Just a quick note before a more comprehensive response. Your observation about religiosity is no more apparent than when one leaves the US. When I lived in Germany and then in Quebec, I didn’t know anyone who was deeply religious. None of my friends, and none of their family — not so far as I could tell. Churches were mostly empty, lightly attended only on ceremonial days, and even then people often went only for cultural reasons.

Moving back to the States, even to a “secular” place like NYC, the differences were immediately obvious and profound. Devout people are everywhere. Religion is deeply engrained in our society, and what churches do can often matter to real lives more than what governments do.

This reality is clearly not lost on Trump.