St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital is the top charity for evangelical Christians, followed by the Salvation Army, according to a new survey of charitable donors.
The survey, conducted by Gray Matter Research & Consulting and marketing firm Infinity Concepts, was released on Wednesday.
“There are many people who like to think of the evangelical community as being in many ways radically different [from non-evangelicals]Gray Matter President Ron Sellers said in an interview. “But in many ways [they] look like average Americans.
The survey identified Evangelicals as those who strongly adhere to theological views such as the Bible being the highest authority for belief, the importance of witnessing to non-Christians, that the death of Christ is the only remedy for punishment from sin and that only those who trust in Christ alone are saved.
About 59 million American adults, or 23%, are evangelicals, according to the survey.
Twelve of the 19 charities favored by evangelicals are also supported by the general public, according to the survey. Seven of the 19 are denominational.
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The top five charities among evangelicals are St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital (15%), the Salvation Army (8%), the American Red Cross (4%), Samaritan’s Purse (4%) and the UNICEF (3%). Only Samaritan’s Purse, led by the Reverend Franklin Graham, and the Salvation Army, which runs churches across the country, are typically evangelical.
“You can’t expect evangelicals to favor you just because you’re an evangelical organization or a largely Christian organization,” Sellers said. “The huge organizations out there, the secular organizations that can say much the same things [evangelicals] say, and they can usually say it more often, and louder, better, because they have the funds to get that message across.
