Irreligion in Romania

Romania is officially designated as a secular state, although there is no effective separation of church and state. Indeed, according to Law no. 142/1999, state-recognized religious denominations employees receive salaries from the state budget.[3] Therefore, all Romanian citizens who pay taxes contribute to clergy salaries, regardless of their religious affiliation.

Religion in Romania 2011 census[1]

  Orthodox Christianity (81%)
  Protestantism (6.2%)
  Catholicism (5.1%)
  Other (1.5%)
  Not religious (0.2%)
  No data (6%)
Eurobarometer Poll 2010[2]
Believes in spirit or life force
 
 7%
Believes there is a god
 
 92%
Does not believe in spirit, God or life force
 
 1%

Romania is one of the most religious countries in Europe,[4] with 92% of people saying that they believe in God.[5] Irreligion is much lower in Romania than in most other European countries and is among the lowest in the world. At the 2011 census, only 0.11% of the population declared itself atheist, up from the 2002 census, while 0.10% do not belong to any religion.[6]

Demographics

Over 20,700 people in Romania are atheists, according to 2011 census.[7] Thus, the number of Romanians who do not believe in God almost tripled in the previous decade.[8] The highest concentration is in Bucharest–Ilfov area (nearly 8,000 atheists) and generally wealthy areas of the country (Transylvania, Banat), the lowest – in Oltenia (750), Dobruja and poor areas of Wallachia (Teleorman, Călărași, Ialomița).[8] Before the census of October 2011, Secular Humanist Association (ASUR) conducted a campaign through which tried to promote an accurate census, in which people who consider themselves atheists to have confidence in selecting this option.[8] According to ASUR, European Values Survey (1999)[9] and World Values Survey (2005)[10] polls show that the real percentage of those who declare themselves atheists is at least 6–7% of the population, 60–70 times more than the result of census in 2002.[8] In The Cambridge Companion to Atheism (2006), Phil Zuckerman gives a figure of 4%.[11] A 2014 poll by WIN/Gallup International Association shows that 16% of Romanians are not religious and only 1% are convinced atheists.[12]

  >0.5%
  0.1–0.5%
  <0.1%
Development regionIrreligiousAtheistsTotal
București-Ilfov3,2958,517 11,812 (0.51%)
Centru5,6112,085 7,696 (0.32%)
Nord-Est1,2131,629 2,842 (0.08%)
Nord-Vest4,6223,098 7,720 (0.29%)
Sud-Est6071,321 1,928 (0.07%)
Sud-Muntenia9701,443 2,413 (0.07%)
Sud-Vest Oltenia380525 905 (0.04%)
Vest2,2192,125 4,344 (0.23%)
Total[13]18,91720,74339,660

Surveys
Survey/StudyYearAtheistsAgnosticsIrreligious
The Cambridge Companion to Atheism2006 4%
Dentsu Inc.[14]20062,4%
WIN/Gallup International[15]20141%16%

Socio-demographic profile
Remus Cernea, the only avowed atheist MEP

According to a study conducted by researchers from Open Society Foundations, Romanian atheists are a very young group and with a significantly higher level of education that the national average: 53% of atheists are under 30 years, and 33% of them have completed higher education.[16] The group of atheists/agnostics/persons without religion lives in a proportion of 59% in urban areas – in the capital and other major cities – and are easier to find in Wallachia and harder in Moldavia.[16]

Atheists are more intolerant than most Romanians with regard to almost all social groups on which were questioned: Roma, sectarians, Hungarians, Muslims, Jews, poor.[17] The only exception to this string of intolerance is represented by homosexuals, towards them atheists showing more tolerance than the national average.[17] As ideological positioning, atheists declare themselves, equally, both right-wing and left-wing, most of them (56%) placing at the center of the ideological line. Only eight percent say they prefer leftist economic policies, while right-wing economic policies attract 47% of atheists.[17]

References
  1. "2011 census results by religion" (xls). www.recensamantromania.ro, website of the Romanian Institute of Statistics. Archived from the original on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 5 May 2015.
  2. Special Eurobarometer 341 / Wave 73.1 – TNS Opinion & Social (PDF). Brussels. October 2010. p. 204. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2010-12-15.
  3. "Legea nr. 142/1999, legea privind sprijinul statului pentru salarizarea clerului". Drept Online.
  4. Tomka, Miklós (2011). Expanding Religion: Religious Revival in Post-communist Central and Eastern Europe. Walter de Gruyter. p. 75. ISBN 9783110228151.
  5. Tarta, Mihai (15 June 2015). "European Culture Wars: Sexual Nationalism between Euro-Christian and Euro-Secular Civil Religion in Poland and Romania". In Sremac, Srdjan; Ganzevoort, R. Ruard (eds.). Religious and Sexual Nationalisms in Central and Eastern Europe: Gods, Gays and Governments. Leiden: Brill. p. 33. ISBN 978-90-04-29779-1.
  6. "Ce ne spune recensământul din anul 2011 despre religie?" (PDF). Institutul Național de Statistică. October 2013.
  7. "Ateismul în România. Care sunt județele cu cei mai mulți atei". Gândul. 9 October 2013.
  8. "Numarul ATEILOR s-a triplat. Cati romani au renuntat la religie?". 9AM. 5 December 2012.
  9. "Survey 1999". European Values Study. doi:10.4232/1.10789.
  10. "World Values Survey, 2005". The Association of Religion Data Archives.
  11. Phil Zuckerman (30 October 2006). "Contemporary Numbers and Patterns". The Cambridge Companion to Atheism. Cambridge University Press. p. 55. ISBN 9781139827393.
  12. "Regional & Country Results". WIN/Gallup International.
  13. "Religiile Romaniei. Orasul cu cel mai mare procent de atei din tara". InCont.ro.
  14. "Dentsu Inc" (in Japanese).
  15. "Q9. Irrespective of whether you attend a place of worship or not, would you say you are?". Romania (PDF). WIN/GIA. 2014. p. 10.
  16. "Ateii din Romania sunt tineri, educati si intoleranti". Ziare.com (in Romanian). 18 October 2011. Archived from the original on 2011-11-12. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  17. Voicu, Ovidiu (18 October 2011). "Atei în România: puțini, tineri, educați, de dreapta și intoleranți" (PDF). Fundația Soros (in Romanian). Archived (PDF) from the original on 2017-05-10. Retrieved 2020-06-26.

See also
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