Pew report finds 35% of U.S. Catholics are college educated

The Pew Research Center released a report examining religious groups’ levels of education in the United States.

The report “Which U.S. religious groups are most highly educated?” found that 35% of U.S. Catholics have received a bachelor’s degree or higher education.

The report was based on Pew’s 2023-24 Religious Landscape Study (RLS). The RLS is a survey with 36,908 American respondents from all 50 states that examines their religious affiliations, beliefs, and practices and their social and political views. The margin of error is plus or minus 0.8 percentage points.

According to the research, 35% of U.S. Catholics are college graduates, which  matches the share for all U.S. adults. Catholics’ education levels tend to vary by race and ethnicity, social and political views, and religious practices.

The research found Asian Catholics were most likely to be college educated, with 53% of the group holding a bachelor’s degree or more education. About 43% of white Catholics and 20% of Hispanic Catholics are college educated.

The RLS did not include enough Black Catholics to show their results separately, but based on analysis of 2019-20 Pew Research Center survey data, Pew reported that 38% of Black Catholics (defined as those who report being one race and are not Hispanic) were college educated.

Findings among other religious groups

Based on the RLS, Pew found that Hindus and Jews are more likely to have a four-year college degree than Americans in other religious groups. Of the Hindu population, 70% hold a bachelor’s degree or more education, and 65% of the Jewish population does.

Fewer evangelical Protestants (29%) and members of historically Black Protestant denominations (24%) hold college degrees.

Among the evangelical denominations Pew analyzed, those with the highest shares of college graduates were the Global Methodist Church (57%) and the Presbyterian Church in America (57%).

The research also concluded that about 40% of mainline Protestants are college graduates, which is slightly higher than U.S. adults overall.

Among religiously unaffiliated Americans, agnostics (53%) and atheists (48%) are more likely than U.S. adults overall to have completed college. In contrast, people who describe their religion as “nothing in particular” (29%) are less likely than Americans overall to hold a bachelor’s degree.