Talk:Christianity by country

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Please place comments at the bottom of the talk page

Make table sortable

The table needs to be made sortable by some kind soul. BTW this is the nearest to the bottom of the page I could get on mobile, so move this section below if needed. -- Quack5quack (talk) 22:32, 24 January 2015 (UTC) hello bob ××××××××××××××××××°°°°°°———–––––§§§§§ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.231.47.117 (talk) 17:57, 10 September 2015 (UTC)

Statistics for each country

http://www.census.gov/main/www/stat_int.html

this webpage links to census departments for each country listed. Most seem to list religius afiliation. Eurobarometer is a poor source since it is a poll and does not ask about christianity directly. The CIA does not list all sources but they do seem to match the information given by the census departments for the countries that I have looked at so far. The census information might not be perfect for countries that have a state church, but should be used unless more accurate information is found. Reading a poll and then doing some math to determine the number of christians in European countries is to me, poor research, sorry. Also, say only a few percentage of people regularly attend church in Sweden, but how many of them answer that they are christian on a census poll? If they consider themselves christian, then they are (at least culturally) whether they ever go to church or not. Mykart —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.37.25.255 (talk) 22:45, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Mykart says: "Most seem to list religius afiliation" ---------- I just looked at about 30 countries at random and I found about two that showed religious adherence. This is the problem. The statistics for religious adherence are thin on the ground. Hence the current state of the article by adhering to varyiable sources rather than estimates. Vexorg 02:58, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Rollback Eurobarometer version

Please rollback the Eurobarometer version, it was more realistic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.8.82.250 (talk • contribs) 10:19, November 5, 2007 — 87.8.82.250 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

Yes it was more realistic, but unfortunately realism isn't a specific requirement of Wikipedia Vexorg 18:24, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is about verifiable information, not what information Vexorg "estimates" is "realistic". - Mdsummermsw 04:06, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

... and not what the CIA "estimates" is "realistic" either of course. Which is why I've gone along with the current verifiable version :) - I do think you'll find most people view the Eurobarometer figures as being most closely aligned with reality though. However that would be appeal to popularity and not verifyable. Vexorg 23:31, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

As repeatedly discussed, the "Eurobarometer figures" are not "Eurobarometer" figures -- they are figures, but they are not from Eurobarometer. We should call them "Vexorg's original research figures". - Mdsummermsw 14:58, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

There is an ERROR in the way the table sorts. When I sort the table, for example, by % Christianity, the table sorts incorrectly. The 9% section follows the 90% section and is in turn followed by the 80% section. Timhouser (talk) 21:41, 4 August 2010 (UTC) timhouser Timhouser (talk) 21:41, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

US in Factbook

I have just reverted 76% for United States. Factbook says "Protestant 52%, Roman Catholic 24%, Mormon 2%, Jewish 1%, Muslim 1%, other 10%, none 10% (2002 est.)". There is a distinct difference between Christian and Catholicism. Those who are "born again" as required by Jesus in John 3:3 make up far less of the United States population then those who merely worship God with their lips. America is more pagan then it is God fearing. Per scripture Roman Catholicism is pagan based. Praying the rosary, statues and its traditions are steeped in paganism. Throughout the papacy's history they in fact killed those who protested their traditions with scripture. That's where the term protestant derived from.

What about the 10% "other"? Could be 76% to 86% Christian based on this source. Mdsummermsw (talk) 02:36, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Then how about >76%? It seems like an extreme measure to remove the entire figure. It's not original research to say 1+1 = 2. And if some of the "other" might be Christian, then the figure is at least 76%. --Anietor (talk) 03:18, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. Unless a more exact figure can be found, there is no reason to exclude that sourced from the factbook. Simple arithmetic hardly qualifies as original research. ~ S0CO^{(talk|contribs)} 04:46, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

And seriously, compare this article to any of the other "by country" articles linked at the bottom. Do any of them show so many blank spaces as this article? As with any survey, no measure is going to be exact. We shouldn't exclude statistics altogether because someone thinks that some of them might be slightly over/understated. If need be, we can simply call them approximates, because that is all they really are or can be counted on to be. ~ S0CO^{(talk|contribs)} 04:51, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

We are NOT saying anything as simple as 1 + 1 = 2. Currently, it says Protestants and Roman Catholics are Christian, no one else is. Or, we might read it as 1 apple + 1 banana + X food items = 2 fruits.

Mdsummermsw (talk) 13:20, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

The appropriate solution to that problem is 2+X, which is also the case here. As I said before, all of these statistics are approximates, because as with any census or survey there is a margin for error. These statistics come from the most reliable, wide-reaching source we can hope to find in this context. To exclude them on the basis that they may not be 100% accurate is a fallacy in its own right; while not perfect, one cannot deny the value to be found in such statistics. An appropriate note at the beginning of the article, or associated with the source itself provided it is needed at all, can be used to emphasize the fact that these numbers are approximates. But then, it is practically common knowledge that such numbers must be taken with a grain of salt. ~ S0CO^{(talk|contribs)} 05:11, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

I said: "Or, we might read it as 1 apple + 1 banana + X food items = 2 fruits."

You replied: "The appropriate solution to that problem is 2+X, which is also the case here."

Looking in a box, I might report one apple, one banana and 30 other food items. You propose calling that "32 fruits". That is not correct, which is also the case here. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 18:48, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Soco is correct. This type of figure has been used for almost every fact in this article. Which is why >76% is a good figure. The Evil Spartan 06:06, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Well, I guess if "almost every fact" is wrong it must be right to ... um ... include more wr... Wait, let me try that again. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 18:48, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Essentially, the proposal is to:

• Take: "Protestant 52%, Roman Catholic 24%, Mormon 2%, Jewish 1%, Muslim 1%, other 10%, none 10%" from factbook (so far, that's NPOV, verifiable and reliable)
• Assume: Protestant and Roman Catholic are Christian, Mormon is not and some portion of "other" is Christian (that's POV OR)
• Ignore: conflicting confidence intervals, error margins and significance levels (that's OR and a great way to fail any basic statistics or social science class)
• Add Protestant to Roman Catholic, exclude Mormon, fudge to allow for "other". (that's unverifiable, POV and OR - a trifecta!)
• Multiply the new figure (minus the fudge factor, of course) by the uncited population figure from a different year to come up with a laughably precise number of 3,668,158. Not 3,668,159 or 3,668,1587. It's 3,668,158. Really. Honest. Check our reliable, verifiable source.

Point-by-point:

• Different countries added or updated by different editors have decided that "Mormons" are or are not Christians. As many of these countries' figures were drawn from Factbook you would think treating the question consistantly would be Job #1. It wasn't.
• We do not know the confidence levels, error margins and significance levels for any of the numbers given. Instead, we are treating them as realities, rather than data. (While data are used to represent realities, they are not. The map is not the territory.) Assuming, based on nothing, that the figures are +/-3% to a 0.95, "52% + 24%" is really: (52% +/- 3% @ 0.95) + (24% +/- 3% @ 0.95).

That gives us (73% to 79%) +/- 3% @ 0.90. However, the official LDS position is that Mormons are the only true Christians, and some of the 10% "other" are probably in there as well. So now we add 2% +/- 3% @ 0.95 and 10% +/- 3% @ 0.95. We end up with 77% to 87% +/- 8% @ .81. Based on that source, numerous OR assumptions, unpublished calculations and more than a little fudging, we can say that we think there might possibly be roughly about a 4 in 5 chance that 69% to 95% are Christians. Go ahead and add it, with a cite to this talk item. I'm a reliable source because I reliably said I am. Care to add in the uncertainty from the population figure and estimated population growth rates between the underlying sources? I'm all ears. Mdsummermsw (talk) 18:48, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Mexico in Factbook

Factbook (cited): "Roman Catholic 76.5%, Protestant 6.3% (Pentecostal 1.4%, Jehovah's Witnesses 1.1%, other 3.8%), other 0.3%, unspecified 13.8%, none 3.1% (2000 census)"

Article: "82.8% (2001 census)"

• Wrong year
• 76.5% + 6.3% + (0 to 100% of 0.3%) + (0 to 100% of 13.8%) = 82.8%?!?!

Mdsummermsw (talk) 13:30, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

The cited supporting source (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2122.html), says: "Mexico — Roman Catholic 76.5%, Protestant 6.3% (Pentecostal 1.4%, Jehovah's Witnesses 1.1%, other 3.8%), other 0.3%, unspecified 13.8%, none 3.1% (2000 census)". 82.8% Christian + 0.3% other + 13.8% unspecified + 3.1% none = 100.0%. 76.5% + 6.3% = 82.8%. https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/mx.html says that the population of Mexico is 108,700,891 (July 2007 est.). 108,700,891*0.828=~90,004,338. -- Boracay Bill 06:02, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

This assumes:

• You can add data in such forms (% with a margin of error, level of significance and prob.) and obtain figures that are similar. You simply cannot do this. Basic statistics (and it's [[wp:or|original research].
• Absolutely NONE of the "other" or "unspecified" are Christian. Simply unsuportable (and not verifiable).
• The data for the population figure and the religion percentages are from the same date. It is unlikely they are (and the math is WP:OR).
• Multiplying a poorly supported (and unverifiable) percentage quoted to .1% by a figure of over 108 million does NOT give you a figure out to the ones.

