From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Palestinianism Anti-Palestinianism or anti-Palestinian racism refers to prejudice, collective hatred, and discrimination directed at the Palestinian people for any variety of reasons. Since the mid-20th century, the phenomenon has largely overlapped with anti-Arab racism and Islamophobia because the overwhelming majority of Palestinians today are Arabs and Muslims. Historically, anti-Palestinianism was more closely identified with European antisemitism, as far-right Europeans detested the Jewish people as undesirable foreigners from Palestine. Modern anti-Palestinianism—that is, xenophobia or racism towards the Arabs of Palestine—is most common in Israel, the United States, Lebanon, and Germany, among other countries.
Anti-Palestinian racism includes "erasing the human rights and
equal dignity and worth of Palestinians"; defending acts of violence
against Palestinians; and refusing "to acknowledge Palestinians as an
Indigenous people with a collective identity". Pakistani author and professor Sunaina Maira, citing American professor of Islamic studies Shahzad Bashir in the context of labelling, states: "...an important aspect of anti-Palestinianism, that is, the moral panic whipped up about the 'radicalization' of Muslim and Arab American youth is often accompanied by the charge that they are automatically anti-Semites if they are critical of the Israeli state's policies." According to Moustafa Bayoumi, anti-Palestinianism preceded the modern wave of Islamophobia and influenced the rise of the latter.
Prevalence by country
Canada
In 2018, author and political activist Yves Engler criticized the New Democratic Party (NDP) for its conduct in respect of the Palestine Resolution
that called for support of efforts to ban "settlement products from
Canadian markets, and using other forms of diplomatic and economic
pressure to end the [Israeli] occupation." Engler said it "demonstrated the need to directly confront anti-Palestinianism within the party."
In 2020, the University of Toronto
allegedly blocked the hiring of Valentina Azarova as director of the
International Human Rights Program (IHRP) due to her pro-Palestinian
activism. Dania Majid, president of the Arab Canadian Lawyers
Association (ACLA), described this as an example that "anti-Palestinian
racism is alive and well" in Canada.
In 2023, the principal of Park West School in Halifax, Nova Scotia, apologized after Palestinian students were told they couldn't wear the keffiyeh
during the school's culture day. Palestinian and pro-Palestinian
activists protested the banning of the keffiyeh as an act of
anti-Palestinian racism in front of the Department of Education building
in Halifax.
France
In May 2021, the French interior minister Gérald Darmanin
requested that the police ban a pro-Palestinian protest in Paris. The
Parisian journalist Sihame Assbague described the decision as an
expression of "French colonial solidarity with the Israeli occupation
forces."
Germany
Mati Shemoelof in +972 Magazine said anti-Palestinian sentiment is common in Germany.
Palestinians in the country have described a "crackdown and
criminalisation" of Palestinians which has included police violence at
protests, racial profiling, censorship, and violations of their human
rights.Majed Abusalama, co-founder of Palestine Speaks in Germany, suggests German anti-Palestinianism is increasing. The German left, particularly the Antideutsch
movement, has been noted for anti-Palestinian sentiment. Many
pro-Israel non-Jewish Zionists on the German left regard being
anti-Palestinian as connected to their solidarity with Jews.
In 2019, the Bundestag declared the BDS movement to be a form of antisemitism.
In response, the BDS movement condemned the motion as anti-Palestinian.
The Palestinian B.D.S. National Committee issued a statement declaring
the motion an "anti-Palestinian...McCarthyite and unconstitutional
resolution passed by the German Parliament." British musician Brian Eno has argued that pro-Palestinian artists are subjected to "censorship and inquisitorial McCarthyism" due to the actions of the German government and anti-Palestinian groups.
Germany's relationship with Palestine has been described as
"complex". At present, Germany's political class exhibits a "zealous
identification with Israel" that is "often explained in terms of the
country's past". Alternative readings, however, view this trend as a
"qualitatively new phenomenon in Germany largely unrelated to moral
considerations pertaining to the Nazi era". Hannah C. Tzuberi argues that German manifestations of "anti-antisemitism" (which has been described as "a defining marker of post-war German identity") can go beyond the identification of Germans with Jews, sometimes leading to the identification of German gentiles as Jews, and the identification of Germany as Israel.
In 2020, scholars and artists began accusing Germany of a "witch hunt" against those who express pro-Palestinian solidarity.
The European Legal Support Center (ELSC) has also accused Germany of
human rights violations for laws which it says amount to suppression of
pro-Palestinian activism, which it says particularly affects Jews and
Palestinians. Artists for Palestine says Germany has censured a number of artists for expressing pro-Palestinian sentiment, include Kamila Shamsie, Kae Tempest, Young Fathers, Talib Kwelli, Walid Raad and Nirit Sommerfeld.
Palestinians are the target of violence by Israeli settlers and their supporters, predominantly in the West Bank. In November 2021, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz
discussed the steep rise in the number of incidents between settlers
and Palestinians in the West Bank, many of which result from attacks by
residents of illegal settler outposts on Palestinians from neighboring
villages. Settler violence also includes acts known as price tag attacks
that are in response to actions by the Israeli government, usually
against Palestinian targets and occasionally against Israeli security
forces in the West Bank.
Palestinian police are forbidden from reacting to acts of
violence by Israeli settlers, a fact which diminishes their credibility
among Palestinians.
Between January and November 2008, 515 criminal suits were opened by
Israel against settlers for violence against Arabs or Israeli security
forces; 502 of these involved "right wing radicals" while 13 involved
"left wing anarchists".
In 2008, the senior Israeli commander in the West Bank said that a hard
core of a few hundred activists were involved in violence against the
Palestinians and Israeli soldiers.
Some prominent Jewish religious figures living in the occupied
territories, as well as Israeli government officials, have condemned and
expressed outrage over such behavior, while religious justifications for settler killings have also been given. Israeli media said the defense establishment began taking a harder line against unruly settlers starting in 2008.
In 2011 the BBC reported that "vast majority of settlers are
non-violent but some within the Israeli government acknowledge a growing
problem with extremists."
