Islam now world's largest single religious denomination

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Vatican says Muslims more numerous than Catholics
Mon Mar 31, 2008 12:26pm BST

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - The number of Muslims has overtaken the number of Roman Catholics in the world, a Vatican official said on Sunday.

Monsignor Vittorio Formenti, who compiled the Vatican's newly-released 2008 yearbook, said Muslims made up 19.2 percent of the world's population and Catholics 17.4 percent.

"For the first time in history we are no longer at the top: the Muslims have overtaken us," Formenti told Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano in an interview, saying the data referred to 2006.

He said that if all Christian groups were considered, including Orthodox churches, Anglicans and Protestants, then Christians made up 33 percent of the world's population -- or about 2 billion people.

The Vatican recently put the number of Catholics in the world at 1.13 billion people. It did not provide a figure for Muslims, generally estimated at around 1.3 billion.

The data on religious groups was generally known from other statistical sources but it was significant that the Vatican chose to draw attention to the numbers and what it sees as the causes behind them.

Formenti said that while the number of Catholics as a proportion of the world's population was fairly stable, the percentage of Muslims was growing because of higher birth rates.

He said the data on Muslim populations had been compiled by individual countries and then released by the United Nations, adding the Vatican could only vouch for its own statistics.

(Reporting by Silvia Aloisi; Editing by Andrew Roche)
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http://uk.reuters.com/article/lifestyleMolt/idUKL3163432620080331
 
Well I feel this is an attempt at self importance by the religious leaders... have they ever checked the numbers of atheists and agnostics? :)

I think this may need to be changed to

"Agnostics now world's largest single "religious" denomination" :)



I find this humorous too :

Formenti said that while the number of Catholics as a proportion of the world's population was fairly stable, the percentage of Muslims was growing because of higher birth rates.
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So the poor buggers have no choice as to what religious belief they follow?
 
LancelotSA said:
Well I feel this is an attempt at self importance by the religious leaders... have they ever checked the numbers of atheists and agnostics? :)

I think this may need to be changed to

"Agnostics now world's largest single "religious" denomination" :)
Click to expand...

What religion do the Chinese practise?
Buddism?
 
Religion in China is a complicated matter. The Chinese Communist Party - the ruling party in China - for a long time discouraged the practice of religion,
 
Here you go....

# Christianity: 2.1 billion
# Islam: 1.5 billion
# Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
# Hinduism: 900 million
# Chinese traditional religion: 394 million
# Buddhism: 376 million
# primal-indigenous: 300 million
# African Traditional & Diasporic: 100 million
# Sikhism: 23 million
# Juche: 19 million
# Spiritism: 15 million
# Judaism: 14 million
# Baha'i: 7 million
# Jainism: 4.2 million
# Shinto: 4 million
# Cao Dai: 4 million
# Zoroastrianism: 2.6 million
# Tenrikyo: 2 million
# Neo-Paganism: 1 million
# Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand
# Rastafarianism: 600 thousand
# Scientology: 500 thousand

So damn only third but I still reckon a lot of those first two are made up of children who have not had time to make up their own minds already. Besides I am probably counted in one but my views are 3.
 
Islam is the world's largest culture in the world. There is a difference between a purely dogmatic following of a certain denomination of a certain faith = culture, and a belief in a fundamental entity that is underlying our whole existence.
 
LancelotSA said:
Here you go....

# Christianity: 2.1 billion
# Islam: 1.5 billion
# Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
# Hinduism: 900 million
# Chinese traditional religion: 394 million
# Buddhism: 376 million
# primal-indigenous: 300 million
# African Traditional & Diasporic: 100 million
# Sikhism: 23 million
# Juche: 19 million
# Spiritism: 15 million
# Judaism: 14 million
# Baha'i: 7 million
# Jainism: 4.2 million
# Shinto: 4 million
# Cao Dai: 4 million
# Zoroastrianism: 2.6 million
# Tenrikyo: 2 million
# Neo-Paganism: 1 million
# Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand
# Rastafarianism: 600 thousand
# Scientology: 500 thousand

So damn only third but I still reckon a lot of those first two are made up of children who have not had time to make up their own minds already. Besides I am probably counted in one but my views are 3.
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kill every last one of them!

:p
 
Also, Islam is not one denomination, there are at least two major branches within Islam.
 
boramk said:
kill every last one of them!

:p
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You've got an intelligent mind ...

Do you really believ that after you kick the bucket ... nothing happens.

Our whole existence came from somewhere. Why is it so difficult to belief that we don't have a connection with that anymore.

What's so important to lose that you can't entertain a religioun (and I'm a talking a religion, not a culture like hinduism and budhism)???
 
w1z4rd said:
Also, Islam is not one denomination, there are at least two major branches within Islam.
Click to expand...

True...

"The largest and best known branches of Islam are Sunni and Shi'ite. Smaller groups within Islam include Sufis (although some Sufis regard their practice of Sufism as pan-denominational or non-denominational), Druze, the U.S.-based Nation of Islam (previously known as "Black Muslims"), and Ahmadiyya."
Click to expand...
 
LancelotSA said:
Here you go....

# Christianity: 2.1 billion
# Islam: 1.5 billion
# Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
# Hinduism: 900 million
# Chinese traditional religion: 394 million
# Buddhism: 376 million
# primal-indigenous: 300 million
# African Traditional & Diasporic: 100 million
# Sikhism: 23 million
# Juche: 19 million
# Spiritism: 15 million
# Judaism: 14 million
# Baha'i: 7 million
# Jainism: 4.2 million
# Shinto: 4 million
# Cao Dai: 4 million
# Zoroastrianism: 2.6 million
# Tenrikyo: 2 million
# Neo-Paganism: 1 million
# Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand
# Rastafarianism: 600 thousand
# Scientology: 500 thousand

So damn only third but I still reckon a lot of those first two are made up of children who have not had time to make up their own minds already. Besides I am probably counted in one but my views are 3.
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Isn't it amazing that so many people believe in something?
Even if they do not believe?

Bloody amazing i tell you!
 
w1z4rd said:
Also, Islam is not one denomination, there are at least two major branches within Islam.
Click to expand...

Yep. And you'd think the Vatican would know that. Seems a bit strange that the Catholics would be fudging the truth. Makes me wonder if the Fuhre..Pope isn't trying to play up western Islamaphobia just a bit.
 
Picard said:
You've got an intelligent mind ...

Do you really believ that after you kick the bucket ... nothing happens.

Our whole existence came from somewhere. Why is it so difficult to belief that we don't have a connection with that anymore.

What's so important to lose that you can't entertain a religioun (and I'm a talking a religion, not a culture like hinduism and budhism)???
Click to expand...

Not wanting to go too far off topic.. but do you really feel we as humans are so superior that when we die, we do not just die?

What happens to a duck, chicken, bee, ant when they die?

Yes, we came from our mother's womb and I can't see us going back there.
 
LancelotSA said:
Not wanting to go too far off topic.. but do you really feel we as humans are so superior that when we die, we do not just die?

What happens to a duck, chicken, bee, ant when they die?

Yes, we came from our mother's womb and I can't see us going back there.
Click to expand...

We can think further ... Do you think that a chicken can think further?
 
LancelotSA said:
Not at all the same difference! The whole point of this thread was that Islam is the world's largest single denomination religion.
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We're missing each other. I'm saying that it doesn't matter how many denominations they have ... they still cling to THEIR religion because it gives structure to their lives.

Christians give structure to their lives because they believe in God. Compute that.
 
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