Mdsummermsw (talk) 20:59, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Other religions by country

Hello ::Mdsummermsw :) - What about Islam BY Country. Hinduism By Country, etc, etc ??? Should we approacj those articels in the sameway. After all it's onyl fair I guess. Vexorg (talk) 21:14, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

I figure we really need to get one of these articles to shake out into something verified, sourced, etc. before we start trying to replicate it elsewhere. Feel free to work on the others if you want, but I'm staying here for a bit longer first. Mdsummermsw (talk) 21:59, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Albania

I have just removed the Albania figure, given as 35%. The cited source said, "An estimated 20 to 25 percent of the population belongs to communities that are traditionally Albanian Orthodox and 10 percent to Catholic communities....In addition to the four traditional religious groups, there are substantial numbers of followers of Protestant denominations, Baha'is, Jehovah's Witnesses, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), and other religious groups."

So, it seems the 35% was assuming 25% Albanian Orthodox (ignoring the 20% figure) + 10% Catholic and ignoring "substantial numbers of followers of Protestant denominations, Baha'is, Jehovah's Witnesses, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), and other religious groups."

This is original research and/or synthesis. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 17:00, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

In fact every percentage about Albania is not true because I live in Albania and the real number of Muslim and Christian population is unknown, and these facts that are figured here are before Socialism, so before the year 1945 and I suppose that today the situation is not the same... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.24.250.130 (talk) 09:38, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

The figure reported for Albania is cited to a current, reliable source. Please do not change the figure without addressing the sourcing. - SummerPhD (talk) 15:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Map sources

This map cites two sources for its underlying data, the Eurobarometer report and Christianity by country at Wikipedia.

Eurobarometer does not give country by country percentages of Christians or any data that can be interpreted to give this information.

The Wikipedia article gives no figures for 245 countries, single figures for 47 countries and a range for 3. (Russia, for instance, is given as 18.5% to 78%.) The map shows data for every country. As a result, roughly 80% of the countries show data without any source.

Mdsummermsw (talk) 13:19, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

But the Eurobarometer statistics are only based for the European countries, it shows the true percentages and adherents of Christianity in the European countries. Lets take United Kingdom for example, in the census as we know over 70% said they are Christians, but this has proven to be not accurate according to the United Nations. Plus the recent Eurobarometer was conducted very well to give a true statistic. We have used the Eurobarometer data to represent the *Europe* data, people are regarded as Christians if they say 'I believe in God' in the poll, they are not regarded as Christians if said 'I believe in a spirit or force'. Yes it does not represent the whole data for the world, but for the data of Europe. If true data is available to be used, then it should be used. In this matter, for Europe it can be used. Plus this is a new same version of the previous map that was present in the article, it does not make any sense to be moved now. Moshino31 (talk) 13:40, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

We've been through this before. The Eurobarometer study does not give percentages of Christians in any country. Let's take some examples:

• Outside of Europe: Where is the data for Argentina from? Cambodia? Chile? Republic of the Congo? Cuba? There are no figures cited in the article and the Eurobarometer document does not mention any of these countries.
• In Europe: Spain shows as 40-50% on the map. The article gives no figure. Eurobarometer does not give a percentage of Christians in Spain. What is the source for that data?

It does not matter if this is a new version or old version, if it was added just now or if it has been there for years. The data for the map does not cite reliable sources. I removed it. You replaced it. It is now your responsibility to demonstrate that the map cites reliable sources. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 15:14, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

This is a more realistic type of data for Europe, as we all know the religious minority groups are well below 5% in Europe (excluding France) for that matter, there is a high strong possibility the poll surveyed has been questioned to Christians, in all European countries there are strong figures of people saying they are Christians in the census data, but in the poll it has shown the people are not really Christians. This reflects the data given for the countries that Church attendants have become very low, for the UK - 7% only attend the Sunday services, and the census says over 70% Christians? Is that really realistic? That is why the Eurobarometer gives a more of a realistic picture of the figures of *EUROPE* only, lets forget about the other countries, the Europe data is inaccurate according to thier census data, the Eurobarometer gives a more percise type of figures of Christians in the countries. Moshino31 (talk) 15:25, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Please view: Religion in Europe

You have not answered the question: Where did the number for Argentina come from? Cuba? Spain? Are they in the cited sources? Where? - Mdsummermsw (talk) 19:08, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

This page [1] links to this page[2].--Carlaude (talk) 20:06, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I know. That is the "Eurobarometer" report. Read it, it does not give Christian percentages at all. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 20:17, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes it does not give percentages of the Christian figures, but all European countries are predominantly Christian, if that is the case, the figures show that the people are not really Christians even though it does not mention religion, it focuses on the belief of God, and those percentages give a relative outlook on the percentages of people who are really Christians (high possibility of mainly Christians (so-called) in the poll). Remember those are Christians if they say, *I believe in God*, for example 38% in the UK said they do, therfore an estimate of around 40% are Christians (real percentage). Moshino31 (talk) 09:35, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Please also view this website where it shows the number of Athiests & Agnostic according to the University Press of Cambridge and local Religious studies (view European countries). The Eurobarometer reflects those statistics for the number of people who are really Christians. Moshino31 (talk) 10:17, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia demands verifiable information. The map cites sources that do not give the information cited. The map, therefore, is not sourced. Your arguments represent original research and synthesis. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 14:22, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I totally support Mdsummermsw arguments. First of all, the Eurobarometer does not provide ANY info on the number of Christians. Secondly the map is not sourced properly, at all. Thirdly obviously arguments of user Moshino31 are original research, and in some cases the conclusions he/she is jumping to aren't showing neutral_point_of_view. The map should not be used here until the proper figures are available. Andreyx109 (talk) 18:08, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

My friends. It is really not important whether they call themselves Christians, Catholics, believers, whether they name what they believe "God" or higher force, whether they call themselves "moral" etc. There is so much elements in the picture ... real world shows that people in their minds have both much of Church and of atheistic propaganda. What is really important nowadays is only the power of priests, i.e. Church attendance. The rest really doesn't matter today and even cannot be measured it is so diverse. – Can anyone give some recent world stats of Church attendance by country? TheUgliest (talk) 22:18, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

regardless of the accuracy of the map, it was a good method of giving a rough indication of the demographci distribution of adherants. Now we have an article that albiet is pedantically more accurate it's farless useful. Vexorg (talk) 04:06, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Your map was a good way to disply unverifiable, unsourced "information". While you believe it was accuarte, a "rough indication" or whatever, is irrelivant. It was not verifiable. Failing one of the three pilars of wikipedia is certainly reason to remove it. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 20:16, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Population figures

Wikipedia demands verifiable information. says Mdsummermsw (talk)

Fair enough. So where is the verifiable information for the population statistics? An estimate from the CIA factbook, which is both an estimate and subject to political bias is NOT a verifiable source. Again .... census figures or nothing??

This article is of much less value now it's been hacked up in accordance with the 'rules'. but if we are going to stick to the rules then the population values should be also verified or removed. Comments? Vexorg (talk) 04:06, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Figures citing the CIA factbook are verifiable: "readers are able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source".

Is the CIA factbook a reliable source? Yes, it is "generally regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand."

If you are going to argue that the CIA is distorting simple population figures for political motives again, you will specifically recall this has already been discussed. For the basic figures being cited here, there has been no credible reason presented to doubt the population figures cited. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 20:12, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

on whose opinion? Vexorg (talk) 17:50, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not arguing the figures are distorted for political motives adn that's not the point. The point is that simply printing a figure without any source ( Census) is NOT a verifiable source. The figures printed in the CIA factbook for religious adherence unless accompanied by a source are not verifiable and were rightly removed from this article on that basis. The same should apply to the population figures. Otherwise there's one rule for one set of figures and another rule for another. The CIA plucking a figure out of thin air doesn't make that figure any more reliable than if anyone else plucks a figure out of thin air. Vexorg (talk) 17:50, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Please do not insert your comments inside another's comment. It gets confusing very quickly.

All of the population figures cite a source: The World Factbook, (2007), [https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2119.html Field Listing - Population]. Accessed 13 December 2007. That is "verifiable", which is to say that you can go to that source (the World Factbook) and find that figure there, clearly and unequivocably.

I did not remove any data because the World Factbook does not state where it got its data from. (If anyone else did, they were wrong to do so.) Verifiability does not require that a source state where it got its data from. Reliable sources does not require this either. I am wholly unaware of any wp policy or guideline requiring that a reliable source state its source(s).

A verifiable source is not a source that you can verify is accurate, as you seem to believe. Rather, it is "whether readers are able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether we think it is true."

