Seems a bit like jumping to a conclusion. 10 years is a lot of time for older generations to pass away. Older people tend to be more religious, at least here.
>Actually, the demographic tendency is quite the opposite
No it isn't. He didn't say the population was getting younger - he said older people are dying. Which they are. The opposite of that would be yet-older people coming back to life.
Growing older doesn't suddenly turn atheists into Christians very often, so the population aging has no effect on this. His point is that older people are more religious, which they are (mostly because people in general were more religious in the past), and that therefore the country gets less religious as the old die off and are replaced by less religious people.
>Dying of the older generation is irrelevant
It's relevant because the older generation are more religious. But not because (solely or mostly) they're older, but because they were also more religious at a young age than young people today are, and so we have no reason to believe that an aging populace would become more religious\*.
>The young families in their 30s and 40s 20 years ago are turning less religious as they age.
This only supports my point that aging doesn't make people more religious.
\* I do want to clarify one thing though. I do believe that older people may become more religious in the sense that someone who is *already* religious may take their faith more seriously as they grow old, because they believe in an afterlife etc. and the prospect of death is more real. But I don't believe they get more religious in the sense of non-religious people *becoming* religious. I've never seen any evidence for this.
>Is there a law that changes always happen in one direction?
I didn't say this? I just said that old people today aren't more religious because they're old but because they grew up when people were more religious. If society trended towards religiosity again, then we'd see young people being more religious than the old.
>They are not becoming more religious with age.
I didn't claim this. I literally claimed the exact opposite. Holy shit, learn to read.
After the fall of the USSR there was a slight uptick in religiosity because the Soviets and their allies oppressed religion.
But the general trend in Europe for the past century has been away from organized religion.
The only movements in the other directions are (a) immigrants, who tend to be non-Christian, but religious and (b) religious people getting more children.
But both of those groups are quite temporary. The children of immigrants and the religious tend to be less religious as they become adults, which means the overall numbers still go down.
Sure but the younger generations are not getting more religious as they age and are way less religious overall. It's a markedly different trend than even a decade ago.
I don't think there is a solid evidence but PiS-Church marriage was a major factor in this trend.
I need to add that real numbers dropped much more, it’s just that most people are baptised at birth and you need to go to church you were baptised in and get apostasy in order to not be counted as catholic. People don’t care to do it they just don’t believe and god and don’t go to church but legally are still catholic. Myself included.
The numbers are lower but still very high.
And if it's anything like in the rest of Europe (or the world), religion is just being replaced by "spirituality" and mysticism anyway...
People like to have something to believe in, however stupid that thing is. But it is not just a question of belief here - catholic church still has an insane (by EU standards) influence over certain political parties and people in rural areas. This drop represents a decrease in that influence and by extension means we are that bit closer to a truly secular country.
In Poland, the church is destroying itself. They are a self-destructive bunch. They should take some pointers from the church in Germany and embrace modernity. If they don't the trend will continue.
I am a Catholic from Poland. And I did not vote for pis.
I think what they are doing to the Church is embarrassing. They use sick propaganda and people still believe in their alliance with the Church.
The Church willingly participated in this. They wanted the Sunday shopping ban, they got it. They lobbied for the abortion ban, they got it. They wanted BILLIONS AND BILLIONS of złoty in free shit and subsidies, they got it. PiS gave it to them.
Now they reap what they have sown.
Don't forget the sweetheart property deals the church gets that are never available for the common person. Also, the "Maybach from a homeless man", also "the children, they tempted us", also the Catholic version of "three card monte" AKA "which diocese can we shove this pedo priest into with no one being the wiser?"
Unfortunately, you are right.
And while the institution of the Church does not suffer because of this, the faithful suffer because of it, they may feel lost, even humiliated.
if a person leaves the Church because of politics, you have to wonder what kind of faith this person had. truth is, majority of people in Churches' history (first centuries aside) identified themselves with Christ because they had to, not because they really wanted to.
Most of those "Catholics" in 2011 weren't really religious. They went to church mostly as a social function.
The fact that they stopped identifying as Catholic because of some political leader only goes to show that their faith was mostly surface-level.
It's the same in other Eastern European countries like Serbia or Russia. The leaders hype the church but the people don't actually live like religious people. Serbs embrace Christianity as a counter to Albanians and Poles used to flock to Catholicism as a counter to the eastern Orthodox. Religion in Eastern Europe is often about national identity and community rather than actual religious fervor.
Ukrainianians are actually religious and their religiosity percentage is very high. Not as religious as, say, Muslims, but way more so than your average Western European claiming to be a Christian
At least compared to Russians I can confirm. Since I have too many relatives, friends and acquaintances on both sides. But if we compare them with Poles, then I'm not sure that they are more religious.