UN figures from 2011 showed that 90% of complaints filed against
settlers by Palestinians with the Israeli police never led to
indictment.
In the 21st century, there has been a steady increase in violence
and terror perpetrated by Israeli settlers against Palestinians. In 2012, an EU heads of mission report found that settler violence had more than tripled in the three years up to 2011. United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
(OCHA) figures state that the annual rate of settler attacks (2,100
attacks in 8 years) has almost quadrupled between 2006 and 2014. In 2021, there was yet another wave of settler violence which erupted after a 16-year-old settler died in a car chase with Israeli police
after having hurled rocks at Palestinians. So far it has resulted in 44
incidents in the span of a few weeks, injuring two Palestinian
children.
In the latter parts of 2021, there has been a marked increase in
settler violence toward Palestinians, condemned at the United Nations
Security Council.
This violence increased further following the election of a
far-right government in 2022 which proposed to expand Israeli
settlements in Palestinian territories, as well as the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October 2023.
In 1994, a Jewish settler in the West Bank and follower of the Kach party, Baruch Goldstein, massacred 29 Palestinian Muslim worshipers at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron. During his funeral, a rabbi declared that even one million Arabs are "not worth a Jewish fingernail". Goldstein was denounced by most religious streams including the mainstream Orthodox", and many in Israel classified Goldstein as insane. The Israeli government condemned the massacre and made Kach illegal. The Israeli army killed a further nine Palestinians during riots following the massacre, and the Israeli government severely restricted Palestinian freedom of movement in Hebron, while letting settlers roam free.
Although Israel also forbade a very small number (18) of Israeli
settlers from entering Palestinian towns and demanded that those
settlers turn in their army-issued rifles, it denied the PLO's request
that all settlers be disarmed and that an international force be
established to protect Palestinians from Israeli aggressors. Goldstein's grave has become a pilgrimage site for Jewish extremists. Current Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir is known to have had a portrait of Goldstein hanging in his living room as homage.
In general, the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories is hardly mentioned by Israeli textbooks or by high school matriculation examinations, according to a study by Professor Avner Ben-Amos
of Tel Aviv University. The lives and perspectives of Palestinians are
rarely mentioned, an approach he terms “interpretive denial.” In most
Israeli textbooks, “the Jewish control and the Palestinians’ inferior
status appear as a natural, self-evident situation that one doesn’t have
to think about."
According to the Ben-Amos study, one of the main civics textbooks used
in Israeli high schools fails to address at all the limited rights of
the millions of Palestinians living in the West Bank under Israeli
military occupation. The more general issue of the occupation was
addressed in a previous edition of this textbook but the Israeli debate
regarding the occupation was shrunk to a few sentences in the most
recent edition under right-wing education ministers. Another Israeli
civics textbook completely omits discussion of the dispute over the
occupied territories. In civics high school matriculation tests over the
past 20 years, no question appeared on the limiting of the
Palestinians’ rights. The geography matriculation exams ignore the Green Line and the Palestinians.
American public opinion has tended in favor of Israel and against
Palestinians for a number of years, although pro-Palestinian sentiment
has increased in the United States during the 21st century.
In 2021, according to Gallup,
only 25% of Americans sympathized more with Palestinians than with
Israelis, with 58% sympathizing with Israel, and only 34% of Americans
believed that the United States should place more pressure on Israel in
regards to the Israel-Palestine conflict. However, 52% of Americans
supported an independent Palestinian state. Democrats were more likely
than Republicans to have pro-Palestinian sentiments.
In her 1990 essay "Israel: Whose Country Is It Anyway?", the Jewish-American writer Andrea Dworkin
wrote that American Jews are raised with anti-Palestinian sentiment,
which she describes as "a deep and real prejudice against Palestinians
that amounts to race-hate."
In May 2021, the Tayba Islamic Center in the Sheepshead Bay
neighborhood of Brooklyn was vandalized with anti-Palestinian graffiti
reading "Death 2 Palestine". The incident was investigated by the NYPD
as a hate crime. Student leaders at the University of Michigan
issued a statement denouncing the anti-Palestinian sentiment they
alleged had been allowed to "run rampant" on campus, stating that
Palestinian students had been "profoundly marginalized through
censorship and threats."
In November 2021, Palestine Legal filed a complaint with Washington, D.C.'s Office for Human Rights against George Washington University, alleging that the university had discriminated against Palestinians in its offering of trauma services.
On 9 November 2023, a former leader of the University of Connecticut's pro-Palestine campus group, who had graduated in 2022, spoke out about threatening voicemails
she had received, as her number was still publicly listed on the
group's website. One particular voicemail she received was from a number
in Oklahoma and contained racial slurs, called her a terrorist, and said "I can't wait to see you dead". The school's Muslim Student Association received an email mocking dead Palestinians, and the messages were reported to the FBI, campus and state police.
Opponents of anti-Palestinianism sometimes allege that it is as
serious a moral failing as antisemitism, but believe that
anti-Palestinianism goes unrecognized or underrecognized within Western
societies.
After fashion retailer Zara condemned anti-Palestinian comments made by one of its senior designers in June 2021, the East Jerusalem born and raised model Qaher Harhash said the fashion industry should stand up against anti-Palestinian sentiment:
We usually see brands standing against anti-Semitism, but it's also time we see brands standing against anti-Palestinianism.
In 2015, Spanish BDS activists accused the Jewish-American rapper Matisyahu of being anti-Palestinian and temporarily succeeded in having his appearance at the Rototom Sunsplash festival cancelled.
Digital anti-Palestinianism
The censorship of Palestinian and pro-Palestinian voices on the
internet, particularly on social media, has been referred to as "digital
apartheid" or "digital occupation".
Facebook and Instagram has been accused of anti-Palestinian bias by digital rights activists. Other websites accused of anti-Palestinian bias include Reddit, YouTube, Twitter, and PayPal.
