Allegations that Barack Obama secretly practices Islam, or that he is the antichrist of Christian eschatology, have been suggested since he campaigned for the U.S. Senate in 2004 and proliferated after his election as President of the U.S. in 2008. As with conspiracy theories surrounding his citizenship status, the claims are promoted by various fringe theorists and political opponents, with American bloggers and conservative talk radio hosts particularly promoting the theories.
Belief in these claims in the public sphere endured and, in some cases, even expanded during Obama's presidency according to the Pew Research Center, with 17% of Americans (including one third of conservative Republicans) believing him to be a Muslim in a 2012 poll.
Barack Obama is a Protestant Christian, while in his twenties, Obama was involved with the Black churches. From 1992 until 2008, he was a member of the Trinity United Church of Christ—a Reformed denomination. Obama left it in the wake of the Jeremiah Wright controversy. Since 2008, he attends various Protestant churches, including Baptist, Methodist and Episcopalian churches.