More Canadians are shunning religion

A national study shows that while Canada remains overwhelmingly Christian, Canadians are turning their backs on organized religion in ever greater numbers.

Results from the 2011 National Household Survey show more than two-thirds of Canadians, or some 22 million people, said they were affiliated with a Christian denomination.

Immigration

At 12.7 million, Roman Catholics were the largest single Christian group, representing 38 per cent of Canadians; the second largest was the United Church, representing about six percent; while Anglicans were third, representing about five per cent of the population.

One in four Canadians, or 7.8 million people, however, reported they had no religious affiliation.That was up sharply from 16.5 per cent from the 2001 census.

The Canadian trend seems to mirror but even exceed levels of non-affiliation in the US. 

A 2012 survey from the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life pegged the ratio of religiously-unaffiliated Americans at just under 20 per cent. But Pew also has found that more than one-quarter of American adults (28 per cent) have left the faith in which they were raised in favour of another religion — or no religion at all.

The Canadian study showed just more than 7 per cent of the country was Muslim, Hindu, Sikh or Buddhist, an increase from 5 per cent a decade earlier.

The Muslim population exceeded the one million mark, according to the survey, almost doubling in size for the third consecutive decade, and recording the biggest increase in growth of any religion, at 60 per cent since 2001.

Muslims now represent 3.2 per cent of Canada’s population, nudging up from the two per cent recorded in 2001. 

Immigration has largely fuelled the increase, with the largest share of Muslims coming from Pakistan over the past five years, according to Statistics Canada.

Hindus made up 1.5 per cent of the population (up 51 per cent); and Sikhs 1.4 per cent (a rise of 54 per cent). Both Christians and Jews declined as a share of the population.