What is Christianity like in Europe?

[robvalue]

That is an interesting point. In the UK, if a politician came in with bible thumping madness, he would have little chance. But in the US, it's kind of the other way around.

Things are changing though, the U.S. will soften in time I think.

[watchamadoodle]

As far as Russia goes, the Eastern Orthodox Church is a pretty large influence on Russian politics, and Putin is all too happy to push it. In fact, as far as I can remember (and I'll look for soruces in a moment) opening/holding/promoting any other Christian denomination (let alone another religion) has been restricted by law.

I'll be back in a bit with some sources if I can find 'em.

EDIT: While their constitution 'claims' to be secular and hold all religions as equal before the law, apparently any religious group considered "non-traditional" (read non-Russian Orthodox) can be subjected to restrictions, police raids, financial discrimination, and can have their religious literature banned, and in some cases even have their entire religious group banned in Russia.

https://www.pcusa.org/news/2011/11/22/fr...ed-limits/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_...us_freedom
http://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/essa...-in-russia

Wow, I suspected there was some state promotion of Eastern Orthodoxy, but I had no idea it was so ridiculous. Maybe the discrimination and hate crimes against homosexuals might be related to Eastern Orthodoxy? Or maybe it would be happening without religion as long as the government is unwilling to defend minorities?

---

Apparently, there are also regions where Christianity is more like ethnicity. People might identify as Catholic without actually believing in God.

Large parts of Germany for example. People have very wishy-washy beliefs and church and religion are upheld as traditions. The two large churches (roman catholic and the association of evangelical protestant churches EKD) are established as almost-government institutions, the church tax is collected by the state, and there is confessional religious instruction in state schools. Almost everyone is baptised or registered either protestant or catholic out of family tradition, but if you look at the numbers actually attending church outside christmas, they are very low. The former socialist east has a larger percentage of openly atheist people.

I've heard references to church taxes, etc. before and it seemed very weird to me as an American. That level of government involvement in religion would be unconstitutional in the US of course. It seems like an excellent system IMO. The Christian traditions are protected and preserved, and maybe this makes them less crazy?

BTW I'm trying to be a cultural Christian now as an experiment. I went to a Catholic service last week, and it was much more tolerable as an atheist, because my expectations were much more realistic. My mother is a devout Christian, and I am trying to respect her beliefs and keep my atheism secret. So the German system sounds much better where people can be Christian atheists.

---

Difficult to really tell I suppose unless you're part of that culture.

I'm in a pretty 'typical' UK city and of an office of about 50 people, I know of a couple or 3 christians, a muslim and a JW. I can't be sure of the total obviously but my spider senses don't twitch too much and I get a general feeling of non-belief or just not bothered.

Lile Rob, I get the occasional JW door knockers but they're only once or twice a year and so much fun to torment I don't mind. Other than the odd street corner nutjob that's about it. We have our cathedral and mosques and they are likely well attended but you rarely see any public shows of religion - almost as if it has a bit of a stigma really which is fine with me.

I think that's probably quite typical of much of England as far as I can tell, apart from some areas of major cities that now have huge majorities of one or another religious cult of course.

That's interesting about the JW's. I never see them knocking on doors where I live. One of my employees is a JW, and he is a very nice person. I'll have to ask him about the door knocking

Your description of the UK religious mix sounds like reasonable. I don't know where these crazy people are coming from that I keep seeing on Christian forums. Literally, some of them are just as crazy as any American Christian. They believe in the rapture, Biblical inerrancy, ...

---

The European Christians or ex-Christians I've met on forums often seem to be fundamentalist/evangelicals.

Then you certainly don't get the right impression. Evengelicals are the fringe of the fringe in European countries. They don't count. Most people would identify as either catholic or protestant. Protestant meaning mainstream protestatism, not in any way fundamentalist. Neither catholicism nor mainstream protestanism in their large majority, take the bible literally. They don't reject evolution of believe in Adam and Eve to have been real persons. Both denominations, at least in Western Europe, don't have much influence in politics either. The people are largely secular and according to a pretty recent international poll, 58 percent of my country (Austria) identified as not being religious at all. Yet 63 percent still belong to the catholic church, which can only be explained by the church being rather a tradition than a matter of faith.

The most important difference between Europe and the States when it comes to religion, is the fact, that religion usually isn't a topic at all. Even with close aquaintances you hardly ever talk about it. It's also not a matter of public debate. Well, usually, of course the news report when the pope said something important, they also report on religious leaders of other faiths making remarks regarding everyday life, but it's not that important. Also politicians don't bring their religion or lack thereoff into public debate. If someone would constantly ramble about the necessity of bringing something biblical into the law, they simply wouldn't be elected. There are outspoken christian parties in the political spectrum, but they don't make it into the parliaments, since the majority of the people don't want what they're selling.

To give you another view on the matter, our president calls himself an agnostic. And he got elected twice in a landslide. His office is no way as powerful as the American president or the French one, but he's still the head od state, expected to represent the republic abroad. The former mayor of Berlin was very open about him being gay. Also the former mayor of Hamburg was openly gay. A christian democrat. The former german secretary of foreign affairs was also openly gay. So you see, religious sentiment or open bigotry doesn't play a role.

One European forum member I'm thinking about was from Switzerland. Her church seemed to be very similar to a non-denominational protestant church in the US which surprised me.

But I agree with you that there is a huge difference. It's just that I'm surprised there is any similarity. The evangelical/non-denominational churches seem so American.

---

That is an interesting point. In the UK, if a politician came in with bible thumping madness, he would have little chance. But in the US, it's kind of the other way around.

Things are changing though, the U.S. will soften in time I think.

It seems in the US that presidents must pretend to be Christians when they are actually atheists. I listened to the D-Day prayer of FDR on a documentary and wondered how he said that without giggling (so many unnecessary thee's and thou's to make it sound churchy).