Anti-Palestinianism during Israel-Hamas war
Following the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October 2023 and the outbreak of the Gaza war, there has been a surge of anti-Palestinianism, anti-Arab racism, and Islamophobia. Palestinians have expressed concerns over increased anti-Palestinianism in mass media and anti-Palestinian hate crimes.Human rights groups have noted an increase in anti-Palestinian hate speech and incitement to violence against Palestinians.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divine_retribution The End of the World, commonly known as The Great Day of His Wrath, an 1851–1853 oil painting on canvas by the English painter John Martin. According to Frances Carey, the painting shows the "destruction of Babylon
and the material world by natural cataclysm". This painting, Carey
holds, is a response to the emerging industrial scene of London as a
metropolis in the early nineteenth century, and the original growth of
the Babylon civilisation and its final destruction. According to the Tate, the painting depicts a portion of Revelation 16, a chapter from the New Testament.
Divine retribution is supernaturalpunishment of a person, a group of people, or everyone by a deity in response to some action. Many cultures have a story about how a deity exacted punishment upon previous inhabitants of their land, causing their doom.
An example of divine retribution is the story found in many cultures about a great flood destroying all of humanity, as described in the Epic of Gilgamesh, the HinduVedas, or the Book of Genesis (6:9–8:22), leaving one principal 'chosen' survivor. In the first example, it is Utnapishtim, in the Hindu Vedas it is Manu and in the last example Noah. References in the New Testament and the Quran to a man named Nuh (Noah) who was commanded by God to build an ark also suggest that one man and his followers were saved in a great flood.
In Greek mythology, the goddess Hera often became enraged when her husband, Zeus,
would impregnate mortal women, and would exact divine retribution on
the children born of such affairs. In some versions of the myth, Medusa was turned into her monstrous form as divine retribution for her vanity; in others it was a punishment for being raped by Poseidon.
The Bible refers to divine retribution as, in most cases, being delayed or "treasured up" to a future time. Sight of God's supernatural works and retribution would militate against faith in God's Word. William Lane Craig
says, in Paul's view, God's properties, his eternal power and deity,
are clearly revealed in creation, so that people who fail to believe in
an eternal, powerful creator
of the world are without excuse. Indeed, Paul says that they actually
do know that God exists, but they suppress this truth because of their
unrighteousness.
Some religions or philosophical positions have no concept of
divine retribution, nor posit a God being capable of or willing to
express such human sentiments as jealousy, vengeance, or wrath. For
example, in Deism and Pandeism,
the creator does not intervene in our Universe at all, either for good
or for ill, and therefore exhibits no such behavior. In Pantheism (as reflected in Pandeism as well), God is
the Universe and encompasses everything within it, and so has no need
for retribution, as all things against which retribution might be taken
are simply within God. This view is reflected in some pantheistic or
pandeistic forms of Hinduism, as well.
Buddhism
The concept of divine retribution is resolutely denied in Buddhism. Gautama Buddha did not endorse belief in a creator deity, refused to express any views on creation and stated that questions on the origin of the world are worthless. The non-adherence to the notion of an omnipotent creator deity or a prime mover
is seen by many as a key distinction between Buddhism and other
religions, though precise beliefs vary widely from sect to sect and
"Buddhism" should not be taken as a single, holistic religious concept.
Buddhists do accept the existence of beings in higher realms (see Buddhist cosmology), known as devas, but they, like humans, are said to be suffering in samsara, and are not necessarily wiser than us. The Buddha is often portrayed as a teacher of the gods, and superior to them. Despite this, there are believed to be enlightened devas.
But since there may also be unenlightened devas, there also may be
godlike beings who engage in retributive acts, but if they do so, then
they do so out of their own ignorance of a greater truth.
Despite this nontheism, Buddhism nevertheless fully accepts the theory of karma, which posits punishment-like effects, such as rebirths in realms of torment,
as an invariable consequence of wrongful actions. Unlike in most
Abrahamic monotheistic religions, these effects are not eternal, though
they can last for a very long time. Even theistic religions do not
necessarily see such effects as "punishment" imposed by a higher
authority, rather than natural consequences of wrongful action.
Judaism and Christianity
"The wrath of God", an anthropomorphic expression for the attitude which some believe God has towards sin, is mentioned many times in the Bible.
Genesis 11:1–9 – The confusion of languages at the Tower of Babel; To scatter them over the Earth
Genesis 19:23–29 – Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah; people of no redeeming value
Genesis 38:6–10 – Destruction of Er and Onan; wickedness in the Lord's sight
Exodus 7–14 – Plagues of Egypt; to establish his power over that of the gods of Egypt
Exodus 19:10–25 – Divine threatenings at Mount Sinai; warn that the mountain is off limits and holy
Exodus 32 – Plagues at the incident of the golden calf; disowning the people for breaking his covenant with them
Leviticus 10:1–2 – Nadab and Abihu are burned; offering unauthorised fire in their censers
Leviticus 26:14–39 – Curses upon the disobedient; divine warning
Numbers 11 – A plague accompanies the giving of manna in the
wilderness; rejecting his gracious gift of heavenly food and failing his
test of obedience
Numbers 16 – The rebellion of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram
– Their supernatural deaths and the plague that followed; insolence and
attempting self-promotion to roles they were unworthy of holding
Numbers 20:9–13 – Reprimand of Moses at the water of Meribah; disobeying the Lord's instruction, showing distrust and indifference in God's presence
Numbers 21 – Murmuring of the people and the plague of fiery flying serpent; spurning God's grace
Numbers 25 – Whoredom with the Moabites and resulting plague; breaching God's covenant through sexual immorality and worshipping other gods
Deuteronomy 28 – Curses pronounced upon the disobedient; another divine warning
The New Testament associates the wrath of God particularly with imagery of the Last Day, described allegorically in Romans 2:5 as the "day of wrath". The wrath of God is mentioned in at least twenty verses of the New Testament. Examples are:
John 3:36 – John the Baptist declares that whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son, or in some English translations, does not believe the Son, shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.
Romans 1:18
– For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness
and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the
truth.
Romans 5:9 – Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God.
Romans 12:19
– Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God,
for it is written, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord."
