeing an evangelical and living in a modern society.

Relations withOther Religious Traditions 

• Conflictbetween religious groups, by contrast, does not loom as a particularly largeconcern for most of the evangelical leaders surveyed. A majority says thatconflict between religious groups is either a small problem (41%) or not aproblem at all (14%) in their countries — though a sizable minority considersit either a moderately big problem (27%) or a very big problem (17%).
• Thosewho live in the Middle East and North Africa are especially inclined to seeinter-religious conflict as a moderately big (37%) or very big problem (35%). Nine-in-tenof the evangelical leaders (90%) who live in Muslim-majority countries say theinfluence of Islam is a major threat, compared with 41% of leaders who liveelsewhere.
• Onthe whole, the evangelical Protestant leaders express favorable opinions ofadherents of other faiths in the Judeo-Christian tradition, including Judaism,Catholicism and Eastern Orthodox Christianity. But solid majorities expressunfavorable views of Buddhists (65%), Hindus (65%), Muslims (67%) and atheists(70%). Interestingly, the leaders who live in Muslim-majority countries generallyare more positive in their assessments of Muslims than are the evangelicalleaders overall.

Social andPolitical Attitudes 

• Overall,the global evangelical leaders hold conservative opinions on social issues. Forexample, more than nine-in-ten say abortion is usually wrong (45%) or alwayswrong (51%). More than eight-in-ten say that society should discouragehomosexuality (84%).
• Leadersfrom the Global South tend to be more conservative than their counterparts fromthe Global North on some issues relating to family, marriage and gender. Forexample, two-thirds (67%) of those from the Global South say a wife must alwaysobey her husband, while 39% of the leaders from the Global North take thatposition. Leaders from the Global South are nearly twice as likely as thosefrom the Global North to say that all adults have a responsibility to marry andhave children (60% vs. 33%).
• Theglobal evangelical leaders support political activism. More than eight-in-ten(84%) think that religious leaders should express their views on politicalmatters, while just 13% say religious leaders should not express their views.

ThePew Forum conducted the survey in nine languages, including English, fromAugust to December 2010. A total of approximately 4,500 people participated inthe Third Lausanne Congress, and nearly half of them completed the survey.

Foradditional findings, read the full report on the Pew Forum’s website.

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The Pew ResearchCenter’s Forum on Religion & Public Life conducts surveys, demographicanalyses and other social science research on important aspects of religion andpublic life in the U.S. and around the world. As part of the Washington-basedPew Research Center, a nonpartisan, nonadvocacy organization, the Pew Forumdoes not take positions on any of the issues it covers or on policy debates.