# Where did the term"Religious Right" originate? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 21, 2006, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-term-religious-right-originate/357660 "2006-05-21T19:09:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Ca3799](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9f8e36/32.png) [@Ca3799](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ca3799)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-term-religious-right-originate/357660/1 "2006-05-21T19:09:52Z")
On another board, a poster is telling me that the term “RR” is one coined by “unappy losers” to denigrate Christians. I thought “RR” was used proudly by those who identify themselves that way. Likely, the truth is somewhere in the middle. Any ideas hwen/where/how the term originated? ---
**Author:** ![cerberus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/71e660/32.png) [@cerberus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cerberus)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-term-religious-right-originate/357660/2 "2006-05-21T19:34:55Z")
Religious Right refers to the religious sub-group of the GoP. The right refers to the rightward tilt of the GoP, and to the generally more rightward wing of the GoP occupied by these people. The term was in use prior to the ascendance of the RR with Bush '43. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-term-religious-right-originate/357660/3 "2006-05-21T19:40:11Z")
Well, according to this article: > **[Christian right](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_right)** > > The Christian right are Christian political factions characterized by their strong support of socially conservative and traditionalist policies. Christian conservatives seek to influence politics and public policy with their interpretation of the teachings of Christianity. In the United States, the Christian right (otherwise known as the New Christian Right or the Religious Right) is an informal coalition which was formed around a core of conservative Evangelical Protestants and conservative Rom... the term “Religious Right” apparently first began being used in the late 1970’s. The groups that it was used to describe began organizing in the early 1970’s. If you went back to the informal beginnings of these groups, you might go back to the early 1960’s. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-term-religious-right-originate/357660/4 "2006-05-21T20:50:41Z")
Following up **Wendell** ’s reference, the term “Religious Right” does not seem to be the preferred designation of people who consider themselves part of this group, but it’s certainly been in use for quite a while. According to Moral Majority founder Jerry Falwell’s [official bio at Liberty University](http://www.liberty.edu/index.cfm?PID=6921) (formerly Liberty Baptist College), > [@](#): > > In June 1979, Falwell organized the Moral Majority, a conservative political lobbying movement which the press soon dubbed the “Religious Right.” (Oddly, the recent growth of the religious right and politicized Christianity in the US since that time seems to have paralleled, or maybe produced, a drop in the [actual numbers of American Christians](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States#Religious_affiliation), and a rise in the number of people not affiliated with any religion: > [@](#): > > - the proportion of the population that can be classified as Christian has declined from 86% in 1990 to 77% in 2001; […] > - the greatest increase in absolute as well as in percentage terms has been among those adults who do not subscribe to any religious identification; their number has more than doubled from 14.3 million in 1990 to 29.4 million in 2001; their proportion has grown from just 8% of the total in 1990 to over 14% in 2001; > - there has also been a substantial increase in the number of adults who refused to reply to the question about their religious preference, from about four million or 2% in 1990 to more than eleven million or over 5% in 2001. If the religious right’s goal is really to re-Christianize all of America, they’re being singularly ineffective, at least as far as the demographics go.)