Ephesians 5:6 – Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.
Revelation 6:17 – For the great day of his wrath has come, and who is able to withstand?
Revelation 14:19
– So the angel swung his sickle across the earth and gathered the grape
harvest of the earth and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath
of God.
Revelation 15:1
– Then I saw another sign in heaven, great and marvelous: seven angels
having the seven last plagues, for in them the wrath of God was
finished.
Revelation 19:15
– From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the
nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the
winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty.
Heinrich Meyer
observes in his consideration of John 3:36 that the wrath of God
"remains" on anyone who rejects belief in the Son, meaning that the
rejection of faith is not the trigger for God's wrath, it is there
already. Their refusal to believe amounts to a refusal to allow the
wrath of God to be lifted from them.
Alleged modern examples
Since the 1812 Caracas earthquake occurred on Maundy Thursday while the Venezuelan War of Independence was raging, it was explained by royalist authorities as divine punishment for the rebellion against the Spanish Crown. The archbishop of Caracas,
Narciso Coll y Prat, referred to the event as "the terrifying but
well-deserved earthquake" which "confirms in our days the prophecies
revealed by God to men about the ancient impious and proud cities:
Babylon, Jerusalem and the Tower of Babel". This prompted the widely quoted answer of Simón Bolívar: "If Nature is against us, we shall fight Nature and make it obey".
While some Orthodox Jews believed that the Holocaust was divine retribution for sins, this argument has many critics. In contrast, many Germans at the time believed that the bombing of Germany was divine retribution for the November pogrom, although seeing the bombings as divine retribution became less popular after the war.
Various Christian, Jewish and Muslim religious leaders claimed that Hurricane Katrina was God's punishment on America, New Orleans or the world for any of a variety of alleged sins, including abortion, sexual immorality (including the gay pride event Southern Decadence), the policies of the American Empire, failure to support Israel, and failure of black people to study the Torah.
Televangelist Pat Robertson stirred up controversy after claiming that the 2010 Haiti earthquake
may have been God's belated punishment on Haitians for allegedly having
made a "pact with the Devil" to overthrow the French during the Haitian Revolution. Yehuda Levin, an Orthodox Jewishrabbi, linked the earthquake to gays in the military via an alleged Talmudic teaching that homosexuality causes earthquakes. Levin posted a video onto YouTube the same day as 2011 Virginia earthquake in which he said, "The Talmud states, "You have shaken your male member in a place where it doesn’t belong.
I too, will shake the Earth". He said that homosexuals shouldn't take
it personally: "We don’t hate homosexuals. I feel bad for homosexuals.
It’s a revolt against God and literally, there’s hell to pay".
Chaplain John McTernan said that Hurricane Isaac, like Hurricane Katrina, was God's punishment on homosexuals. Buster Wilson of the American Family Association concurred that statement.
McTernan also said that Hurricane Sandy may have been God's punishment against homosexuals. In addition, WorldNetDaily columnist William Koenig, along with McTernan himself, suggested that American support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict led to the hurricane.
Iraqi Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr
said the brutal 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquake was "God's (Allah) rebuke
against Turkey because weak response against the holy book (Quran)
burning by right wing extremist groups in Sweden".
ISIS
officials said the 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquake was "God's (Allah) rage
against Turkey for renounced Sharia laws, replaced it with unbeliever
(Kuffar) laws and enforced it, adopted unbeliever lifestyles, declared
war against ISIS and allied with the army of unbelievers (NATO)" in their propaganda narrative.
After the brutal 2025 California wildfires, some Muslims viewed the wildfires as "God's (Allah) rage against Joe Biden administration's support of the Israel Defense Forces which committed war crimes against civilians during the Israel-Hamas war while some American Christians (mostly Trump supporters)
viewed it as punishment from God for the moral corruption and blasphemy
of some Hollywood A-tier stars and city residents — also suggested that
the fires were punishment from God for the city's support for Democratic Party policies. Many Christians compared the disaster to the story of Sodom and Gomorrah in the Book of Genesis.
Rebuttals
Orthodox rabbi Shmuley Boteach denounces such claims since they carry the implication of victim blaming,
writing that "For many of the faithful, the closer they come to God,
the more they become enemies of man." He contrasts the Jewish tradition,
which affords a special place to "arguing with God", with an approach
to religion that "taught people not to challenge, but to submit. Not to
question, but to obey. Not how to stand erect, but to be stooped and
bent in the broken posture of the meek and pious." Speaking about the COVID-19 pandemic,
Boteach said "I utterly reject and find it sickening when people
believe that this is some kind of punishment from God – that really
upsets me."
A Jesuit priest, James Martin, wrote on Twitter in response to Hurricane Sandy
that "If any religious leaders say tomorrow that the hurricane is God's
punishment against some group they're idiots. God's ways are not our
ways."
In the West, since at least the mid-twentieth century there has
been a gradual decline in adherence to established Christianity. In a
process described as secularization, "unchurched spirituality" is gaining more prominence over organized religion.
Background
According to a 2012 Pew Research Center survey, Christianity will continue to be the world's largest religion
throughout the next four decades. However, Christianity may experience
the largest net losses in terms of religious conversion, according to
expectations. Worldwide, religious conversions are projected to have a
"modest impact on changes in the Christian population" between 2010 and
2050 and may negatively affect the growth of Christian population and its share of the world's populations "slightly".
However, these forecasts lack reliable data on religious conversion in
China, but according to media reports and expert assessments, it is
possible that the rapid growth of Christianity in China may maintain, or even increase, the current numerical advantage of Christianity as the largest religion in the world.
In the United States, there have been some conversions to Christianity
among those who grew up non-religious, but they have not been in numbers
that make up for those who were raised as Christians but became
religiously unaffiliated later in their lives.
