Canada: Survey on the importance of religion in daily life
At the request of Maclean’s magazine, the Canadian Institute Angus Reid Strategies did a survey in 20 countries, from September 22 to October 6, 2006, with an Internet questionnaire sent to 5,800 people selected at random. The results were adjusted according to the demographic characteristics and the behavior of the people surveyed in each country. They were made public on November 16.
The question asked was: “Do you agree or not with this statement: For me, religion is very important in my daily life.”
Agree / disagree = Saudi Arabia 96% / 4%; Egypt: 89% / 11%; South Africa: 70% / 30%; Mexico: 65% /35%; United States: 63% / 37%; India: 55% / 45%; Italy: 51% / 49%; Russia: 51% / 49%; Turkey: 51% / 49%; South Korea: 42% / 58%; Israel: 41% / 59%; Australia: 41% / 59%; Canada: 39% / 61%; Spain 31% / 69%; China: 26% / 74%; Germany: 24% /76%; Japan: 24% / 76%; Great Britain: 23% / 77%; France: 17% / 83%.
Craig Worden, Angus Reid’s Vice-President, declared that: “The geopolitical map is designed more and more according to the division between lay States and religious States” rather that according to “the tensions between Islam and Christianity.”
The survey shows that France, like Great Britain, Japan, Germany and China are indifferent to religion. Italy, a country of Catholic tradition, is the only European country in which 51% of the inhabitants grant some importance to religion.
In Switzerland, another survey reveals that one fourth of the population thinks that there is nothing after death. According to the Link Institute of Lucerne, which interrogated a representative sample of 1,026 persons, one fourth of the people questioned had no precise idea of life after death. 13.7% of the Swiss still retain a “Christian idea” of the world beyond: “After death, I will go to paradise”, or “to heaven” or “I will go to God”, or “I will enter life eternal,” 13.4% believe that “something” goes on, but they do not know precisely where, and say: “my spirit”, “my soul survives me.” 24% believe that after death there is nothing: “my body is destroyed, I return to dust.” 8.7% believe in some form of reincarnation.
