That is a direct quote from Andrew Grenville, senior vice-president of Ipsos Reid regarding a poll on Canadian and American faith.

There really isn’t much new in this poll taken for The National Post by Ipsos Reid leading up to Easter weekend April 11-12, 2006, by phone with 814 Canadians and 768 Americans.

- Canadians express as strong a faith as they did when surveyed 10 years ago. However faith is not expressed in church attendence which has slipped.

- 4 out of 10 Canadians surveyed believe they have been in the presence of God or have had a spiritual (religious or mystical) experience. The survey did not ask participants to define what that means

- 3 times as many people believe in God and have a personal faith as attend a church

The number of Canadian believers is virtually unchanged from 1996, but regular church attendance dipped four percentage points. Moreover, just over half of Canadians now say they go only once a year or never at all, a drop from 43% a decade ago.

a) Canadians see faith as more private, less public driven than their US counterparts tending to shy away from public displays of faith

“In America, every athlete thanks God after a game, and in Canada, if somebody did that after a hockey game, they’d be a freak,” he said.

Canadians also showed they are less religious than Americans in their answers to questions about specific beliefs.

b) the gap between church attendence and belief is not generational, even though baby boomers children were not exposed to Sunday school like their parents were

- Canadians have a stronger distrust of institutions than their US counterparts and evangelicalism doesn’t have the hold in Canada it does in the US - the belief in God does not translate to belief in institution. Native abuse and sexual abuse scandals crossing Catholic and Protestant experience in Canada contributes to this caution.

-Atlantic Canadians are more apt to say they’ve been in the presence of God than Westerners who are more apt to say they have had an epiphany-like experience.
42% of Canadians say they felt they have been in the presence of God, 29% say they have had  an experience of spiritual insight or awakening.
I disagree with the expert that Atlantic Canada is the Canadian bible belt, I think it’s one of the buckles. Geographical regionalism in Canada has created buckles of faith as opposed to the US bible belt.

Theology - Canada/US differences

- Sixty-two per cent of those polled agreed with the statement that “through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, God provided the way for the forgiveness of sins.” 76 percent of Americans polled agreed with the statement

- In Canada, 20% agreed with the statement that “the world will end in the Battle of Armageddon between Jesus and the Antichrist.” In the United States, 46% answered in the affirmative.

- Only 25% of Canadians said it is important to encourage non-Christians to become Christians, compared with 46% in the United States.

via: The National Post
Ipos Reid (requires registration)

Canadians are aware and concerned about American style religion gaining ground in Canada and this latest Ipso Reid poll supports findings by John Stackhouse (Regent College, Vancouver) whereas our US counterparts tend to think we are very much like them in our liberal/conservative religious divides and evangelicalism expression. In going through my archives I found a number of posts where politicians have used scare tactics about religion and faith. And in typical Canadian fashion, mistrust of that tactic by the political establishment hasn’t worked well with voters.

Yes, we have a deep mistrust of institutions.
Is that the key explanation for the drain out the church door? 
What other reasons do you think Canadians are not entering church buildings like American counterparts?