Scholars have proposed that Church institutions decline in power
and prominence in most industrialized societies, except in cases in
which religion serves some function in society beyond merely regulating
the relationship between individuals and God. Developing countries in Latin America and Africa are not experiencing a decline, mostly because of religious conversion in those countries where the Church offers broad social support services. Together with the decline of Western Christians, increasing numbers of Christians in the global South will form a "new Christendom" in which the majority of the world's Christian population will be found in the South. According to various scholars and sources, Pentecostalism – a Protestant Christianmovement – is the fastest growing religion in the world; this growth is primarily due to religious conversion.
The European Values Study found that in most European countries in 2008, the majority of young respondents identified themselves as Christians. Unlike Western Europe, in Central and Eastern European countries, the proportion of Christians has either been stable or it has increased in the post-communist era.
A large majority (83%) of those who were raised as Christians in
Western Europe still identify as such. The remainder mostly
self-identify as religiously unaffiliated. Christianity is still the largest religion in Western Europe, where 71% of Western Europeans identified themselves as Christian, according to a 2018 study by the Pew Research Center.
A 2015 analysis of the European Values Study in the Handbook of Children and Youth Studies identified a "dramatic decline" in religious affiliation across Europe from 1981 to 2008;
however, according to the same analysis, "the majority of young
respondents in Europe claimed that they belonged to a Christian
denomination".
In 2017, a report which was released by St. Mary's University, London,
concluded that Christianity "as a norm" was gone for at least the
foreseeable future. In at least 12 out of the 29 European countries
which were surveyed by the researchers, based on a sample of 629 people,
the majority of young adults reported that they were not religious.
The data was obtained from two questions, one asking "Do you consider
yourself as belonging to any particular religion or denomination?" to
the full sample and the other one asking "Which one?" to the sample who
replied with "Yes". The Pew Research Center
criticized the methodology of the two-step approach: "Presumably, this
is because some respondents who are relatively low in religious practice
or belief would answer the first question by saying that they have no
religion, while the same respondents would identify as Christian,
Muslim, Jewish, etc., if presented with a list of religions and asked to
choose among them. The impact of these differences in question wording
and format may vary considerably from country to country".
In 2018, the Pope lamented the ongoing trend of re-purposing churches: some of them were being used as pizza
joints, skating parks, strip clubs and bars. In Germany, 500 Catholic
churches have closed since 2000. Canada has lost 20% of its churches in
this time frame. This is the result of a lack of clergy who are willing
to staff churches as well as the result of the churches' inability to
meet costs. After a scandal in Naples where a deconsecrated church became the venue for a Halloween party which featured scantily clad witches who were seated on the former altar, Pope Francis,
acknowledging the decline in Church attendance, implored that the
deconsecrated churches be placed in service to fulfill the social needs
of caring for the poor.
In a new study published in 2022, Pew Research Center projects that if
the rate of switching continues to accelerate (primarily to no religious
affiliation), Christians will make up less than half of the American
population by 2070, with estimated ranges for that year falling between
35% and 46% of the American population (down from 64% in 2022 and down
from 91% in 1976).
The same study found a retention rate among American Christians closer
to 67%, with one-third of those who were Christian in childhood leaving
the religion by age 30.
In the Western world, historical developments since the reformation era in the sixteenth century led to a gradual separation of church and state
from the eighteenth century onward. From the mid-twentieth century,
there has been a gradual decline in adherence to established
Christianity. In a process described as secularization, "unchurched spirituality", which is characterized by observance of various spiritual concepts without adhering to any organized religion, is gaining more prominence.
Europe
Largest (non-)religious group by EU member state according to Eurobarometer survey 2019.
More than 75% Catholic
50–75% Catholic
Relative Catholic majority
50–75% Protestant
More than 75% Orthodox
50–75% non-religious
Relative non-religious majority
30% Catholic, 30% non-religious (Germany)
According to Scholars, in 2017, Europe's population was 77.8% Christian (up from 74.9% 1970). These changes were largely the result of the collapse of Communism and switching to Christianity in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc countries. According to the 2021 Eurobarometer survey, Christianity was the largest religion in the European Union, accounting 66.1% of the EU population, down from 72% in 2012.
In 2017, Pew Research Center have found that the number of
Christians in Europe, is in decline. This is mainly because the number
of deaths is estimated to exceed the number of births among European
Christians, in addition to lower fertility and switching to no religious
affiliation.
In 2018, Pew Research Center have found a retention rate among
Western European Christians of around 83% (ranging from 57% in the
Netherlands to 91% in Austria). Despite the decline in Christian affiliation in Western Europe, Christianity is still the largest religion in Western Europe, where 71% of Western Europeans identified themselves as Christian, according to a 2018 study by the Pew Research Center. Unlike Western Europe, in Central and Eastern European countries the proportion of Christians has been stable or even increased in the post-communist era.
The decline of Christianity in the Czech Republic recorded throughout the censuses of 1991, 2001 and 2011.
In Western Europe, Christians have relatively low retention rates in
the Netherlands (57%), Norway (62%), Belgium and Sweden (65%); the
majority of those who have left Christianity in these countries now
identify as religiously unaffiliated.
Meanwhile, Christians have relatively high retention rates in Austria
(91%), Switzerland and Italy (90%), and Ireland and the United Kingdom
(89%).
The proportion of respondents who currently identify as Christian has
been in decline in Czechia and Slovakia; meanwhile, the proportion of
respondents who currently identify as Christian has been stable or even
increased in the rest of the Central and Eastern European countries.
Austria
In
Austria, between 1971 and 2021 Christianity declined from 93.8% to
68.2% (Catholism from 87.4% to 55.2% and Protestantism from 6% to 3.8%)
while people with no religion rose from 4.3% to 22.4%.
Currently, Christianity is adhered to by 68.2% of the country's
population, according to the 2021 national survey conducted by
Statistics Austria. Among Christians, 80.9% were Catholics, 7.2% were
Orthodox Christians (mostly belonging to the Eastern Orthodox Church),
5.6% were Protestants, while the remaining 6.2% were other Christians,
belonging to other denominations of the religion or not affiliated with
any denomination, and 22.4% declared they did not belong to any
religion, denomination or religious community.