So, the operative question for the population figures is this: Is the World Factbook a reliable source? I contend that it is. As WP:RS explains, "Reliable sources are credible published materials with a reliable publication process; their authors are generally regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand. How reliable a source is depends on context." As I pointed out before, you were already involved in an extensive discussion about whether or not the World Factbook is a reliable source. The concensous was that it is. If you would like to re-open this discussion, the Reliable Sources/Noticeboard is the appropriate forum.

To sum up, Eurobarometer and the World Factbook both seem to be reliable sources. However, the figures citing Eurobarometer were not verifiable (they simply are not in the source) while the remaining figures for the World Factbook are verifiable (they are unequivocably in the source). I removed some of the figures citing the World Factbook because they were not verifiable (i.e. the Factbook said "x% Eastern Orthodox, y% Catholic, z% Protestant" and the article stated "x+y+z% Christian": x, y, and z were in the source, but "Eastern Orthodox + Catholic + Protestant = Christian" was not.)

Barring any substantial clarification on this issue, I will remove the map again in a few days. If the dispute persists, I'll ask for yet another outside opinion on this. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 19:07, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

This article starts with the following claim: "As of the early 21st century, Christianity has around 2.5 billion adherents." Yet all 3 listed sources give the number between 2.1 and 2.2 billion. This is a serious flaw. (Rider In The Storm (talk) 03:59, 17 April 2012 (UTC))

New map

The new map is vague on sources. It cites: "CIA - The World Factbook - To view percentages visit country by choice, and select 'People' [3]. Census Bureau: Statistical Agencies - Percentages of the governments census data, select country of choice for statistics."
1) We do not know which countries' data came from which source. In the event that both sources cite figures, how was it decided which source to use?
2) "Census Bureau: Statistical Agencies" is not a source, it is a listing of statistical agencies.
3) WP:BURDEN states, "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged should be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation.[1] The source should be cited clearly and precisely to enable readers to find the text that supports the article content in question. Editors should cite sources fully, providing as much publication information as possible, including page numbers when citing books.[2]" The map in question does not "clearly and precisely" cite sources for each individual figure.
4) The article is missing data for the overwhelming majority of the countries listed because we have been unable to find unambiguous data in reliable sources. The map, however, is nearly complete.
5) Given the contentious history of the data in this article, it should be self-evident that all data presented is "likely to be challenged". Please provide complete data and sourcing information similar to:

• Primoden: 16.3%, 2003 Primoden Census "[http://ps.gov.ps/religion.pdf Religion]", page 16.
• Secundostan: 84.9%, CIA - The World Factbook, "[https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ss.html#People Secundostan - Religion]".

Or, you may wish to simply update the article to match the data reflected by the map.

Thanks. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 18:39, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Return of the soft figures

Other, unspecified, etc.

I've just gone through the first few (up to Bahrain) of the returned figures and added a few +s. Many of those sourced said "Muslin q%, Catholic x%, Protestant y%, other z%, unspecified n%" or similar. The article then stated "x+y% Christian". Yes, we probably agree that Catholics and Protestants are Christians. But, some of those classified as "other", "unspecified", etc. might be Christians. So, the figure stated was far less exact than it seemed.

Adding rounded figures

Next, we have to deal with the abuse of statistics. A census might categorize the population as being in one of 10 categories. If we assume that 9.95% fit into each of the first 9 categories, we would have 10.45% in the tenth, for a total of 100.00%. If we round these to one decimal, though, we get ~10.0% in each of the first nine and ~10.5% in the tenth, for a "total" of 100.5%. You cannot add rounded figures and get a meaningful result.

Adding figures that have a margin of error

Finally, we have margins of error. Surveys typically question a small number of people (hundreds or thousands) and project those answers into the larger population (millions or billions). No census ever captures 100% of the population and statistical methods calculate numbers for the remainder. There is a margin of error, typically under 5% or so. The margin of error means that there is a 98% (varies) chance that the actual figure (if it could be found) would be within 5% of the figure shown. So, that "25.0%" actually means a 98% chance that the number is between 23.75% and 26.25%, which is all well and good. Now lets add the figures from before (9 cats at 9.95% and 1 at 10.45%). Adding up the rounded figures (10.0%) for four of those categories gives us a mythical 40.0%. Actuallly (sparing you the math), there is about a 92% chance that the number is really between 37.8% and 41.8%. For the usual 98% confidence, we would actually have a margin of error of about 11.5%, meaning there is a 98% chance the real figure is between 35.2% and 44.4%. You cannot add figures with a margin of error and get a meaningful result.

Summary

If the source says something, we can report what it says. If it almost says what we are hoping it will tell us, we cannot use it. Please read WP:OR. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 15:00, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I was wondering whether all the (Foo).0(%) texts might be removed for the sake of consistency. GregKaye 09:30, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

CIA is NOT a reliable source

The CIA factbook is NOT a reliable source. Apart from the fact that the article now uses the CIA factbook for the vast majority of sources, most of the figures published in the factbook could easily have been plucked out of thin air. They have no source. For example a figure of 90% of Norwegians being Christian is clearly ridiculous and is widely inaccurate. In that case the Eurobarometer figure is much more sensible in terms of real world number.

Let's not forget that that the CIA is the USA Central Intelligence Agency. It is a politically biased body. Can we say figures from, for example, the Russian Intelligence agency, Iranian Intelligence Agency, Chinese Intelligence agency as being reliable if there is no evidence that are not plucked from thin air? No, So why the American intelligence agency.

In fact pretty much every references in this article is now the US CIA Factbook or the US Department of State. Wikipedia is never going to be taken seriously with this kind of bias. This is simply unencyclopedic Vexorg (talk) 01:35, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Cmon Vexorg. We've been over this before. CIA Factbook is considered among the most reliable sources of data on the internet and on the rest of Wikipedia, despite how much you've decided you hate America. And you're going to replace that with figures which say nothing about Christianity but only has your own original research estimation of what Christianity is? Slick. The Evil Spartan (talk) 02:09, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I have brought this up at WP:ANI. I don't know what will occur, but this has gone from ridiculous to sublime; many people have talked about this on the talk page, Vexorg, and it is universally agreed this is wrong. The Evil Spartan (talk) 02:13, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Please The Evil Spartan we've gone over this before. If you make one more offensive comment that I 'hate' America I shall report you. The figures in the CIA fact book. It is NOT universally agreed this is wrong. In fact man of the CIA figures were proven to be unreliable.

The CIA factbook is not considered one of the most reliable sources on the Internet. Why doesn't the CIa factbook list the source of it's data? In fact it does list a source in some case. for example. Census and so on. But for many figures there is no source. The Eurobarometer figures are shown as an estimate based upon a proper poll. The CIA figures I have replaced could haev been plucked out of thin air. If you are so concerned about having the CIA figures in, then why not write to them and ask a] where is their source of these figures and b] why don't they publish that source? Vexorg (talk) 19:26, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, we have been over this before. And you've also had probably half a dozen other editors tell you exactly what I'm telling you right now (I can produce the diffs if you'd really like). As for your assertion that the factbook is unreliable - if you have any evidence for this, other than the fact you don't agree with the results and are making up this allegation out of whole cloth, please do produce it. That's the nature of the beast - different poll results and differently worded questions will come up with different types of results. But seriously, Vexorg, on both this and the Eurobarometer, please read up on WP:OR. The Evil Spartan (talk) 20:08, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

The CIA World Factbook is a respected, reliable source and is used extensively across academia. Plus, that Eurobarometer source I reverted does not measure Christianity, it only asks a bunch of questions about religious belief in general, and thus not relevant. - Merzbow (talk) 22:49, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

On the contrary 'Academia' would NOT rely upon a figure simply being printed without reference to it's source. What you're asking people to blieve is an unreferenced figure versus an 'approximation' based upon a religious poll that goes to extensive length to cite it's means of compilation. There is no evidence that figures in the CIA factbook is reliable unless supported by a source. Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia that is expected to provide a source for it's figures, yet you're suggesting it should use figures from another encyclopaedia that doesn't source it's figures. very contradictory. Vexorg (talk) 22:56, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Not all reliable sources clearly provide sources for their inferences and claims, and there is no requirement to do so to be considered a reliable source. The sources we consider reliable have some degree of oversight, peer review, expertise, editorial process, reputation for accuracy, etc to establish their reliability. Wikipedia requires that claims be cited to reliable sources because we lack a system of expertise recognition, editorial oversight, peer review and so on. Since Wikipedia's fundamental design lacks a system to review original research, we stick to what is reported in reliable sources. Using the Eurobarometer poll is deeply flawed for a number of reasons, including the primary concern that it makes no explicit claims about Christianity or the number of Christians. Since it does not discuss the topic and information at hand, it is inappropriate for use here. Vassyana (talk) 23:44, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

