Throughout its history, the religiously active population in West Virginia has been overwhelmingly Protestant. Most settlers before the American Revolution were Anglicans, Presbyterians, Quakers, or members of German sects, such as Lutherans, German Reformed, Dunkers, and Mennonites. The Great Awakening had a profound effect on these settlers and they avidly embraced its evangelism, emotionalism, and emphasis on personal religious experience. Catholics were mostly immigrants from Ireland and southern and eastern Europe.
In 2000, the major Protestant denominations and the number of their adherents were the United Methodist Church, 150,985; the American Baptist Churches USA, 108,087; the Southern Baptist Convention, 43,606; and the Presbyterian Church USA, 28,467. Other fundamentalist denominations included the Churches of Christ, 24,143; the Church of God (Cleveland, Tennessee), 21,657; and the Church of the Nazarene, 21,389. The Catholic population was 105,363 in 2000; there were an estimated at 2,400 Jews and 1,528 Muslims. Over 1.1 million people (about 64% of the population) were not counted as members of any religious organization.