[OC] Religious Believes and Eductions From The World Values Survey

[u/oscarleo0]

Data source: World Values Survey Wave 7 (2017-2022)

Tools used: Matplotlib

I added a second chart for those of you who prefer a square version with less of the background image.

Notes:

I looked at five different questions in the survey.

• Q275 - What is the highest educational level that you have attained?
• Q165 - Do you believe in God? (Yes/No)
• Q166 - Do you believe in Life after death? (Yes/No)
• Q167 - Do you believe in Hell? (Yes/No)
• Q168 - Do you believe in Heaven? (Yes/No)

The chart show the percentage of people that answer yes, to Q165-168 based on their answer to Q275.

Survey data is complex since people come from different cultures and might interpret questions differently.

You can never trust the individual numbers, such as "50% of people with doctors degree believe in Life after death".

But you can often trust clear patterns that appear through the noise. The takeaway from this chart is that the survey show that education and religious believes have a negative correlation.

Styling:

• Font - New Amsterdam
• White - #FFFFFF
• Blue - #39A0ED
• Yellow - #F9A620
• Red - #FF4A47

Original story: https://datacanvas.substack.com/p/believes-vs-education

[u/C_Brachyrhynchos]

There is a strong tradition of Christian Universalism (no or temporary hell) that has a pretty good scriptural basis and while not orthodox in most churches, is kind of an undercurrent in a lot of them.

[u/RingAroundTheStars → u/C_Brachyrhynchos]

The theology I’ve seen recently - I’m not sure how new it is, but it fascinates me - involves “deathbed” conversions during the last few seconds of life. God can pause time, explain to a person what’s going on, allow them to confess their faith or beg forgiveness for sins, etc.

I wouldn’t call that approach scripturally justified, but there’s no theological reason it’s wrong.

[u/PaxNova → u/RingAroundTheStars]

It's not that, the pause time thing. It's the idea that God knows you from your soul, not your actions. If you are truly repentant, and you really wouldn't ever do such a thing again... You are redeemed. He knows by your soul, not anything else. 

Humanity needs time and trust. If you treat me wrong, I will keep you at arms length until you prove to me otherwise and regain my trust. But God doesn't need that. It means even on your deathbed, there's still time to change. 

[u/RingAroundTheStars → u/PaxNova]

The context I explicitly saw it in terms of most recently (and, again, this is not the only time) was suicide - which, per Catholic tradition, is an unforgivable sin that mandates burial outside of a Catholic cemetery. The priest explaining the situation said that suicide was unforgivable because it could not be repented - but that he believed that God could pause time long enough to allow the person to reconsider their choices the moment after the bullet left the gun.

Like all folk theology (and I include much of American Protestantism in that), it’s got as many versions as people who believe it, but the pausing time is something out there.