A new study from Pew Research Group analyzes the world’s evolving religious landscape for the years 2010 to 2020 and reveals some surprising insights.
The biggest takeaway: although Christianity remains the globe’s biggest religion, if current trends hold, it won’t be the biggest faith for long. Data shows that while Christianity is growing, another faith is growing even faster: Islam.
Muslims could soon outnumber Christians worldwide.
Global Faith Shifts: Christianity Falls in the Rankings
Not just yet, though. Christians remain the world’s largest religious group. As of 2020, some 2.3 billion people around the world identified as Christian.
However, Muslims are not far behind – and now number over 2 billion.
Importantly, while Christianity remained the world’s largest religious group, it failed to keep pace with global population growth.
That means that despite adding 122 million Christians globally over that ten year period, their percentage of the population actually fell nearly 2 percentage points, to 28.8%.
Replacing them? Non-religious people and Muslims. Both groups handily outpaced global population growth.
Muslims added a whopping 347 million to their ranks in the 2010s, increasing their share of the world’s global faithful by 1.8%, to a total of 25.6%.
The non-religious were the only other group to increase their share of the population, growing their share of the world’s (non)believers by 1% to 24.2% (adding 270 million people over the past ten years).
Most other groups – including Hindus and Jews – held steady with global population growth. Buddhists were the only other faith group other than Christians to lose a significant share of the global population.
What’s Fueling Faith in Flux?
In the ten-year period analyzed by the survey, Christianity experienced massive drops in Europe and the Americas, and likely only held on to the title of world’s largest faith thanks to Christian gains in sub-Saharan Africa.
Rates of Christianity are dropping across the western world, as more people stop identifying with Christianity once they reach adulthood. Rather than choosing another religion, increasingly they are stepping away from faith entirely (and we’ve written about this rise of the “nones” before).
As for what’s causing these shifts, theories vary.
Everything from widespread availability of scientific information to perceived religious persecution of minorities like the LGBTQ+ community has been blamed for people stepping away from religion.
Islam’s growth was boosted by high birth rates in Muslim communities, helping to grow the faith through reproduction (as opposed to conversion). Pew estimates that Islam is the religion that benefited most from high fertility rates in recent years.
The Muslim faith is also seeing expansion in some surprisingly places, including Japan:
Will Islam Overtake Christianity?
If current trends continue, the answer is not if, but when Islam will become the world’s biggest religion. Some estimates put that date as far out as 2070, though more recent updates predict 2050 – or even sooner.
As for how people feel about this? Reactions are mixed.
Some Muslims expressed pride in their religion’s growth, despite what they see as unfair criticism:
Meanwhile, others are sounding the alarm, warning that “Sharia Law is right around the corner”:
These divisions have heightened tensions across the country, including in New York City, where rising star Zohran Mamdani has faced backlash for his faith as he vies to become the city's first Muslim mayor.
What is your reaction?
Scrivo in Italiano, è probabile che l' Islam con il tempo superi il Cristianesimo, qui in Italia e paesi Europei sta accadendo già da tempo Grazie