France
Christianity has been declining in France
steadily since the 1960s. In 2021, a French poll showed that over half
of French citizens do not believe in God or consider Christianity to be
irrelevant. People who identified as Catholic declined from 81% in 1986
to 47% in 2020, while the number of people who identified as not
religious rose from 16% to 40%. In 2021, around 50% of all French respondents identified as Christians.
Finland
In Finland, 77.4% of the population practiced Christianity, and the figure decreased to 67.7% in 2021, about a 10 digit decrease in a decade.
The number of church members leaving the Church saw a particularly
large increase during the fall of 2010. This was caused by statements
regarding homosexuality and same-sex marriage – perceived to be
intolerant towards LGBT people – made by a conservative bishop and a politician representing Christian Democrats in a TV debate on the subject.
Germany
In
2023, it was estimated that around 48% of the German population were
Christians, among them, 46% members of the two large Christian churches. Attendance and membership in both Catholic and Protestant churches in Germany
have been declining for several decades. As of 2021, less than half of
German citizens belong to a church for the first time in the country's
history. Around 52.7% of the population were Christians, among them,
49.7% members of the two large Christian churches. Around 360,000 Catholics left the church in 2021 alone, and about 280,000 people have left Protestant churches.
In 2017, Pew Research Center have found that the number of deaths is
estimated to exceed the number of births among German Christians by
nearly 1.4 million.
Hungary
According to some sources, Christianity is declining in Hungary.
Between 1992 and 2022, Christianity declined from 92.9% to
42.5%(Catholicism from 67.8% to 29.2%). In 2022, only 35.5% of people
with age group 30-39 identified as Christians, the number further
dropping to 32.8% of people with age group 20-29. Among Catholics, only 12% regularly attend church.
On the other hand, a series of surveys conducted by Pew Research Center
in 2018 found that the share of Christians has remained fairly stable
in Hungary (75% who say they were raised Christian versus 76% who say
they are Christian now).
Ireland
Christianity, specifically Catholicism, remains the predominant religion in the Republic of Ireland. In the 2022 census, 75.7% of the population identified as Christian.
However, recent social changes, including the lifting of a ban on
abortion and the legalizing of same sex marriage, have solidified the
growth of liberal thinking in Ireland, particularly within the younger
community. An Irish priest, Fr. Kevin Hegarty, asserted in 2018 that the
church's authority was undermined by the papal encyclical, called Humanae Vitae, that established the Church's opposition to contraception. He reported that there is only one priest under the age of 40 in the entire diocese of Killala;
only two priests have been ordained over the last 17 years, and there
have been no candidates for the priesthood since 2013. Hegarty blames
this decline on the Church's positions on female ordination, contraception and sexuality. A continued requirement for children entering Irish Catholic
owned schools to be baptized keeps the overall level of baptisms high,
though the number of individuals practicing a faith or attending church
is decreasing. Problems arising from the sexual abuse of children and
the historical persecution of single mothers and their families have
also greatly contributed to the decline of Catholicism in Ireland.
Netherlands
Church converted into Belgian Beer Cafe in Utrecht, Netherlands.
The Netherlands has tolerated greater religious diversity among
Christian sects than Scandinavian countries, where "automatism" (default
registration in the Lutheran Church
by birth) has been the norm. Non-denominationalism increased in the
Netherlands during the 19th century. This process slowed between the
1930s and 1960s, after which non-denominational affiliation increased at
very high levels. The Church's ministry to the poor was not needed in
the modern Netherlands that had developed systems of government welfare
and secular charity. The declining influence of religious institutions
in public life allowed great religious, philosophical and theological
pluralism in the private and individual spheres of Dutch society. During the 1960s and 1970s, pillarization
began to weaken and the population became less religious. In 1971, 39%
of the Dutch population were members of the Roman Catholic Church; by
2014, their share of the population had dropped to 23.3%
(church-reported KASKI data), or to 23.7% (large sample survey by
Statistics Netherlands in 2015). The proportion of adherents of
Calvinism and Methodism declined in the same period from 31% to 15.5%. In 2022, the diocese of Amsterdam announced that 60% of Catholic churches (approximately 100 churches total) would be closing there in the next five years.
As of 2015, 63% of Dutch people think that religion does more harm than good.
A quarter of the population thinks that morality is threatened if no
one believes in God, down from 40% in 2006. The number of people
reporting that they never pray rose from 36% in 2006 to 53% in 2016.In 2015, Statistics Netherlands found that 50.1% of the adult population declared no religious affiliation.
Poland
In 2021 Polish census,
71.3% of Polish people identified as Catholic, although 20.53% refused
to answer the question about their religion. A 2022 poll showed that 84%
of Polish people identify as Catholic, but only 42% are practicing
Catholics, and among 18-24 year olds only 23% are practicing Catholics,
compared to 69% in 1992. The Catholic sex abuse scandal, the large
restrictions on abortions in Poland contributed to this decline in
Catholicism among the younger generations.
Adherence to established forms of church-related worship is in rapid
decline in Italy and Spain, and Church authority on social, moral and
ethical issues has been reduced.
Daily church attendance has declined but Catholicism still remains the
predominant religion in Spain and Italy. However, according to the
Spanish Center for Sociological Research, 55.6% of Spaniards self-identified as Catholic in 2023, but only 18.3% claimed to be "practicing" Catholics.
In Italy, about 68% of participants in a 2023 poll by Ipsos self-identified as "Christians". However, although most of the population claims religious affiliations, according to the Italian National Institute of Statistics (ISTAT) data, less than 19%
of Italians have declared themselves to be practicing. While the
proportion of those who have never practiced a religion has doubled,
from 16% in 2001 to 31% in 2022.
Attendance at Anglican churches had begun to decline in the United Kingdom by the Edwardian era, with both membership in mainstream churches and attendance at Sunday schools declining. Infant baptism declined after World War II. In 2014, Archbishop of CanterburyRowan Williams stated that the UK had become a "post-Christian country". That same year, only 4.3% of the population participated in a Church of England (C of E) Christmas service. Nevertheless, around 60% of all respondents still identified as Christians in the 2011 Census.
