New religious movements in the Pacific Northwest

Expression

Although the Pacific Northwest is often listed as the least churched part of the United States, some researchers have found the region to be strong in the "secular but spiritual" category. Sociologist Mark Shibley has identified several modes of expression of those who identify as "secular but spiritual" in the Pacific Northwest, including New Age, earth-based and pagan practices, and nature religion. Shibley notes daily practice of nature religion in environmentalism, deep ecology and wilderness preservation, and finds the dominant dimension of Pacific Northwest life to be how the people relate to the landscape. Other academics have found "episodic public life in ethically charged matters" to be a characteristic of Northwestern religious sensibility.

Religious expression in the Pacific Northwest has been called, unlike most of the United States, "never ... a 'Christian culture' ...[but] a diverse marketplace of spiritualties including varieties of New Age, neo-paganism, Gaia worship, channeling, metaphysics, holistic health, earth-based spiritualties, Nordic spiritualties, Wicca, meditation centres, astrologers, and westernized forms of Buddhism and yoga."

Movements founded in the Northwest

New religious movements founded in the region include:

Nones

People who don't express any religious affiliation, called "nones" by experts like Elizabeth Drescher, make up a larger percentage of the population in the Northwest more than in any other part of the United States. Drescher, a professor at Santa Clara University's Department of Religious Studies, calls the entire Pacific Northwest a "none zone". Susanna Morrill, a scholar of religion at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, called some Northwesterners' expression "experiencing the natural world in a way that feels supernatural". If counted as a religious group, the "nones" in the Northwest would outnumber the next largest group, Roman Catholics, by more than two to one.