Georgia is in the top 10 states for weekly church attendance, according to a new Gallup poll, though it trails Deep South compatriots such as Alabama, Tennessee and both Carolinas.
Thirty-nine percent of Georgia respondents attended church weekly, according to Gallup's daily tracking from January-December 2014.
"These results are based on Gallup Daily tracking interviews throughout 2014 with 177,030 U.S. adults, and reflect those who say 'at least once a week' when asked, 'How often do you attend church, synagogue or mosque -- at least once a week, almost every week, about once a month, seldom or never?'" Frank Newport wrote.
But Georgians also reported a 25 percent "next week/monthly" church attendence -- one of the highest in the nation, ahead of many of the states that top it in the weekly rate. Thirty-four percent of Georgians reported seldom or never attending church.
These results come as Georgia becomes self-reportedly more religious: 52 percent of residents reported being "very religious" in Gallup's 2013 daily tracking, an increase from 48 percent the year before.
"Church attendance self-reports are estimates, and may not reflect precise week in and week out attendance, but provide an important measure of the way in which Americans view their personal, underlying religiosity," Newport wrote.
Utah led the nation, with 51 percent of respondents attending church weekly -- the only state with a majority response and the direct result, according to Gallup, of the state's strong Mormon fiber, as "Mormons have the highest religious service attendance of any major religious group in the U.S."
Vermont came at the bottom of the list, with a 17 percent weekly attendance rate.
The Gallup poll included 5,326 Georgians; Gallup said its interviews were conducted by phone, with a margin of error no greater than ±6 percentage points.
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