The Roman Catholic Church
has witnessed the highest retention rate among all Christian
denominations. In 2015, 9.2% of the UK population was Catholic.
According to scholar Stephen Bullivant, based on the British Social Attitudes Survey and European Social Survey,
the decline in Anglicanism has slowed thanks to "the return of
patriotism and pride in Christianity", and the number of followers of
the Anglican Church has increased slightly by 2017.
This growth however is still below that needed and is mainly from
African immigrants. Anglicanism has been majority African since 2001. In
2017, a report commissioned by the Christian group Hope Revolution
indicated that 21% of British youth identified as "active followers of
Jesus".
According to the 2018 British Social Attitudes Survey
(BSA), 33% of over-75s identified as C of E, while only 1% of people
aged 18−24 did so. The report stated that "Britain is becoming more
secular not because adults are losing their religion but because older
people with an attachment to the C of E and other Christian
denominations are gradually being replaced in the population by younger
unaffiliated people."
In the 2022 Scotland census, for the first time a majority of
people stated that they did not identify with any religion - 51.1%, up
from 36.7% in 2011.
Oceania
Australia
A deconsecrated church in Australia, now in use as a restaurant.
The percentage of people belonging to some form of Christianity
decreased from 52.2% the 2016 Census to 43.9% in the 2021 Census.
Meanwhile, those declaring that they had no religion increased from 30%
in the 2016 Census to 38.9% in the 2021 Census.
In a 2017 survey of teenage Australians aged 13–18, 52% declared that
they had no religion, compared with 38% Christian, 3% Muslim, 2%
Buddhist and 1% Hindu.
The only form of Christianity that showed a significant growth in 2016 Census is the Pentecostal church, increased from 2.1% up from 1.7% in 2016. However, like other forms of Christianity, it also has declined in 2021 Census. Most of the followers of the Pentecostal churches are young as the average age among them is 25.
New Zealand
Population recorded as having 'no religion' overtook Christianity in the 2018 census
In New Zealand, there has been a decrease in Christianity and
increase in the population declaring "No religious affiliation". The
reason for this is attributed to the decline in belief in institutional
religion and increase in Secularism. In the 1991 census, 20.2% of the New Zealand population followed No religion.
This proportion more than doubled in two decades, to reach 41.9%
in the 2013 census, and the figure increased again to 48.2% in the 2018
census. In 2023 Census, the figure reached 51.6%, crossing the 50% mark
for the first time. At the same time, the Christian population declined
from 37.31% in 2018 Census to 32.3% in 2023. In the 2018 Census, the New
Zealand population claiming "No religion" officially overtook
Christianity.
North America
Canada
Percentage of Christians per Canadian province or territory based on 2021 Census data
80-89.9% Christian
70-79.9% Christian
60-69.9% Christian
50-59.9% Christian
40-49.9% Christian
30-39.9% Christian
In 2021, Statistics Canada
found that only 68% of Canadians 15 years and older reported having a
religious affiliation, marking the first time the number had dipped
below 70% since StatCan began tracking religious affiliation in 1985. Christianity remains the largest religion in Canada, in the 2021 census, 53.3% of the population identified as Christians.
In Quebec, since the Quiet Revolution, over 500 churches (20% of the total) have been closed or converted for non-worship based uses. In the 1950s, 95% of Quebec's population went to Mass; in the present day, that number is closer to 5%. Despite the decline in church attendance, Christianity remains the largest religion in Quebec, where 64.82% of people were Christians, according to 2021 census.
With the loss of Christianity's monopoly after having once been central and integral to Canadian culture and daily life, Canada has become a post-Christian and secular state.
Mexico
Although
Mexico is the second largest Catholic country in the world in terms of
members, Catholicism has been declining over the past 30 years, from
89.7% of the population in 1990 to 77.7% in 2020. The number of
Catholics in Mexico have decreased by 20.5% since 1950. In 2020, 8.1% of Mexicans did not identify with any religion.
United States
Christianity, the largest religion in the United States, experienced a 20th-century high of 91% of the total population in 1976. This declined to 73.7% by 2016 and 64% in 2022.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) lost about 30% of its
congregation and closed 12.5% of its churches: the United Methodist
church lost 16.7% of its congregation and closed 10.2% of its churches.
The Presbyterian Church had the sharpest decline, losing over 40% of its congregation and 15.4% of its churches between 2000 and 2015. Infant baptism has also decreased; nationwide, Catholic baptisms declined by nearly 34%, and ELCA baptisms by over 40%.
In a study published in 2022, Pew Research Center projected that
if the rate of decline continues to accelerate, Christians will make up
less than half of the American population by 2070, with estimated ranges
for that year falling between 35% and 46% of the American population.
In 2024, Pew Research Center published a study stating that the
percentage of American adults who identify as religiously unaffiliated,
known as "nones", numbered 28%, higher than Catholics at 23% and
Evangelical Protestants at 24%.
In 2019, 65% of American adults described themselves as Christians.
In 2020, 47% of Americans said that they belonged to a church, down
from 70% in 1999; this was the first time that a poll found less than
half of Americans belonging to a church.
Nationwide Catholic membership increased between 2000 and 2017, but the
number of churches declined by nearly 11% and by 2019, the number of
Catholics decreased by 2 million people, dropping from 23% of the population to 21%.
Since 1970, weekly church attendance among Catholics has dropped from
55% to 20%, the number of priests declined from 59,000 to 35,000 and the
number of people who left Catholicism increased from under 2 million in
1975 to over 30 million today.
In 2022, there were fewer than 42,000 nuns in the United States, a
76% decline over 50 years, with fewer than 1% of nuns under age 40. The Southern Baptist Convention
has experienced decline: between 2006 and 2020, it lost 2.3 million
members, representing a 14% decrease in membership during that period. The Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod reported in 2021 that the denomination has been declining in membership.
In 2020, the church reported approximately 1.8 million total baptized
members, a decline from its peak in 1971 when it reported nearly 2.8
million total baptized members.
