Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition, Quantified

Pew examines who loves God and guns.

One of past President Barack Obama’s most infamous quotes was his 2008 campaign trail comment on small-town citizens that “cling to guns or religion.” New research identifies how many Americans actually favor both.

Two out of five self-identified white evangelicals own a gun, higher than any other religious group, according to a recent study from the Pew Research Center. Four out of five have fired one.

But only a quarter of white evangelical gun owners are members of the National Rifle Association (NRA), and more white evangelicals actually want US gun laws to be more strict than less strict. (A plurality are satisfied with the status quo.) Read More

For those who may be curious in regards to the origin of the phrase "praise the Lord and pass the ammunition, I am providing links to a relevant article and video.

The two photo show black-powder enthusiasts who reenact the Battle of Antietam, also known as the Battle of Sharpsburg. It was originally fought on September 17, 1862, near Sharpsburg, Maryland and Antietam Creek as part of the Maryland Campaign. It was the first field army-level engagement in the Eastern Theater of the American Civil War. It took place on Union soil and was the bloodiest single-day battle in American history. A total of 22,717 Union and Confederate soldiers were killed, wounded, or missing in action.

Approximately one in four soldiers who fought in the American Civil War never returned home. Casualties on the battlefield were high in a war that combined new military technology with old-fashioned tactical doctrine and were unprecedented in American history.

Most casualties and deaths in the Civil War were the result of disease that was unrelated to combat. For every three soldiers killed in battle, five more died of disease. See Civil War Casualties for further details.  Major Civil War diseases were Dysentery, Typhoid, Pneumonia, Tuberculosis, Malaria, and Measles. About 1 in 20 people who came down with the Measles died from it.