There are, obviously, a lot of differences between the United States and Canada - with one of the biggest being religion. For Americans, religion is naturally an important part of public and political life; not so for Canadians.

The Times Colonist reports on Canadian pollster Michael Adams' recent data:

The poll shows 58 per cent of Americans saying that it is necessary to believe in God in order to be a moral person, while only 30 per cent of Canadians agree to this. And while 45 per cent of Americans now say they go to church every week, only 20 per cent (down from 85 per cent in the 1950s) of Canadians can say the same thing.

"In the United States, I guess you can say that there is one category of person who cannot be elected, and that's an atheist. And in Canada, there's a category of person who can't be elected and of course that is a person who is an ostentatious religious person," said Adams. "In fact, people who believe in God are suspect and we want to know a little bit more about them."

He noted that former Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day suffered at the polls in the 2000 federal election after it was revealed that he questioned evolution because of his Christian fundamentalist beliefs. As well, he showed that 69 per cent of Canadians believe in heaven but only about 43 per cent believe in hell and the devil. Meanwhile, in the U.S., 81 per cent believe in heaven and 70 per cent in hell and the devil.

In America, a fundamentalist Christian who reveals that they question evolution would probably get more votes in an election, not fewer and certainly wouldn’t lose because of that. Canada, it seems, has gone much farther in terms of fostering a secular attitude among it citizens. American institutions may be generally secular, but a great many people don’t entirely respect that and would even like to reverse the trend that has been going in the secular direction for the past couple of centuries.

Read More:

• Separation of Church and State 101
• Church and State News
• Secularism 101