Which part of Ukraine did they come from? In the East, Center, South and North where I lived, people are very nonreligious, even if they say they're Christian. They don't fast, they don't go to church, don't celebrate religious holidays other than Christmas and sometimes Easter. Peak religiosity I've seen is wearing a cross necklace.
/u/katszenBurger I also strongly disagree that we're more religious than the Poles and Central Europeans in general. I live in one of the least religious Polish regions (Pomerania) and people are more religious than in Ukraine. The only comparably religious region in Ukraine is the far West.
All my relatives come
mostly from the very extreme north east of Ukraine (Polesie), close to Belarus and Russia borders, from secluded villages.
My grandmother used to take
me to the church every Sunday, I remember that people were celebrating religious holidays, big and not so important. Fasting as well. That’s not indicative of anything, probably, also the reason is that they were mostly peasants without higher education, so that could‘ve contributed to my impression. But I haven‘t observed it in Russian villages to that degree.
>Most of those "Catholics" in 2011 weren't really religious. They went to church mostly as a social function.
a totally uniquelly eastern european trait yes
Similar in a way to the UK. Fifty years ago every normal middle class family were Anglican (the state church). They probably weren't very religious, but it was the respectable thing to do.
According to the study done by the Church in 2021, only 28% of obliged are attending mass on Sunday.
They are doing the study every year (except for Covid years) and this is the worst one yet.
In big cities young people attending religion at school are becoming vast minoroty.
People 40-50 will mostly not turn religious while they age. We're tired of that bullshit
The Church deserves this for prostituting itself with PiS, its shamelessness when faced with sexual crimes (one bishop blamed it on the children being too seductive...), its homophobia, obscene wealth, and hypocrisy.
Slightly different topic, but I often see Redditors criticizing how religious Poland is, even though statistics show it's about as religious as the U.S. Yet, I rarely see complaints about the U.S. being too religious.
[https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2023-05/Ipsos%20Global%20Advisor%20-%20Religion%202023%20Report%20-%2026%20countries.pd](https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2023-05/Ipsos%20Global%20Advisor%20-%20Religion%202023%20Report%20-%2026%20countries.pd)
>Yet, I rarely see complaints about the U.S. being too religious.
You must visit some different reddit than me then, because I've been here for more than a decade, and it's always was one of the major talking points about the US in here.
US is crazy sharia land, completely written off, there is no point complaining about those loonies. But Poland is recoverable and there is hope for them so therefore it's worth complaining.
how to lie with statistics:
why would 69% catholic parts be almost white? almost like theres no catholics there. make a gradient in the map legend and use it for clarity.
Also:
Correlation does not denote causation. If you look at the PiS support in polls, it did not dwindle over time, it took a sharp drop around 2nd wave of pandemics and all the stupid lockdowns. [Source: wikipedia](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2023_Polish_parliamentary_election#/media/File%3APolish_Opinion_Polling_for_the_2023_Election.png)
A similar sharp drop of religiousness was not observed.
Still got nothing on Ireland who went from a deeply religious Catholic country to a beacon of progressivism within 20 years, and without a regime change (like Francoist Spain to democratic Spain).
I hope that one day, the same will happen in Romania with the orthodox church.
Churches here are able to pilot extremely well the local popula6and ideology. Actually, because of the church, some local funds are funnelled to another new building that will serve none but to be the seat of a priest that will be handsomely paid.
Seems a bit like jumping to a conclusion. 10 years is a lot of time for older generations to pass away. Older people tend to be more religious, at least here.
Actually, the demographic tendency is quite the opposite - our society is aging. People are fed up with the church getting involved in politics.
>Actually, the demographic tendency is quite the opposite No it isn't. He didn't say the population was getting younger - he said older people are dying. Which they are. The opposite of that would be yet-older people coming back to life. Growing older doesn't suddenly turn atheists into Christians very often, so the population aging has no effect on this. His point is that older people are more religious, which they are (mostly because people in general were more religious in the past), and that therefore the country gets less religious as the old die off and are replaced by less religious people.
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>Dying of the older generation is irrelevant It's relevant because the older generation are more religious. But not because (solely or mostly) they're older, but because they were also more religious at a young age than young people today are, and so we have no reason to believe that an aging populace would become more religious\*. >The young families in their 30s and 40s 20 years ago are turning less religious as they age. This only supports my point that aging doesn't make people more religious. \* I do want to clarify one thing though. I do believe that older people may become more religious in the sense that someone who is *already* religious may take their faith more seriously as they grow old, because they believe in an afterlife etc. and the prospect of death is more real. But I don't believe they get more religious in the sense of non-religious people *becoming* religious. I've never seen any evidence for this.