While this issue is being resolved I have added a note in the introduction of the article so that readers are aware of the lack of source of the figures. Vexorg (talk) 23:11, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Editors should not insert their personal opinions in the form of commentary. Vassyana (talk) 23:44, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Hello there. Sorry but there was no personal opinion inserted into the article. The edit I was was entirely factual. But in case I missed something could you kindly show me the personal opinion? Thanks Vexorg (talk) 00:02, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

The obvious result, if not intent, was to provide information completely unrelated to the article topic to "warn" the reader about the source. Whether the insertion of opinion is done explicitly or by leading the reader is irrelevant. Vassyana (talk) 00:23, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

The info was not unrelated to the article. Some of the figures in the CIA factbook have no source. This is devaluing Wikipedia. My preface contained NO opinion. It was simply explaining to the reader that the figures in the CIA factbook have no source. This article is hardly more than a copy of the CIA factbook at the moment. Most of the figures presented in this article have no source and as such is a disgrace to wikipedia. I am just trying to improve it. Vexorg (talk) 00:35, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Some of the numbers may have no source cited, but that is not the same thing as having no source. The Factbook states that it generally draws its information for a broad swath of sources, providing several examples. Regardless and again, we do not (and academia does not) require a source to cite a reference for all of its claims or inferences and there are a number of factors that go into the determination of reliability, both on-wiki and in the professional world. The information is unrelated to this article, as it is unrelated to the topic of this article. The statements have nothing to do with the number of Christians by country. Even if we assumed that the claims were on-topic, we only present what the body of reliable sources says about a topic, in proportion to the prominence of those claims in the general body of reputable references. Vassyana (talk) 00:51, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

The CIA Factbook is a reliable source, I believe.--Filll (talk | wpc) 11:52, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Offensive remarks by The Evil Spartan noted

Hi. The offensive remarks by The Evil Spartan where I am accused of 'hating America' above have been noted on WP:ANI and on his talk page. This editor clearly has a personal agenda against me. Vexorg (talk) 19:51, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Holy moly. Coming from a stated atheist who dislikes organized religion, I believe this would be a textbook case of the pot calling the kettle black. The Evil Spartan (talk) 20:08, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

why are you continuing your personal attacks? You are using 'atheist' as a pejorative term? Why has being an atheist have anything to do with a personal agenda against you. Please stop the personal attacks. Vexorg (talk) 20:18, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm not responding to the above other than to state that I did nothing of what you claim; I'm not upping the approbium. The Evil Spartan (talk) 20:26, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

You've done exactly what I claim. Your words..."despite how much you've decided you hate America" . Denying it is rather pointless considering everything is archived.Vexorg (talk) 20:48, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Fine, I've struck the hating America comment; happy now? The Evil Spartan (talk) 21:27, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

This entire article, is a joke. surfingus (talk) 08:48, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

Denmark

The CIA information about Denmark is extremely off the hook. I have no idea where they got that number from. About 20% of Danes are atheists/non-religious according to a study from 2005; "Gudstro i Danmark". I'm therefore removing the number, because I can't remember the correct number. --Deleet (talk) 05:50, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

What you can remember isn't important. What you can cite to a reliable source is. If you wish to claim that the CIA World Factbook is not a reliable source, please do so. Please base your arguments on WP:RS. Otherwise, it remains. - SummerPhD (talk) 19:16, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

It is a reliable source. The number from that clearly conflicts with the CIA so the CIA is wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Deleet (talk • contribs) 06:57, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

What? I don't understand what you are claiming is a reliable source. The only source mentioned here is the CIA World Factbook. You say something is a reliable source, but disagrees with the CIA (the only source mentioned). Please clarify. (What you "remember" is not a source, reliable or otherwise.) - SummerPhD (talk) 15:06, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

I stated the source above. "Gudstro i Danmark 2005". That's the name of the study. Look it up. Again I'm removing the wrong information about the amount of Christians in Denmark.

I'm reverting your edit and restoring the 98% figure citing the CIA Factbook as a supporting source. Please read the Wikipedia policy/guideline articles on verifiability and source reliability. The article does not assert that 98% of Danes are Christian. What the article does assert is that the CIA Factbook contains the info that 98% of Danes are Christians. If you have a verifiable source which asserts that 20% (or whatever) of Danes are athiests, you are welcome to add information to that effect to the table, citing your supporting source. I am unable to verify that myself from the source you cited because I have no access to a paper copy of your source and, though it is mentioned in Google Books here and here, it is not previewable online. I suspect that many Danes are nominally Lutheran (and the documentation somewhere of stats related to that is probably behind the CIA figure) but are nonpracticing. I came across some info related to that here (I don't read Danis, but got the sense by using Google Language Tools to translate the bit supported by footnote 6 into English). -- Boracay Bill (talk) 22:56, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Blah blah. Please don't give me the bureaucratic crap. You claim that "What the article does assert is that the CIA Factbook contains the info that 98% of Danes are Christians." but I can not see this in the article. It seems to be just a list of numbers for countries. If one really meant it to be "list of information about religion on countries according to CIA." Then it should be clearly visible.

The book has an official homepage, here. http://www.gudstro.dk/ Much of the data is available there. Recall that this is a cross-university study. That is much, much more reliable information that what CIA just claims. (They don't cite a source for the claim about christians in Denmark. AFAIK.) It's not my problem or Wikipedia's that you can't read Danish. I can since I live in Denmark. All sane grown-ups in Denmark know that this figure of 98% is wrong. People are not mistaken about that kind of information. (So it's not an ad populum fallacy.)

Additional information about the book is: Gudstro i Danmark, Forlaget Anis, ISBN 87-7457-389-6, 2005.

This article written by one of the authors of the book (i.e. one of the researchers) states that about 60% of Danes believe in God. Obviously this is incompatible with CIA's cliam. Unless we're using some non-traditional meaning of 'christian'. That's a huge problem with the article anyway.

http://www.kristeligt-dagblad.dk/artikel/55779:Kronik--Gudstro-i-Danmark

I'm again removing this obviously false information. Stop putting it back in. This is not the first time I've removed it. --Deleet (talk) 01:43, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Deleet, please read again what I wrote above. Please also take another look at Wikipedia:Verifiability, WP's policy on verifiability which I asked you to read above, the lead sentence of which reads, "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—that is, whether readers are able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether we think it is true."

I have re-added the material which you have deleted from the article. I have also added the assertion that only about 60% of Danes believe in god today, supported by the source which you mentioned above. I am requesting that you stop removing properly-sourced content from this article. I won't edit war further with you over this, but if you intend to continue removing this content it appears that you and I have a dispute here. If we do have a dispute, we would need to proceed with WP's WP:Dispute resolution process (in which, incidentally, please read the incivility section). The first step of that process would be to request Wikipedia:Editor assistance. Should I proceed with that? -- Boracay Bill (talk) 04:02, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with both sources being cited. Though only the CIA gives such as insanely high number. I cannot be bothered to add ten other sources that disagree with the CIA. Maybe the CIA means to say that of the god-believers in Denmark, 98% of them are Christian. That's more likely, though I don't know. Don't waste my time with bureaucratic links. I won't read them. I did read the quote you made though, about verification, not truth, thanks for that. I wasn't aware of that. --Deleet (talk) 17:11, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

38-80 percent Christian is wrong

Russia is over 70 percent, UK is over 70 percent. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.224.156.129 (talk • contribs) 20:05, 1 January 2009

We need a reliable source or we cannot add any such claim. - SummerPhD (talk) 20:35, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

This is the trouble with Wiki, people with agendas attempting to write history of sorts with no interest in facts. I'm from the UK. The idea that 70% of people in the UK are practicing christians is absolutely ludicrous. I wish you well but this is little more than propaganda for Christianity. Its ludicrous. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.63.214.23 (talk) 04:19, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

North Korea

This edit (Summary: Undid revision 287182394 by Wtmitchell (talk) This is the population of the country, and by all sources its not 12.000). My undone edit was a mistaken revision of an earlier edit, was indeed an error—I apparently somehow mistook the Population column as a count or estimate of the number of Christians. The cited supporting source does support the 12,000 figure, which is approximately .05% of the population figure of about 23 million. Since the reversion of my error was done by an anon without a talk page, I'm acknowledging my error here. I note that the 23,301,725 figure gives for population is unsupported and that the current CIA World Factbook page on North Korea] says "22,665,345 (July 2009 est.)." I haven't changed the figure in the article, thinking that a figure disclaimed as "(July 2009 est.)" might look dodgy as of the current May of 2009 date. 12,000 Christians would be roughly .05% of either population figure. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 20:02, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

85-90% in France can't be accurate

Look at the figures here here. Another source says: 65% of French people declare themselves catholics, 25+% agnosticists, 6% muslims, 2% protestants, 1% of other christian churches, less than 1% jews, and same for buddhists. Source here. 82.240.207.81 (talk) 09:06, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

First, let me point to Wikipedia's verifiability policy, summarized in its lead sentence as follows: "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—that is, whether readers are able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether we think it is true."

