UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

A. THE COUNTRY

The U.S.A. is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states

and a federal district.  The country is situated mostly in central North

America and has Alaska in the northwest of the continent, Hawaii in the

mid-Pacific, and also possesses several territories in the Caribbean and

Pacific.  With a population of under 318 million, the U.S. is the

world’s third largest nation in area and population.  It is one of the

most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, the product of

large-scale immigration from many countries.  It is the world’s largest

and most diverse economy, driven by technology, industry, natural

resources, agriculture and services.  America’s time as the sole

superpower is declining while it accounts for up to 50% of the world’s

military spending.  The threat of terrorism at home and abroad has seen

U.S. forces increasingly engaged overseas, a foreign policy that

generates significant backlash from some parts of the world.

The U.S. is being challenged more than ever by natural and man-made
disasters.

 

B. THE PEOPLE

 

Thirty-one ethnicities have a population of 1 million.  Larger ethnic

groups are:

U.S. Caucasian 58.1%, Latin-Caribbean American 14.7%, African-American

12.2%, Eurasian 6.6%, Jews 1.8%, East Asian 3%, Arab 1.4%, Malay 1.1%,

North Asian 0.7%, Southeast Asian 0.7%, North American Indigenous 0.6%.

There is an increasing gap between rich and poor.

About 13% of the population use a language in the home other than the

official English language.

 

RELIGIONS AND CHRISTIANITY/PENTECOSTALISM

 

A rich legacy of Christian history has profoundly shaped the U.S.A., and

it continues to affect the world as provider of stability and of aid,

peacekeeper and proponent of democracy, and spreader of Christianity.

77.62% claim to be Christian, 16.5% non-religious, 1.65% Jewish, 1.63%

Muslim, and less than 1% each:

New religions, Buddhist/Chinese, Ethnoreligionist, Hindu, Baha’i, Sikh.

In the Christian groups, of note are:

27.51% Protestant, 21.19% Catholic, 17.47% Unaffiliated, 7.81%

Independent.

Evangelicals are 28.9% of the population. Charismatics are 19.8%, and of

those 6.8% are Pentecostals.  Pentecostal/charismatic groups make up

most of the growing Christian denominations in the U.S.A.

Donna Siemens

 

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org

Operation World, Jason Mandryk. Colorado Springs: Biblica Publishing, 2010.