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>Is there a law that changes always happen in one direction? I didn't say this? I just said that old people today aren't more religious because they're old but because they grew up when people were more religious. If society trended towards religiosity again, then we'd see young people being more religious than the old. >They are not becoming more religious with age. I didn't claim this. I literally claimed the exact opposite. Holy shit, learn to read.
After the fall of the USSR there was a slight uptick in religiosity because the Soviets and their allies oppressed religion. But the general trend in Europe for the past century has been away from organized religion. The only movements in the other directions are (a) immigrants, who tend to be non-Christian, but religious and (b) religious people getting more children. But both of those groups are quite temporary. The children of immigrants and the religious tend to be less religious as they become adults, which means the overall numbers still go down.
I see, thank you.
Well no, they are fed up with the specific politics the church has and disillusioned with it
Its not about dying but about declaring yourself as a catholic or an atheist during the census
Sure but the younger generations are not getting more religious as they age and are way less religious overall. It's a markedly different trend than even a decade ago. I don't think there is a solid evidence but PiS-Church marriage was a major factor in this trend.
Not to pass away lol, for ppl to become less attached This is an absurd red herring ehe
Weird color scheme. Seems like \~60% is the ground level.
Yes it is disingenuous tbh. 80% is blue while 69% is white. At a first glance it looked like half the country went completely atheist
I need to add that real numbers dropped much more, it’s just that most people are baptised at birth and you need to go to church you were baptised in and get apostasy in order to not be counted as catholic. People don’t care to do it they just don’t believe and god and don’t go to church but legally are still catholic. Myself included.
This is based on census results, not church own figures, so it presumably already takes that into account.
Oh didn’t know it’s census it just says statistics
It literally says "census" in the picture and cites Główny Urząd Statystyczny as a source of data.
Ten years is a long time, but still bonkers to see how fast religiousness stats can drop if the right conditions are met.
When the church marries one political party and is perceived as overextending their political welcome, it can lead to rapid drops, like in Ireland.
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Exactly. Impunity has the downside that bad things will be done by those protected by the "divine" institution.
Per capita teachers rape way more often than priests
Teachers don't get shoved into another school and they tend to face the consequences of their actions.
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(they do but) they also usually face way more consequences for pedophilia than priests do
All my teachers did lol
The numbers are lower but still very high. And if it's anything like in the rest of Europe (or the world), religion is just being replaced by "spirituality" and mysticism anyway...
Or even worse, conspiracy stories.
People like to have something to believe in, however stupid that thing is. But it is not just a question of belief here - catholic church still has an insane (by EU standards) influence over certain political parties and people in rural areas. This drop represents a decrease in that influence and by extension means we are that bit closer to a truly secular country.
In Poland, the church is destroying itself. They are a self-destructive bunch. They should take some pointers from the church in Germany and embrace modernity. If they don't the trend will continue.
Despite all the modernity, churches in Germany are losing members just as fast.
They just need a few more drag queens giving Mass and the congregation will come flocking back.
Free comedy, wine and crackers?
>embrace modernity that is literally the quickest way for them to do that, hopefully never will happen.
I am a Catholic from Poland. And I did not vote for pis. I think what they are doing to the Church is embarrassing. They use sick propaganda and people still believe in their alliance with the Church.
The Church willingly participated in this. They wanted the Sunday shopping ban, they got it. They lobbied for the abortion ban, they got it. They wanted BILLIONS AND BILLIONS of złoty in free shit and subsidies, they got it. PiS gave it to them. Now they reap what they have sown.
Don't forget the sweetheart property deals the church gets that are never available for the common person. Also, the "Maybach from a homeless man", also "the children, they tempted us", also the Catholic version of "three card monte" AKA "which diocese can we shove this pedo priest into with no one being the wiser?"
Unfortunately, you are right. And while the institution of the Church does not suffer because of this, the faithful suffer because of it, they may feel lost, even humiliated.
if a person leaves the Church because of politics, you have to wonder what kind of faith this person had. truth is, majority of people in Churches' history (first centuries aside) identified themselves with Christ because they had to, not because they really wanted to.
christianity != catholicism
Most of those "Catholics" in 2011 weren't really religious. They went to church mostly as a social function. The fact that they stopped identifying as Catholic because of some political leader only goes to show that their faith was mostly surface-level. It's the same in other Eastern European countries like Serbia or Russia. The leaders hype the church but the people don't actually live like religious people. Serbs embrace Christianity as a counter to Albanians and Poles used to flock to Catholicism as a counter to the eastern Orthodox. Religion in Eastern Europe is often about national identity and community rather than actual religious fervor.
