Austria’s religious landscape has changed significantly in recent decades. While the number of Catholics and Protestants has decreased significantly, that of Muslims and Orthodox has increased significantly. In addition, there are significantly more people of no religious denomination, who are already the largest group in Vienna, according to a recent survey by Statistics Austria.
After all, 77.6 percent of people in Austria say they are a religious community. The development of the individual religions was quite different. In 1951, 89 percent professed to be Catholic, in 1971 it was still 87 percent. Since then, the value has fallen sharply, recently even at a faster rate. In 2001 it was just under 74 percent, the year before Roman Catholic Austrians made up just over 55 percent of the population.
The share of evangelical Christians is shrinking
It was not much different for the Protestants. The proportion of Protestant Christians has fallen from 6.2 to 3.8 percent over the past 70 years and the Old Catholic Church has also shrunk from 0.5 to just 0.1 percent.
The development is very different for Orthodox and Muslims, who mainly acquired shares through immigration to Austria. Data for Islam is first available for 1971. At that time, only 0.3 percent declared themselves to be Muslim. In 2021 that was 8.3 percent, while the share has doubled in the past 20 years. About the same development took place during this period for the Orthodox, for whom figures have only been available since 2001. Since then, their share has increased from 2.2 to 4.9 percent.
More and more people without religion
Third climbers in this period are the non-denominational, who have increased their share from 12 to 22.4 percent in the past 20 years. By way of comparison: in 1951 this was less than four percent. By far the largest share of non-religious people is located in Vienna (34 percent).
The federal capital is also the outlier among the Orthodox and Muslims with more than 11 and almost 15 percent of the population respectively. In contrast, in Vienna there are only slightly less than 32 percent Catholics. In all other federal states they represent an absolute majority, in Tyrol with 66.2 percent even almost a two-thirds majority.
Trend towards more religious diversity
Austria’s director-general of statistics, Tobias Thomas, sees a trend towards greater religious diversity as an engine for development, alongside the surge in secularization. After all, there are also 26,000 Buddhists in Austria, for example. Their share of 0.3 percent is even higher than that of people of Israelite faith (just 0.1 percent).
Source: Krone
I am Ida Scott, a journalist and content author with a passion for uncovering the truth. I have been writing professionally for Today Times Live since 2020 and specialize in political news. My career began when I was just 17; I had already developed a knack for research and an eye for detail which made me stand out from my peers.
