Divinity Atlas

Sacred Correspondences
States & Territories

Maryland

South

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Maryland was founded in 1634 as a refuge for English Catholics under the proprietorship of the Calvert family, and its 1649 Toleration Act, protecting the worship of any Trinitarian Christian, was among the earliest religious liberty statutes in English North America even as it excluded Jews and non-Trinitarians. Baltimore became the seat of the first Roman Catholic diocese in the United States in 1789. Methodism also grew rapidly on the Eastern Shore in the same period, and the state's religious character has long balanced its founding Catholic identity against a strong later Protestant majority.

Facts
Religion
Leading Religious Affiliation
Nothing in Particular (Unaffiliated) 2
Maryland: no named religious tradition is the largest single group. Nothing in particular is 19% of adults, ahead of Evangelical Protestant and Historically Black Protestant, tied with each other at 15%. Margin of error plus or minus 6.1 points. Source: https://www.pewresearch.org/religious-landscape-study/state/maryland/
Identity
Jurisdiction Status
U.S. state 1
Law and State
Establishment Status
Disestablished 1
The Church of England held established status in colonial Maryland from 1702; the state's 1776 constitution ended public financial support for the church, though a religious test for officeholders lingered afterward.
Geography
Census Region
South 1
Origins
Origin of the Name
Named for Henrietta Maria, queen consort of King Charles I of England, in the colony's 1632 charter. 1
Learn More
The Toleration Act Was Repealed Within Its Own Century

Maryland's 1649 Toleration Act, protecting the worship of any Trinitarian Christian, is usually remembered as a settled achievement of the colony's Catholic founding, but it did not hold even within the lifetime of the people who passed it. A Puritan dominated assembly seized control of the colony's government in 1654 amid the broader upheaval of the English Civil War and promptly repealed the Act, outlawing Catholic worship outright. The Calvert family regained enough authority to restore toleration by 1657, but the reversal proved to be only postponed rather than avoided. After England's 1688 Glorious Revolution stripped the Catholic Calverts of political control for good, Maryland's new royal governor required all officeholders to swear a Protestant oath in 1692, and by 1702 the Church of England had been formally established as the colony's official religion, with Catholics barred from public worship, from voting and from holding office under penal laws that stood until the American Revolution restored religious liberty in the state's 1776 constitution.

Baltimore became the seat of the first Roman Catholic diocese in the United States in 1789, a return achieved only after nearly a full century of legal exclusion the founding generation's own toleration statute had failed to prevent. No single tradition leads Maryland today, Nothing in Particular at nineteen percent of adults per Pew's 2023-24 study, ahead of Evangelical and Historically Black Protestant, tied with each other at fifteen.

Cross-Tradition Connections

Associated With

This source names Maryland directly: "Headquartered in Silver Spring, Maryland, ADRA operates as a network of national offices across more than a hundred countries, delivering relief and development assistance in health, education, food..."

Source History of ADRA (ADRA Asia Regional Office)ADRA Asia Regional Office
Americas, Continents

This source names Americas directly: "Maryland was founded in 1634 as a refuge for English Catholics under the proprietorship of the Calvert family, and its 1649 Toleration Act, protecting the worship of any Trinitarian Christian, was..."

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editors

This source names Maryland directly: "report released by the Office of the Maryland Attorney General on April 5, 2023, closing an investigation into how the Archdiocese of Baltimore handled child sexual abuse by clergy and other church..."

This source names Maryland directly: "in 1730 and transported to colonial Maryland in 1731, covering his own practice of prayer there and Thomas Bluett's 1734 memoir of his life, one of the earliest printed accounts in English of an..."

This source names Maryland directly: "in 1730 and transported to Annapolis, Maryland, in 1731."

This source names Maryland directly: "Headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland and governed by a board that includes twelve bishops, Catholic Relief Services now operates in more than ninety countries, delivering emergency relief..."

Source Catholic Relief Services (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

This source names Maryland directly: "States, headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, governed by a board of twelve bishops, one priest and ten lay people."

Source Catholic Relief Services (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

This source names Maryland directly: "Headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, Corus International connects Lutheran World Relief and IMA World Health alongside several smaller for-profit ventures under one shared structure, while each..."

Source Corus International (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

This source names Maryland directly: "2020, headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, formed by Lutheran World Relief and IMA World Health following their January 2019 operational merger."

Source Corus International (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

This source names Maryland directly: "New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland."

Source Presbytery Of Philadelphia (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

This source names Maryland directly: "EIN 52-0643036, Silver Spring, Maryland, classified Religious and tax-exempt since January 1950."

This source names Maryland directly: "Headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, Lutheran World Relief now works across nearly thirty countries in Africa, Asia, the Middle East and the Americas, focused on smallholder agriculture, climate..."

Source Lutheran World Relief (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

This source names Maryland directly: "Synod, headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, a member of the Corus International family of faith-based development organisations."

Source Lutheran World Relief (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

This source names Maryland directly: "Relief Inc (EIN 13-2574963, Baltimore, Maryland)."

Source Lutheran World Relief Inc. IRS Form 990 (ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer)Lutheran World Relief Inc. (filed with the US Internal Revenue Service, reproduced by ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer)

This source names Methodism directly: "diocese in the United States in 1789. Methodism also grew rapidly on the Eastern Shore in the same period, and the state's religious character has long balanced its founding Catholic identity..."

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editors

This source names Maryland directly: "Louis, Missouri; its National Council is now headquartered in Maryland Heights, Missouri, and supports roughly 4,000 local Conferences and Councils across the country, whose lay volunteer members..."

Source Society of Saint Vincent de Paul (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

This source names Maryland directly: "Vincent de Paul (EIN 13-5562362, Maryland Heights, Missouri)."

Source National Council of the United States Society of St. Vincent de Paul IRS Form 990 (ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer)National Council of the United States Society of St. Vincent de Paul (filed with the US Internal Revenue Service, reproduced by ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer)

This source names Maryland directly: "on 17 October 2012 in Silver Spring, Maryland, by hand vote of more than 200 pastors, lay people and denominational workers, reaffirming that marriage is "a lifelong union between a man and a woman..."

This source names Maryland directly: "Louis, Missouri; its National Council is headquartered in Maryland Heights, Missouri."

Source Society of Saint Vincent de Paul (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

This source names Maryland directly: "psychotherapy there and later at the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center in the United States, work that shaped his later theories of consciousness."

This source names Maryland directly: "Supreme Court decision striking down a Maryland religious test for holding public office."

Source Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U.S. 488 (1961)Supreme Court of the United States (Justice Hugo L. Black, writing for the majority)

This source names Maryland directly: "the Bishop of London's commissary in Maryland showed him colonial parishes going years without a resident minister."

Source Our History (USPG)
Sources
1. Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)
Encyclopaedia Britannica editors, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 2024View the Source
2. Pew Research Center: 2023-24 Religious Landscape Study
Pew Research Center, Pew Research Center, 2025View the Source
A Religious History of the American People
Sydney E. Ahlstrom, Yale University Press, 1972View the Source
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