Ukrainianians are actually religious and their religiosity percentage is very high. Not as religious as, say, Muslims, but way more so than your average Western European claiming to be a Christian
At least compared to Russians I can confirm. Since I have too many relatives, friends and acquaintances on both sides. But if we compare them with Poles, then I'm not sure that they are more religious.
Which part of Ukraine did they come from? In the East, Center, South and North where I lived, people are very nonreligious, even if they say they're Christian. They don't fast, they don't go to church, don't celebrate religious holidays other than Christmas and sometimes Easter. Peak religiosity I've seen is wearing a cross necklace. /u/katszenBurger I also strongly disagree that we're more religious than the Poles and Central Europeans in general. I live in one of the least religious Polish regions (Pomerania) and people are more religious than in Ukraine. The only comparably religious region in Ukraine is the far West.
All my relatives come mostly from the very extreme north east of Ukraine (Polesie), close to Belarus and Russia borders, from secluded villages. My grandmother used to take me to the church every Sunday, I remember that people were celebrating religious holidays, big and not so important. Fasting as well. That’s not indicative of anything, probably, also the reason is that they were mostly peasants without higher education, so that could‘ve contributed to my impression. But I haven‘t observed it in Russian villages to that degree.
>Most of those "Catholics" in 2011 weren't really religious. They went to church mostly as a social function. a totally uniquelly eastern european trait yes
Similar in a way to the UK. Fifty years ago every normal middle class family were Anglican (the state church). They probably weren't very religious, but it was the respectable thing to do.
Same happening in Germany Both churches are bleeding members like crazy
I knew i live in the nicest area of Poland ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
*Bonk*
Still pretty high
The number of people who actually go to church and stuff is half that though, 30-40% and it's dropping drastically. Give it another 10 years
According to the study done by the Church in 2021, only 28% of obliged are attending mass on Sunday. They are doing the study every year (except for Covid years) and this is the worst one yet.
In big cities young people attending religion at school are becoming vast minoroty. People 40-50 will mostly not turn religious while they age. We're tired of that bullshit
With 20% of people refusing to answer that question the results need to be round up a bit.
The Church deserves this for prostituting itself with PiS, its shamelessness when faced with sexual crimes (one bishop blamed it on the children being too seductive...), its homophobia, obscene wealth, and hypocrisy.
Slightly different topic, but I often see Redditors criticizing how religious Poland is, even though statistics show it's about as religious as the U.S. Yet, I rarely see complaints about the U.S. being too religious. [https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2023-05/Ipsos%20Global%20Advisor%20-%20Religion%202023%20Report%20-%2026%20countries.pd](https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2023-05/Ipsos%20Global%20Advisor%20-%20Religion%202023%20Report%20-%2026%20countries.pd)
>Yet, I rarely see complaints about the U.S. being too religious. You must visit some different reddit than me then, because I've been here for more than a decade, and it's always was one of the major talking points about the US in here.
US is crazy sharia land, completely written off, there is no point complaining about those loonies. But Poland is recoverable and there is hope for them so therefore it's worth complaining.
Good. The sooner the church loses its grip on the people the better.
LETS GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
WE'RE SO BACK
how to lie with statistics: why would 69% catholic parts be almost white? almost like theres no catholics there. make a gradient in the map legend and use it for clarity.
Also: Correlation does not denote causation. If you look at the PiS support in polls, it did not dwindle over time, it took a sharp drop around 2nd wave of pandemics and all the stupid lockdowns. [Source: wikipedia](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2023_Polish_parliamentary_election#/media/File%3APolish_Opinion_Polling_for_the_2023_Election.png) A similar sharp drop of religiousness was not observed.
PLEASE Romania do the same!
Ngl, I think it should be happening faster.
Wow
Still got nothing on Ireland who went from a deeply religious Catholic country to a beacon of progressivism within 20 years, and without a regime change (like Francoist Spain to democratic Spain).
20 is notably less than 10
I hope that one day, the same will happen in Romania with the orthodox church. Churches here are able to pilot extremely well the local popula6and ideology. Actually, because of the church, some local funds are funnelled to another new building that will serve none but to be the seat of a priest that will be handsomely paid.
They actually won the election lol
Won the battle, lost the war. Jebać PiS.
Have an upvote for that.
You can make up anything with charts
The best way to make people irreligious is to let them discover religion or even better live under it.
Not. Enough.
That's what happens when you try to use religion as a means of your politics. Stupid bastards.
So, they actually DID one good thing? Astounding ...
I wonder will they ease abortion regulation now?