The Wikipedia article you mention is not considered a reliable source, but supporting sources cited therein might be. I took a quick look at that article and see that it reports a variety of figures from a number of different sources. I've added a "See also" wikilink and a cite-supported mention of the figures reported by the outside source you mentioned. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 21:03, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Wtmitchell, we can include this source as well, but I don't think that we need to mess the table thad bad. We can just put this as references links and do not insert "see also stuff in there"? What do you think? Andreyx109 (talk) 00:53, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I was reacting to the questioning of the figures for France. I added the one contradicting external supporting source which was supplied when the question was raised and, looking at Religion in France#Statistics, I saw that other contradicting figures and supporting sources were given there: 51% Christian[3], 52% specifically Catholic[4], Only 27% believed in any type of God or supreme being[5], 51% of the French population describe themselves as Catholics (and only half of those said they believed in God)[6], 34% of French citizens responded that "they believe there is a God"[7]. In light of that, the most concise way I thought of for the France entry to offer reasonably useful information was with a couple of contradictory cite-supported figures plus that See also link. My guess is that the situation with the France entry is probably no worse than with a lot of other entries—it just happens that that particular entry was questioned. Though this article is on my watchlist, it is not an article which I keep a close eye on. I think that editors who are more invested in this article than I should decide how to approach this. I've seen a other List of ... articles which take the approach of supplying figures from a single reasonably authoritative source for most or all listed entries and supplying individual conflicting cite-supported information from other sources where that is considered to be useful. http://www.nationmaster.com/cat/rel-religion doesn't have a list for Christians, but it does have separate by-country lists for Catholics and Protestants (currently listing 77% Catholic and 2% Protestant for France). Such list articles tend to need pretty frequent policing and maintenance, and they need a strong consensus between interested editors to keep them from getting out of hand. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 05:30, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Wtmitchell, I think i wasn't very cleanr, I mean we can leave both figures as they are now, however rather then having it this way:

85-90%The World Factbook, (2007) 67%(2006 report) See also: Religion_in_France#Statistics

I propose to make it like this:

85-90% - 67%

It Looks a bit better on the page, and doesn't mess the table at all. What do you think? Andreyx109 (talk) 13:36, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I think that the article is a hodgepodge of styles and that it reports a hodgepodge of information from a hodgepodge of sources. I think that the article should be more consistent in all of these respects. That consistency can be achieved by building a consensus among editors who are interested in improving the article. I'm not personally interested in taking any major role in that. The consensus, if it is to be built, would probably come about via the Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 02:11, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

References

Thinking about adding info to the article

I've noticed that this article presents info from the CIA Factbook in some cases and omits it in other cases. Nationmaster.com collects this info and presents it in a convenient format here and here. I'm thinking about making a pass through the article and adding that info to the article. I've done a few entries below to show what this would look like:

Region	Country	Population	% Christian
Middle East	Christianity in Afghanistan	31,889,923	<1%
Balkans	Christianity in Albania	3,600,523	30% (approx.) 10% (Catholic)
North Africa	Christianity in Algeria	33,333,216	<1%
Western Europe	Christianity in Andorra	71,822	Predominately Catholic
Southern Africa	Christianity in Angola	12,263,596	53% (1998 est.) 53% (10% Protestant, 38%Catholic)
Caribbean	Christianity in Anguilla	13,677	90.5+%(2001 census) 50.2% (30.2% Protestant, 20% Catholic)
South America	Christianity in Argentina	40,301,927	94+% 94% (2% Protestant, 92% Catholic)
Caucasus	Christianity in Armenia	2,971,650	98.7%
Oceania	Christianity in Australia	20,434,176	64%(2006 census)
Central Europe	Christianity in Austria	8,199,783	78.3+% (2001 census) 76.5% (4.7% Protestant, 72.3% Catholic)

References

Adding such info into the table would confuse the users. Breaking up the statistics by different Christian denomination can be done, but in separate article (new?), such as Christian Demographics or something like it. This article gives an idea about the total number of Christians not number by the denomination.

• In regards to the references and CIA FACTBOOK it is a reliable source, and replacing it with other wouldn't give any advantage to the readers (i don't know much about Nationmaster but I guess that they take part of their info from the CIA factbook?). The table is already messed up with all these phrases (i.e Predominately, about etc) instead of numbers, which are supposed to be there, adding even more text would make it extremely hard to read. Andreyx109 (talk) 21:38, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

The pages at those nationmaster links I provided above say, "SOURCE: World Factbook, 22 August 2006". The advantage from an editing viewpoint is that the info is provided in a format which is much more convenient than the factbook format to a WP editor editing an article covering numerous countries. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 00:50, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

I thought about replacing name=FACTBOOK refs where there would be a duplicate (as with Angola above), and I might do that. I'm not sure that I'm motivated enough, or knowledgeable enough, to check out the details where there would be a conflict (as with the Albania entry above where Nationmaster classes a 20% Albanian Orthodox group as Protestant and this article doesn't report that group as Christian). This would probably still leave conflicts between Nationmaster-supported and Factbook-supported items, as with Armenia above where the Factbook reports "Armenian Apostolic 94.7%, other Christian 4%, ..." but Nationmaster missed that. Nationmaster cites a 22 August 2006 version of the Factbook, and info supported by FACTBOOK refs likely cone from a different edition. This might explain some of the disconnects between info seen at Nationmaster vs. Factbook. Comments? -- Boracay Bill (talk) 03:38, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Some changes.

I've made the following changes:

• Moved some notes and comments (others will follow) from within the tables to the footnotes.

• Updated countries which didn't have information on % of Christians, with available data from CIA factbook, I will continue working on it. I don’t think that “predominantly” or “nominal” is good enough when the actual percentage is available.

• I also propose to remove “<” “>” “+” symbols as they don’t clarify anything in most of the cases. I agree we can leave them in some cases, but its seems ridiculous when all of them are used within one percentage field.

Please if you want to add a comment to the available statistics do it as a footnote, and don't insert it into the percentage field, it messes up the table.

Thank you Andreyx109 (talk) 22:55, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

I think we should also include similar/same to Islam_by_country sentence before the statistics, it should be something like this (taken from Islam by Country):

Note: Population statistics by religious affiliations, are based upon statistical science and are subject toobservational error (technically referred to as estimates). Likewise, partisans may seek to bias the estimates. Most of the percentage of Christian population of each country was taken from the US State Department's International Religious Freedom Report, the CIA World Factbook, and Adherents.com.

Andreyx109 (talk) 20:59, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

I am trying to make sure that each % figure has two references. That would make all the numbers more reliable and correct. Andreyx109 (talk) 17:44, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

You might take a look at my suggestions in the #Thinking about adding info to the article section above. I never got around to following through on that, and I doubt that I will get back to it, though it still strikes me as a good idea. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 01:49, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Wtmitchell, it is certainly a good idea, however i think that breaking up the % of Christian per country by denominations worth a separate page. I feel like that this page gives a rough estimate on a total number of Christians regardless of their denomination, however we can include a link at the top of the table to the newly created page Christian demographics and in that page we can break up percentage for the major Christian denomination as per country, thats what they have done inIslam by Country and i think it works pretty well, let me know what you think. Andreyx109 (talk) 15:49, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

The reason that I broke it up is that the source I used (actually two sources, here and here, which organize the information very conveniently for a WP editor to work from) gives separate lists for Catholic and Protestant percentages, but no combined list for a Christian percentage. Since the source provided the figures separately, I mentioned the separately supported separate figures separately and then totaled them. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 00:17, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Templates for deletion nomination of Template:Lists of countries

Template:Lists of countries has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for Deletion page. Thank you. Cybercobra (talk) 07:11, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Suggested deletion

I suggest that the sects per country map be deleted or replaced as it does not accurately show Country's main Christian religions. Australia is NOT a predominately protestant country. I suggest using a map with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Worldreligion.png statistics

Hmmm... As I interpret it, the map shows Australia as a Catholic/Protestant combination. The Christianity in Australia article says that as of 2006 it was 63.9% Christian: 18.7% Anglican, 25.8% Catholic, 19.3 % "Other Christian". The 2008 US State Dept. Religious Freedom Report says that according to the 2006 census the breakdown was 64% Christian, including 26% Roman Catholic, 19% Anglican, 19% other Christian. Both of those sources classify 40% of Australian Christians as Catholic. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 02:35, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Sweden

The number cited for the fraction of Christians of the Swedish population is, similar to the case for the Danish number made by Deleet above, vastly overstated.

It appears the CIA Factbook (the link to which, incidentally, is dead) has taken the sum of the number of people registered under any kind of Christian denomination, including the Protestant Church of Sweden, as the total number of true Christian believers in Sweden. Nothing could be further from the truth:

Until 1951, non-membership in the Church of Sweden was illegal for a Swedish subject. After that, membership came automatically with baptism, or simply being born to member parents - i.e., in the vast majority of cases, membership in the Church of Sweden had little to nothing to do with the faith of the member.

