The world has become increasingly more secular in the last few decades. However, religion remains an integral part of many people’s lives, and 84% of the world’s population identifies with a religious group.

The religious profile of the world is rapidly changing, driven primarily by differences in fertility rates and the size of youth populations among the world’s major religions, as well as by people switching faiths.

Determining the exact number of religions across the world is a daunting task. Many religions can be difficult to categorise or to tell apart for those not intimately familiar with their doctrine.

The Pew Research Center organises the world’s religions into seven major categories, which includes five major religions (Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Judaism), one category that broadly includes all Folk/Traditional religions, and an unaffiliated category.

Globally, Christianity has the largest following of these categories. Around 31% of the world’s population are Christians, closely followed by Muslims at 25%. Jews have the smallest population of major religions, with only 0.2% of the world identifying as Jewish.

Christianity

The world’s largest religion, Christianity, is practiced by about 2.4 billion people.

The country with the highest number of practicing Christians is the United States, with a Christian population of 253 million. Brazil and Mexico follow closely with 185 million and 118 million Christians, respectively.

Christianity has historically spread around the globe and today it remains a geographically widespread religion. Over the past century, it has become less concentrated in Europe while becoming more evenly distributed throughout the Americas, sub-Saharan Africa, and the Asia-Pacific region.

Islam

Even though it’s the predominant religion of countries in the Middle East and Northern Africa, by sheer number, countries in Asia have the highest percentage of practicing Muslims in the world.

It may surprise you to know that 14.2% of Indians are Muslim. As a result, the country is home to one of the world’s largest Muslim populations, surpassed only by Indonesia.

Islam is also the world’s fastest-growing major religion. The number of Muslims is expected to increase by 70%, from 1.8 billion in 2015 to nearly 3 billion in 2060. The fact that they have the youngest median age, at 24, also helps this population growth. 

Hinduism

Hinduism is the third-largest religion worldwide, with approximately 1.2 billion Hindus in many countries. Interestingly, however, Hinduism is the dominant religion in only three countries, India with 79%, Nepal with 80%, and Mauritius with 48%.

Although Hinduism is rarely a country’s primary religion, it still enjoys a global presence. Many regions around the world support significant populations of Hindus, including the Caribbean, Southeast Asia, North America, and South America.

Buddhism

According to estimates, half the world’s Buddhists live in China. Still, they make up only 18% of the country’s population. Most of the rest of the world’s Buddhists live in East and South Asia, including 13% in Thailand (where 93% of the population is Buddhist). There are approx 520 million Buddhist adherents globally.

Buddhism in Asia is a matter of both identity and practice. Scholars and journalists have documented that many Asian countries may engage in Buddhist practices without considering themselves part of any organised religion.

Folk Religion

Folk religion is any ethnic or cultural religious practice that falls outside the doctrine of organised religion. Grounded on popular beliefs and sometimes called popular or vernacular religion, the term refers to how people experience and practice religion in their daily lives.

As of 2020, an estimated 429 million people, about 6% of the world’s total population, were adherents of folk or traditional religions. Some notable folk religions include African traditional religions, Chinese folk religions, Native American religions, and Australian aboriginal religions.

Judaism

While Jews historically have been found all around the globe, Judaism is highly geographically concentrated today. More than four-fifths of all Jews live in just two countries: the United States and Israel. Israel is the only country with a Jewish majority, with 76% of the population being practicing Jews. In 2020 there were 14.7 million Jews in the world. 

The largest remaining shares of the global Jewish population apart from the U.S. and Israel are in Canada (about 3% of the country’s population), France (2%), the United Kingdom (2%), Germany (2%), Russia (2%) and Argentina (between 1% and 2%).

Unaffiliated

The religiously unaffiliated population includes atheists, agnostics, and people who do not identify with any particular religion. 720 million of the Chinese population consider themselves religiously unaffiliated, while 78% of Czechs feel the same way.

However, it is worth noting that many of the religiously unaffiliated hold some religious or spiritual beliefs. For example, surveys have found that faith in God or a higher power is shared by 7% of unaffiliated Chinese adults, 30% of unaffiliated French adults, and 68% of unaffiliated U.S. adults.

Prevailing Beliefs - Interactive Map (below)

When studying the data in the interactive map, it’s worth remembering that in a highly populated country, a small group of religious people with a certain belief system, may represent a large number of people. For example, in 2010, China had a population of 1.3 billion.  68 million (5.1%) were Christians.  

🤓  Complete:  ACTIVITY 2 - The main world religions

Youcat (Youth Catechism of the Catholic Church) https://youcat.org/ 

Question 135: What is the relation between the Church and the Jews? 

Jews are the “older brethren” of Christians, because God loved them first and spoke to them first.

Jesus Christ as man is a Jew, and this fact unites us. The Church recognizes in him the Son of the living God, and this fact separates us. In awaiting the final coming of the Messiah we are one. 

The Jewish faith is the root of our faith. The Sacred Scripture of the Jews, which we call the Old Testament, is the first part of our Sacred Scripture. The Judeo-Christian concept of man and morality, which is informed by the Ten Commandments, is the foundation of Western democracies. It is shameful that for hundreds of years Christians were unwilling to admit this close relation to Judaism and for pseudo-theological reasons helped foment an anti-Semitism that all too often had lethal effects. During the Holy Year 2000, Pope John Paul II expressly asked forgiveness for this. The Second Vatican Council clearly states that the Jews as a people cannot be charged with any collective guilt for the crucifixion of Christ. 

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfil them.” Mt 5:17

The rulers of the Third Reich wanted to crush the entire Jewish people. . . . Deep down, those vicious criminals, by wiping out these people, wanted to kill the God who called Abraham, who spoke on Sinai, and laid down principles to serve as a guide for mankind, principles that are eternally valid.

Pope Benedict XVI,  May 28, 2006, in Auschwitz-Birkenau

For us the Jewish religion is not something external but in a certain way intrinsically belongs to our religion. Consequently we have relations with it unlike those with any other religion. You are our privileged brothers and, one might say, our older brothers. Pope John Paul II (1920-2005), during his visit to the Great Synagogue in Rome, 1986

🤓  Complete:   ACTIVITY 3 - What are the ‘Abrahamic’ faith traditions? What do they have in common?