The End of Secularisation through Demography? Projections of Spanish Religiosity

Abstract

This article presents the first projection, to our knowledge, of the intensity of religiosity in a population, which has a strong bearing on the critical question of the religious future of Europe. Spain has, in recent decades, simultaneously experienced rapid religious decline and marked demographic change through high immigration and declining fertility. To investigate future trends, we carry out population projections by religion and religiosity to the year 2050. We find that both fertility and immigration increase the share of the highly religious, as the more religious tend to have more children and immigrants tend to be more religious than non-immigrants. The non-religious population grows because people switch from religion to no-religion and because they are younger. Our findings suggest that in the longer term (2050), there may be growth in the no-religion population, a decline in the share of highly religious Christians, and moderate development of low religious Christians. The Muslim population would substantially increase, unless there is an end to migration and fertility differentials.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Samir K.C. for his help and advice in the project and the anonymous referees of the Journal of Contemporary Religion for their constructive and helpful comments. We are also grateful to Matthew Cantele for language editing. The research was part of a project generously funded by ERC Starting Grant, ERC Grant Agreement No. 241003-COHORT.

Notes

1. Extant work generally focuses on the impact of religion on demography (Lehrer, “Marital”; Westoff and Frejka).

2. Multistate projections are a demographic methodology used in projections of populations disaggregated by status—individual characteristics that can change over time—such as education attainment, marital status or religion and level of religiosity (for further details, see Schoen and Jonsson; Rogers, Introduction, Multiregional; Philipov and Rogers).

3. According to the Spanish constitution, no individual is obligated to answer questions regarding his/her religious beliefs.

4. The category ‘Protestants and Others’ mostly consists of Protestants, Orthodox, and other Christian groups (e.g. Marginals, Independents).

5. The current “6–10” group encompasses 39% of the population aged 15 and above in Spain, whereas a “5–10” grouping would include 57% of the population. Calculations were based on ESS 3–5 wave data (2006–2010).

6. INE data for the period 1996–2008.

7. TFR for the total population of Spain comes from the 2010 Revision of World Population Prospects (UNPD). Estimates of fertility by religion and religiosity are consistent with the UN data on the aggregated level.

8. The wording of the question was: “And what about when you were around 11 or 12, how often did you attend religious services then?”

9. The wording of the question was: ”How often do you go to mass or other religious services, excluding the occasions related to social ceremonies, such as weddings, first communions, or funerals?”

10. According to the ISSP 2008, among respondents who attend religious services at least once a month, around 82% define themselves as at least ‘somewhat religious’.

11. Countries taken into account include: Spain, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, the UK.

12. Fert(p)Migr(p)Switch(p) and (Fert(p)Migr(p)Switch(o).

13. For example, ranging from no switching [Switch(o)] to baseline switching rates [Switch(p)].

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Marcin Stonawski

Dr Marcin Stonawski is a Deputy Project Director at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in the World Population Program, Austria. He is also associated with the Department of Demography at Cracow University of Economics. His main fields of scientific interest are demographic projections, changes in religion and religiosity around the World, and the process of population aging and its socio-economic consequences. Dr Vegard Skirbekk is Project Director at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in the World Population Program, Austria, and Clinical Professor of Population and Family Health in the Columbia Aging Center, Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University. He focuses on the global distribution of religion, attitudes, productivity, ageing, and fertility. Eric Kaufmann is Professor in the Department of Politics at Birkbeck College, University of London. He works on problems of nationalism, religious demography, and political demography. Dr Anne Goujon is a Research Group Leader at the Vienna Institute of Demography at the Austrian Academy of Sciences and a Research Scientist at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in the World Population Program. She is interested in religious demography, education, fertility differentials, and population projections. CORRESPONDENCE: International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), World Population Program, Schlossplatz 1, A-2361 Laxenburg, Austria.