In its most recent (2000) survey (in Swedish), the "Svenska Institutet För Opinionsundersökningar " (SIFO) or "Swedish Institute for Opinion Surveys", arguably the world-wide greatest authority on any statistically measurable aspect of Sweden and the Swedes, found 8% of survey participants to identify "Jesus as their savior", out of 46% believing in any form of divine or supernatural, higher power.

These findings are entirely congruent with those of a recent Gallup poll, in which Sweden ranks as the second least religious country in the world, behind Estonia but ahead of Denmark at number three.

I think these references, which are as credible and recent as they are free of bias in either direction, make it clear that the fraction of 87% Christians of the population of Sweden cited by this article is entirely incorrect and grossly misleading. Since this is my first major suggested edit as a member of Wikipedia, I will wait for a time to hear the counter-arguments, and will then adjust the number for Sweden. ErikRM (talk) 20:18, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

None of the sources you've pointed to talk about "the number of Christians in Sweden". We had this discussion before. Most of the reliable sources (cia, freedom report, etc) give more or less similar number, and thus we use their estimates in this article.Andreyx109 (talk) 13:19, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Wrong. The first source specifically determines the number of Swedish Christians as a fraction of the population, by a highly relevant and accurate statistical survey (download the PDF and read it, it's mainly numbers). The second source gives the fraction of the population for which any religion is "an important part of daily life", as approximately a factor of five lower than the supposed fraction of Swedish Christians cited by this article. The number of those labeling themselves as Christians is of course probably different, but isn't likely to be larger by that much. On the other hand, as I explained, the (now unavailable) CIA Factbook and other sources rather cites the number of people registered under a Christian denomination, which in the case of Sweden is an entirely different matter - that is, while arguably reliable, these sources simply do not measure the intended quantity. ErikRM (talk) 14:03, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I suppose that the situation is about the same with Norway as with Denmark and Sweden. The reason is that the number of 'christians' (whatever that means) in the scandinavian countries is about the same. The numbers gathered from CIA are downright insane if they really mean to say that such a high percentage of the total population is christian. I suspect that they may be talking about something else: The percentage of christians in the total religious population. --Deleet (talk) 18:11, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Its not up to us to decide on who is considered to be a Christian and who is not. Our purpose here is obviously not to make a new definitions. Wikipedian community consider CIA Factbook and Religious Freedom report as a reliable sources. I don't know whether it is insane or not, (and I guess no one can make this sort of statement without providing evidence in support of such words) (is there an NPO case?). As for me as long as it recognized as a reliable source we have to agree. In addition to this we have to use the sources purpose of which is to answer the given question, the sources we have now are doing exactly this. The new proposed sources on other hand, can hardly answer the question on the number of Christians in Sweden, the main topic of these sources is different(!). Again, please note, we had this discussion before. Wikipedia is not the place for original research, if you don't agree with reliable sources we are using, then, well then you can challenge them directly. CIA and the Religious Freedom report are the best sources available to us as of today, and I don’t see any reasons to doubt them. Andreyx109 (talk) 16:18, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

The CIA Factbook and the RF report are not published by recognized international organisations. They have an informative basis but they are totally distorted by a US POV. How can numerous polls made in the country itself - and which radically deny CIA or RF numbers - be less accurate than US organisations? The good thing is that they collected their information with the same manner, but it doesn't mean they are reliable. RF reports the numbers of a 2008 French Catholic Church "Guide" (65% catholics of whom 5% attending). The way the CIA presents religions for France reminds me of that little line put at the end of every US politician infobox here on Wikipedia: everyone has their religion. Can't I call it a bias? 82.240.207.81 (talk) 01:33, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Can you cite a reliable source supporting your assertion that the CIA Factbook and the RF report are totally distorted by a US POV, either in general or specifically in re Sweden? If you can, it would be appropriate to note this, citing that source, in the article. If reliable sources report results from numerous polls differing substantially from the figures reported by the CIA Factbook and the RF reports, the fact of those differing reports should be noted in the article, citing the reliable sources reporting them. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 23:12, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Inclusion of Somaliland

I noticed that there was no mention of Somaliland, and no link to the Christianity in Somaliland page. Their numbers are small but still, I see other countries with a less than 1 percent of the population on the list. Any thoughts? I should note that according to the List of states with limited recognition page it is not listed as having any status. Does this qualify for inclusion, or has this issue been addressed in the past? Outback the koala (talk) 05:51, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Having received no reply, and finding consensus on another talk page, I will begin to include all states with limited recognition to the list. Outback the koala (talk) 06:38, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Fastest-growing religion?

Two tables in a section "Claims to be the fastest-growing religion" indicating growth of major religions seems to be based on biased sources ( http://fastestgrowingreligion.com/index.html ), that is promoting one of the religions. Therefore appropriate disclaimer should be included (What's more - the data in this table is inconsistent with data provided in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_by_country article). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.17.37.2 (talk) 08:41, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Sourcing

The intro to the Christianity by country table says, "... Most of the percentage of Christian population of each country was taken from the US State Department's International Religious Freedom Report,the CIA World Factbook and Adherents.com."

For the UAE,

• The 2009 IRF Report for the UAE says,

"The country has ... a population of 4.8 million, ... . According to the most recent Ministry of Economy census (2005), 76 percent of the total population is Muslim, 9 percent is Christian, and 15 percent is "other." According to unofficial figures, at least 15 percent of the resident population is Hindu, and 5 percent is Buddhist."

• The current CIA Factbook entry says,

Population:4,798,491

Religions: Muslim 96% (Shia 16%), other (includes Christian, Hindu) 4%

• Adherents.com - Religion by Location currently says,

Group	Where	Number of Adherents	% of total pop.	Number of congreg./churches/units	Number of countries	Year	Source	Quote/Notes
Catholic	United Arab Emirates	122,000	5.28%	5 units	–	1995	1998 Catholic Almanac: Our Sunday Visitor: USA (1997), pg. 333-367.	Figures are as of Dec. 31, 1995. Number used for "congregations " is from number of Catholic parishes.

this edit popped up in my watchlist. It changed the table entry for the UAE from

Region	Country	Total Population	% Christian	Christian total
Middle East	United Arab Emirates (details)	2,563,212	10.0%	256,321

to

Region	Country	Total Population	% Christian	Christian total
Middle East	United Arab Emirates (details)	2,563,212	15.0%	384,482

Given the info in the cited supporting sources, I think that the UAE entry should read something like,

Region	Country	Total Population	% Christian	Christian total
Middle East	United Arab Emirates (details)	4.8 Million* 4,798,491 (July 2009 est.)**	9%* < 4%** 5.28% (Catholic, 1995)***	432,000* < 200,000** 122,000 (Catholic, 1995)***

with the article linking the^*, ^** and ^*** flags (or others with a similar purpose) indicating which cited source supports what figures.

I just happened to look at the UAE because a change to that item popped up in my watchlist. I suspect that other entries in this table have similar problems. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 01:57, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

CIA is a political source heavily vested in UAE. It and other political sources may not be impartial. 99.236.221.124 (talk) 01:57, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

Those assertions by 99.236.221.124 may or may not have some measure of validity. Regardless, the lead sentence of Wikipedia's verifiability policy reads, "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—whether readers can check that material in Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether editors think it is true." Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 22:24, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

pics

The pictures of those churches are nice, but they create a blank on the middle and on the left which is quite unpleasant. The presentation could be improved.

--Laurentleap (talk) 20:23, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

The pictures are nice, but I'm not interested in them just now but wish to read about Christianity by country. They should be in another article, since they disturb the article too much, a few exceptions could be made for decoration, f.ex. 1 church per continent. According to policies they shall be a gallery on Wikimedia Commons, I think such a gallery could be linked up to the current article. Rursus dixit. (^mbork³!) 15:47, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

FYI, it's the sortable attribute in the giant table that causes problems. One way to solve it would maybe be to integrate the pics into the table as one column spanning infinite number of rows. I'll test whether it works, but I also think I'll delete it. Rursus dixit. (^mbork³!) 16:16, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

It works, but it look horrible - like ... no forget it! Rursus dixit. (^mbork³!) 16:19, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

The pics are now moved to commons — I've kept a few unrepresentative pics because of me feeling merciful and compassionate today — even though it is tempting to add ones own favourite tourist pic and write long tirades of boasts of how fantastic exactly this church is, one should abstain because of the general modesty ascribed in the new testament, and because all Christians are equal before God, and instead add the image to the commons gallery.

