Religion had much influence on the American society when many started to perceive the US as a religion protector once the Soviet Union was widely recognized as “godless communism.” The Civil Rights Movement received most of its supporters and advocators from black religious groups such as the Southern Leadership Conference. Martin Luther King Jr. was a pastor and leading activist of the Civil Rights Movement. Likewise, another black religious group called the Nation of Islam supported the black separatist movement. While, white congregations of liberal beliefs also played defending roles for racial equality in the Civil Rights Movement.

In the 1950s, an interest in Eastern religions had emerged due to the Beat Movement which included Daoism, Hinduism and Zen Buddhism which lasted till the late 1960s. During this time, a small number of American citizens also joined religious communities and groups called ashrams. The emergence of socialist ideas in the 1960s favored perceptions and views of antireligious nature which were considerably different from those held by these religious conservatives.

These ideas were primarily espoused by college students who promoted women’s rights, moderate drug used, gay rights, legalized abortion and contraception as well as alternative lifestyles. These ideas shaped in to widely supported movements which were not successful enough to grant such radical lifestyles by the 1970s. As a reaction to the acceptance of secular ideas and concepts in campuses, the conservatives assembled the Campus Crusade. This movement soon became the training ground for numerous popular conservative politicians of the 1980s and 1990s.