IRELAND
Irish Independent
The large drop over the past seven years in the proportion of Irish people describing themselves as religious is almost certainly part of the fallout from the Catholic hierarchy’s disastrous mishandling of the clerical child sex abuse scandal.
Since 2005 the percentage of Irish people describing themselves as “a religious person” has fallen from 69pc to just 47pc.
Over the same period the proportion of Irish people describing themselves as either “a convinced atheist” or “not a religious person” has almost doubled.
These results are contained in the latest WIN-Gallup global index of Religion and Atheism, which surveyed people in 57 countries, including Ireland, on their religious beliefs.
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