One reason why God, in his eternal wisdom, have prescribed this general modesty and sense of equality into Christians, is that if the article gets too many pics, it will take too long time to load, when a random reader surfs into the article Christianity by country. Cheers, be happy, keep-up editing! Rursus dixit. (^mbork³!) 17:41, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Nigerian Christian figure

In the Top twenty-five Christian countries in this article, Nigerian Christian Population is 74,579,000.I have made some minor corrections towards that. Earlymen (talk) 12:48,13 September 2010 (UTC)

Contradiction to other Wikipedia pages

Many people have commented here that this page contradicts what this source or that source says, or what they consider local common knowledge. But it's even more simple than that: the figures shown here contradict those in the majority of related pages in Wikipedia! I haven't looked extensively recently, but in just a few minutes, I found that the pages for "Irreligion" "Irreligion in Canada" and "Religion in Canada" all contradict your findings. Now, I read that you are simply quoting what the CIA factbook says, but maybe you need a better source! Just because a source is considered reliable but the community does not make it academically responsible to use it if you doubt the reliability of the relevant information. Now, if you wanted to title the page "CIA Factbook figures on Christianity by Country," then by all means, do it as you have. Otherwise, you have a responsibility to find the most accurate information available. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.55.128.88 (talk) 16:44, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Contradiction to other pages doest mean that other pages contain correct information. Moreover it should not act as supporting evidence in favor of destroying the article which was so nicely done. On the same grounds it is possible to remove half of Wikipeida pages on religion, as most of them contradicts each other. I think the previous version should be returned, as it was most reliable and verifiable info an author can find, moreover, CIA Factbook is one of the most reliable source one can find, and there is no solid basis not to trust it. Andreyx109 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 13:38, 28 October 2010 (UTC).

Percentages in the table are unreadable

The use of the dark blue background makes the percentages in the table unreadable. Please try putting the percentages in a plain box, and next to that hopefully a little box with just the colored background keyed to the map colors. That way the numbers are easy to read, and we get the instant visual recognition from the color coding. Thanks. CountMacula (talk) 04:53, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Population of the countries

I think we need to include the total population of the countries listed, it will help to compare the number of Christians to the total population. If you have any objections, please share your thoughts. Andreyx109 (talk)

Demographic research is based on adult populations

The Pew research for the USA was based on 225 million adults over the age of 18. I'm not sure who did all the work on the table calculating the total population figures from the percentages but you have to make sure it is calculated on adult OR total populations.

This table has some problems then and has to be reevalutated. I adjusted the USA total to 176,850,000 from the Pew study based on 225m adults at 78.6%. Not sure where the 243,186,000 figure came from since I have looked at 4 sources and not found it supported anywhere. The ARIS 2008 study puts the total at 173,402,000 which is close to the 176,850,000 number but would put the USA behind Brazil. So is the Brazil number calculated from total population of adults only? Alatari (talk) 16:59, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

For methodological reason and in order to estimate Pew Study can use only adult population - fair enough, however, on what basis 20% of population are excluded from the total number of Christians. 20% of those who were baptized and regularly attend the church? It doesn't make sense and this principle should not be used on Wikipedia, as it does not provide fair representation of the total number of Christians. Andreyx108 20:43, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Fairness, we don't decide. We use what best sources we can find. If you have reliable source that is not over 10 years old (because this is supposed to be up to date) that accurately counted Christians under 18 then provide it. Counting baptism numbers is an exaggeration of Christians because there are many that were baptized and are no longer Christian. Alatari (talk) 17:19, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Indeed we use the best source available, and we do use those two sources CIA factbook and Adherents.com - those two sources provide fairly accurate information on the number of Christians and are not excluding those who is not able to participate in the study, which based on 200.000 (ARIS) and 35.000 (PEW) people. 90.209.31.33 (talk) 17:24, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

As an example another reliable source: Ash, Russell (1997). The Top 10 of Everything. DK Publishing, Inc.. p. 160-161. states: "the mid 1990's the United States had the largest Christian population on earth, with 224 million Christians". The PEW study and ARIS - are probably the only sample based studies, both of them stand a side with their estimations, and contradict almost all relible sources used on Wikipedia. I am not sure on what grounds you dismissed the CIA and Adherents.com figures and replaced them with figure from PEW study. 90.209.31.33 (talk) 17:36, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Ash, Russell (1997). The Top 10 of Everything. DK Publishing is NOT WP:RS. He has continued publishing his top 10 list books every few years until 2011 and you are quoting a source from 1997. That is 14 year out of date. Quote from his newer books. Also, we have NO idea where he obtained his information. Until we see HIS sources I still consider it unreliable to quote a book of lists from a populist author.

As for PeW and ARIS being polled of 200k and 35k people... those are HUGE samples. Alatari (talk) 04:40, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Adherents.com is out of date and now unreliable

'This Christian geography and statistics web page is copyright © 2000 by Adherents.com. Please address send comments, questions, etc. to webmaster@adherents.com. Webpage created 10 August 1999. Last updated 24 January 2000. '

It hasn't been updated since 2000 and the data is from 1990 studies. It is now unreliable compared to Pew study of 2009 and ARIS study from Trinity College of 2008. Alatari (talk) 16:21, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Alatari, if you look at the bottom of some pages you will see that the web-site is being updated, on some pages it says: "Last modified 9 August 2007" - http://www.adherents.com/Religions_By_Adherents.html, and so on. So there is no reason to call Adherents.com unreliable. Andreyx108 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Andreyx108 (talk • contribs) 20:18, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

The page that presents the number of Christians in the USA is data from 1996 Top Ten list book and still shows last up date of 2000. There have been Russel Top Ten list books published every year or two since 1996. Still, the last adherents update you show is 2007 but Pew and ARIS are still newer. Alatari (talk) 17:23, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Just to be clear, this is the page that has the Christian pop of the USA and it is older than 11 years. Alatari (talk) 17:30, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Does it say anywhere on Wikipedia that newer means better or more reliable? 90.209.31.33 (talk) 17:26, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

When you are talking about populations that are in flux; yes newer is more reliable. From WP:RS:

Many Wikipedia articles rely on scholarly material. When available, academic and peer-reviewed publications, scholarly monographs, and textbooks are usually the most reliable sources. However, some scholarly material may be outdated, in competition with alternate theories, or controversial within the relevant field. Try to cite present scholarly consensus when available, recognizing that this is often absent. Reliable non-academic sources may also be used in articles about scholarly issues, particularly material from high-quality mainstream publications. Deciding which sources are appropriate depends on context. Material should be attributed in-text where sources disagree.

Alatari (talk) 04:47, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Chart is highly inaccurate

How can Sweden be more than 3/4 Christian when less than a quarter believe in God. Similar discrepancies exist in Denmark, United Kingdom, and Norway. Claiming that everyone who isn't atheist is Christian is highly suspect. Soxwon (talk) 04:04, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Honesty please?

This article has greatly inflated the number of Christians in many countries. For example, Kazakhstan's 2009 census recorded 26% Christians, yet here it is saying it's 51%. And like a previous user said, many of these percentages directly contradict the percentages as stated in every other Wikipedia page. Many of these figures are taken from highly biased websites. I suggest these figures get revised because it won't make sense when someone sees that in the Albania article that around 30% or less are Christians, yet here in Christianity by country it's 35%. And it won't make sense when someone sees that in the Islam by country article that Eritrea is 97% Muslim, yet here in Christianity by country the percentage of Christians is at 6% (97% + 6% = >100%).

With the new resource that can be corrected now.Alatari (talk) 11:44, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

New consistent source

Any thoughts about using this as a reference for the country numbers? Stats are from 2010. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 21:35, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

That is the new study the Pew contact mentioned would be out this year in my email to him. I fully support it's use but am not sure User:Christendom2 and his sockpuppet User:Christendom3 was pulling from it and sourcing it reliably. I reverted his work before seeing it. I'll do some quick checking but I do not have much time to work on Wikipedia. Alatari (talk) 11:06, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

His numbers were inflated and NOT supported by this reliable source so I'll keep my revert because we have to add the correct numbers again anyway. The source says 2.18 billion people are Christians and not 2.33 like he added so he's wrong everywhere. Alatari (talk) 11:09, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

Missing countries and contradicting figures

I noticed a few countries are missing: St Kitts-Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent, Kiribati and Nauru. Are there no statistics for these countries? Samoa, Marshall Islands and Tuvalu aren't in the main table either, but do appear in the Oceania top ten table at the bottom, even if the two figures given for Samoa don't match.

The table is titled Sovereign States, but lists many places that aren't sovereign states, like Anguilla, American Samoa, Aruba etc. These are colonies or dependencies or territories, not sovereign states.

The figures for Lebanon seem very high (63%). The wikipedia page Demographics of Lebanon says that estimates range from 39% (CIA factbook) to 63% (source given on that page is a NY Times article which actually says 35%), so I don't really know where the 63% comes from.

In the top ten Oceania table, it lists US Virgin Islands. That's a US territory in the Caribbean, why is it in this list?

Also, some of the figures and percentages in the main table don't correspond with figures given in the smaller tables below. A few examples:

Kazakhstan: main table 8,152,000 and 51%, Asia top ten table 4,214,232 and 26.6%.

Armenia: main table 98.7%, Asia top ten table 100%.

South Korea: main table 15,734,000 and 33.2%, Asia top ten table two different figures are given, 16,534,000 and 33.4%, and 14,534,000 and 29.2%.

