Christian numbers fall with atheism on the rise in UK
The number of Christians in England and Wales fell by more than four million in the last decade, the 2011 census has suggested, while the number of people identifying as atheists increased by six million over the same period.
The data from the Office for National Statistics showed there were 33.2million Christians last year, compared to 37.3million in 2001.
The number of people declaring themselves to be atheists rose by more than six million to 14.1million meanwhile.
Ahead of the release of the second tranche of census data, the outgoing Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, had claimed it was a ‘cliché’ that the Church of England was fading.
The census also showed that between 2001 and 2011 the population of England and Wales increased by 3.7million to 56.1million, as the number of foreign born residents rose from 4.6million to 7.5million.
Guy Goodwin, the ONS director of census, said the data helped to ‘paint a picture of society’ and allowed politicians to plan for the future.
‘This is just the tip of the iceberg of census statistics,’ he said. ‘Further rich layers of vital information will be revealed as we publish more detailed data for very local levels over the coming months.’
The census questionnaire was sent to around 26million households in England and Wales in March last year.
The second biggest religion according to the data is Islam, with 2.7million people ticking the Muslim box.
Half of the 7.5million people living in England and Wales who were born overseas arrived between 2001 and 2011, with India, Poland, Pakistan, Ireland and Germany the top five countries in this respect.
In contrast, in 2001, Poland did not make the top ten list of sending countries.
While the number of people identifying themselves as ‘white British’ fell by 0.4million – 80 per cent of the population compared to 87 per cent – the ‘white other’ category increased by 1.1million to 2.5million.
http://metro.co.uk/2012/12/11/census-2011-christian-numbers-fall-with-atheism-on-the-rise-3311594/