The 2014 Religious Landscape Study found a large majority of
those who were raised as Christians in the United States still identify
as such (retention rate of 87.6% among those raised Christian), while
those who no longer identify as Christians mostly identify as
religiously unaffiliated.
More recent studies have found a retention rate closer to 67%, with
one-third of those who were Christian in childhood leaving the religion
by age 30. The 2014 study found that 84% of all adults who were raised as historically black Protestant continue to identify as such or identify now with different Christian denominations, Evangelical Protestant (81%), Mormon (76%), Catholic (75%), Orthodox Christian (73%), mainline Protestant (70%), and Jehovah's Witnesses (62%) continue to identify as such or identify now with different Christian denominations. Significant minorities of those raised in nearly all Christian denominational families now say they are unaffiliated, ranging from 13% among those raised historically black Protestant to 35% of those raised Jehovah's Witnesses.
A small minority of those raised in nearly all Christian denominational
families identify now with another faith, ranging from 3% among those
raised historically black Protestant, Evangelical Protestant, Mormon,
Orthodox Christian, and Jehovah's Witnesses to 4% of those raised
Catholic and mainline Protestant.
A 2022 Pew Research study found that 30% of Latinos in the United
States were religiously unaffiliated, and half of Latinos age 18-29 were
religiously unaffiliated.
In 2018, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported that churches in Minnesota were being closed due to dwindling attendance. Mainline Protestant churches in Minnesota have seen the sharpest declines in their congregations. The Catholic Church has closed 81 churches between 2000 and 2017; the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis closed 21 churches in 2010 and has had to merge dozens more. In roughly the same time frame, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America in Minnesota has lost 200,000 members and closed 150 churches. The United Methodist Church,
which is Minnesota's second-largest Protestant denomination, has closed
65 of its churches. In the early 1990s, the Archdiocese of Chicago closed almost 40 Catholic churches and schools.
In 2016, increasing costs and priest shortages fueled plans to close or
consolidate up to 100 Chicago Catholic churches and schools in the next
15 years. The Archdiocese of New York announced in 2014 that nearly one-third of their churches were merging and closing. The Archdiocese of Boston closed more than 70 churches between 2004 and 2019. In 2021, the Archbishop of Cincinnati announced that 70% of Catholic churches would be closing there in the next several years. In May 2023, the Archbishop of St. Louis announced the closing of 35 parishes. In 2024, 13 Catholic parishes in New Orleans closed or merged. In 2024, the Archdiocese of Baltimore announced that two thirds of their parishes would be closing. In 2024, the Catholic Diocese of Buffalo, New York announced the closing of 89 churches. Nationally as of 2020, Catholic school enrollment declined by more than 430,000 students since 2008.
Moderate and liberal denominations in the United States have been
closing down churches at a rate three or four times greater than the
number of new churches being consecrated. However, according to The Christian Century,
the rate of annual closures is approximately 1% and quite low relative
to other types of institutions. It has been asserted that of the
approximately 3,700 churches that close each year, up to half are
unsuccessful new churches. The more conservative evangelical denominations have also declined, representing 23% of the population in 2006 and 14% in 2020 according to the Public Religion Research Institute.
The Orthodox Church and the denominations like Jehovah's Witnesses, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and Pentecostals
had slight increases in membership between 2003 and 2018, but the
number of adults in the United States who do not report any religious
affiliation nearly doubled over that period. However, in 2021, the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, the largest Orthodox church in the United States, reported membership losses during a 40-year period. In 2015, Pew Research Center reported a decline among the Orthodox Churches in the United States.
The Public Religion Research Institute's 2020 Census of American Religion showed that the overall decline of white Christians in America had slowed, stabilizing at around 44% of the population.
It also showed that, contrary to expectations, white evangelicals had
continued to decline and that they were now outnumbered by white
mainline Protestants. Conversely, the Pew Research Center found in 2022 that the decline had continued to accelerate over the previous fifty years.
An article written by Adam Gabbatt in April 2021 for the British newspaper The Guardian
claimed that an "allergic reaction" to conservative Christians had
caused the decline of the religion as a whole, primarily towards how
certain conservative Christians generally do not support the advancement
of LGBT rights and abortion rights,
a perspective primarily shared by younger people like millennials.
Gabbatt and other researchers interviewed in the article particularly
blame the Republican Party for pushing social conservative policies.
South America
Argentina
As of 2019, Catholicism in Argentina was around 63%, down from 76.5% in 2004.Irreligiosity grew from 12% to 19% in 9 years.
A 2019 survey made online by the Universidad de San Andrés showed
that that 76% of Argentinians believed in God (a decrease from 91% in
2008), 44% believed in heaven, 32% believed in hell, around 29% prayed
daily, only 13% attended religious services weekly and about 24%
considered religion to be very important in their lives.
Chile
Cases
of sexual abuse, attempts to hide information, and interference in
government affairs have been the main causes of the decline of
Christianity in Chile. According to the public broadcaster TVN, the number of Chileans who declare themselves Catholics fell from 73% in 2008 to 45% in 2018.
In addition, it is the Latin American country that has less trust (36%)
in the Church throughout the region according to Latinobarómetro. 63% of the Chilean population profess some branch of Christianity, according to the Encuesta Nacional Bicentenario identifies as Christian, with an estimated 45% of Chileans declaring to be part of the Catholic Church and 18% of Pentecostal churches. 5% of the population adhere to other religion.
Attempts to restore the Roman Catholic Christian faith in Chile have failed. The Argentine newspaper Clarín reported that Pope Francis's State visit to Chile in 2018 "had been the worst in his five years of pontificate." After the papal visit, the crisis in the Chilean Catholic Church increased. According to the Bicentenario
survey, atheism has grown from 21% in 2018 to 32% in 2019 and then to
36% in 2020 and 37% in 2021. Despite the decline of Roman Catholic
Church, Pentecostalism still maintains the same percentage of adherents since 2012.
Uruguay
Uruguay is one of the world's most secular nations. A recent study indicated that almost 44.5% of Uruguayans are unaffiliated.
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