Vatican City: all tables agree on 100%, but the population figures are different. Main table says 2,800, top ten Europe says 800 (more likely), and the table giving Christian population from countries with 100% says 550 for 2 countries.

I understand that it's difficult to find a reliable source for religious statistics, but surely the figures need to be consistent within the same page. Zolkhawaja (talk) 18:25, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

References

Pew Research December 2011 Global Christianity resource is out!

I started updating the table with the top ten countries with the reference <ref name="PewDec2011"/>. On page 71 of the new resource starts the complete list of countries. Earlier in the resource are various tables to update the rest of the page. It's a lot of work to update the article with these new data and so to show what work has been done I am adding the reference behind each entry completed. If it has a <4> behind it you know it's correct with the new resource. Alatari (talk) 11:48, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

The study is updated Feb 2013 with slight corrections mostly but a huge 20m correction for the USA. I did the top 10 but the rest all needs correcting still. Alatari (talk) 22:32, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

All wrong

Ok guys, I am french and official statistics state there are nomore than 45-50% of the population who is christian. This is even stated in the "detail article" related to the figure. So as we are 65 000 000 of people, 50%*65000000 can never match 54000000 of christians.So I guess you can divide all figures by two, and for each religion, which is a great newsKlinfran (talk) 00:17, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Serious citation and OR problems

Right now, the list says "well, the data came from one of a dozen sources." That's not good enough; every single percentage is uncited. Worse, it's original research; how this data was measured varies wildly, and combining various sources falsely implies that data from one source can be casually compared with data from another source, particularly if you're not mentioning sources.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:12, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

The overall chart is taken from the 2012 Pew research study on global religion and is cited in the total as citation (4). If there are differing sources they are added after each entry. Each entry has a details link to the countries article where other sources can be found. The percentages are taken from the Pew article which lists a total population and a population for each columns entry (ie, Orthodox, Protestant, Catholic) and simple percentages is not OR as long as it's done exactly from the source and not mistaken. Alatari (talk) 04:10, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Canada and China

Canada's number is way off. The total population is 35 million of which 77% are estimated to be Christian at most. [The chart claims 33 million Christians].

China's percentage is incorrect. It is listed at "1,4" but even 1.4% seems low.

However, admit that getting good numbers must be difficult, especially in China. --174.7.56.10 (talk) 20:46, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Italian data, not consistent with quoted source, contradicts actual ISTAT data

Source (30) points to a page of ISTAT (Italian official statistics agency) that doesn't report the data given in the wiki article. Actually, nowhere in the Italian census forms appears a box for detailing one's own religion.

Navigating from that point, though, one can view the "Indicatori demografici" page at http://dati.istat.it/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=DCIS_INDDEMOG1&Lang= and browse it for Partecipazione Sociale->Pratica Religiosa->Frequenza luogo di culto (Worship place attendancy), which gives a 19.2% of the population aged 6+ as NEVER attending to any religious worship place. Since 100% - 19.2% is 80.8%, the data given in the article for a prevalence of Christianity in Italy greater than 90% appears as totally ungrounded. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.64.45.199 (talk) 14:10, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

The PEW study says Italy is 85% Christian and gets it's information from: "Total estimate based on 2005 World Values Survey, adjusted to account for underrepresented religious groups; tradition estimates based on 2010 World Religion Database". The istat source is for the total Italian population only. Alatari (talk) 04:14, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Response: Attending worship places has nothing to do with what religion a person identifies themselves with. A person may be identifying as christian and never go to a church because of personal feeling. Such as they don't feel comfortable with a local church, or don't like to go on their own, or are not in the mood, or just prefer to believe, without practising. Identification is what makes them christian not your judgement about whether they practise in the way you say. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.150.8.25 (talk) 18:45, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

I didn't create the PEW source and can not question their data gathering. They are a reliable source. If you have another reliable source that has differing information on the number of Christians in Italy then provide it. Alatari (talk) 00:14, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

France number of christians is missing a zero.

Hi the page is locked so i can't edit this. France is simply missing one zero at the end of it's number of christians. This is making it appear in the wrong rank in the list. It is a simple error for someone to correct by adding the extra zero at the end. Thanks. Have a good day. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.150.8.25 (talk) 18:46, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

Done. Thanks for catching it. Alatari (talk) 00:11, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

Figures about Greece (99.7% Christians) are not true. Country population is about 12,000,000 and Muslims are over 500,000. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.204.129.223 (talk) 22:59, 9 August 2014 (UTC)

GDP/Capita PPP World Bank 2012

What's the point of GDP/Capita PPP World Bank 2012 in the population table? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.229.119.114 (talk) 04:57, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

Christianity by country table input for Bosnia and Herzegovina according to their details page does not state the correct information.Idakovic (talk) 01:22, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

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Data appears to be wrong

According to the diagram, 95% of Icelanders identify as Christians. This is at odds with the Wikipedia page on Religion in Iceland (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Iceland), where it is stated that only 57% identify themselves as religion people. The information that 95% of Icelanders are religious appears to come from here: http://www.pewforum.org/files/2012/12/globalReligion-tables.pdf, but I cannot find any information on what studies or research that number is based on.

A large number of people have noted that the data in the diagram appears to be wrong for other countries as well. Therefore I am adding a disputed tag until this discrepancy is solved. Elephantplot (talk) 01:31, 17 November 2016 (UTC)

Identify themselves as religion people doesn't mean the rest do not identify themselves as Christians, and being a non religious person doesn't mean they don't do not identify themselves as Christians. the studies as pew attempts to count groups and individuals who self-identify as Christians. This includes people who hold beliefs that may be viewed as unorthodox or heretical by other Christians. It also includes Christians who seldom pray or go to church. according to Formal religious affiliation in Iceland (2016): 82% of Icelanders identify as Christians. Oh the page do not cited that 95% of Icelanders identify as Christians, it's cited that 85.3% of Icelanders identify as Christians, according to the Statistics Iceland.--Jobas (talk) 20:12, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

Even if 85.3% of Icelanders are Christians (where exactly did you get that figure from?) this is vastly below the 95% claimed in this article. Other estimates are overstated as well, as claimed by other users. Therefore I am reinstating the disputed tag until this discrepancy is resolved. If you remove the tag again, I will be asking for administrator attention here or arbitration. Elephantplot (talk) 23:23, 28 November 2016 (UTC) Edit: The source linked on this page for the 85.3% figure is this: http://statice.is/?PageID=1180&src=https://rannsokn.hagstofa.is/pxen/Dialog/varval.asp?ma=MAN10001%26ti=Populations+by+religious+and+life+stance+organizations+1998%2D2015+++%26path=../Database/mannfjoldi/Trufelog/%26lang=1%26units=Number. I cannot find the 85.3% figure anywhere on that page. Elephantplot (talk) 23:32, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

You clearly haven't looked hard enough and it isn't mine or anyone else's responsibility to do the work for you. The link to the table on Statistics Ireland that provides the percentages is as follows: here

If you add each of the percentages from all the Christian denominations listed in the table, it comes out to be about 85%. You are welcome to remove the tag by reverting yourself or I will start an RfC here since you are having trouble accepting reliable sources. Also, the Pew Research Center meets WP:RS. Just because you don't like it doesn't give you the right to raise hell on Wikipedia. Jobas (talk) 00:47, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

@Elephantplot: Can you show me where exactly the article mention that 95% of Icelanders identify as Christians'?? because you claims that the article cited 95% of Icelanders identify as Christians, but i can't find that, and then you adding disputed tag based in this incorrect claims. These are the only figures from article about Iceland: Iceland (details) 280,000[65] 85.3%[66] 3.6% 81.7% 37,533 (I can't find the 95%!!). and here the source check please before, as 2016 and according to the government records, about 71.5% of the population are belong to the The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Iceland, and you can check the percentage of the other churches (which account around 10%), based in this source also around 5.7% of Iceland population are Unaffiliated (or No religious organization). and you can show us where is exactly the other problems or countries that should change the source, so we can fix it, instead of the a general talk?

And your source above is not mention the Christians, it's only mention the percentage of religious, which as i cited before mean nothing, because many people are self-identify as Christians, even if they may be viewed as unorthodox or heretical by other Christians, or they seldom pray or go to church. we have here numbers provide from Statistics Iceland, which is the main official institute providing statistics on the nation of Iceland, show that as in 2016 the majority of Icelander are Christians, and overwhelmingly Lutheran. --Jobas (talk) 23:49, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

@Elephantplot: There is extensive manipulation of data not only in this article but in other ones as well, such as list of religious populations, growth of religion and Christian population growth, with the aim of inflating the number of Christians (the lede of this article says that there are 2.4 billion Christians, but only Christian sources support this claim; the same discourse may apply to articles about other religions or religious denominations, see for example "Protestantism by country"). In the past I tried to discuss the issue and tag the other articles. You can find the most recent discussions in here. My concerns for the health of all these articles about religion demographics were ignored as the primarily involved user, Jobas, apparently had conflicts with a banned user on the same issues. I strongly suspect that behind this article's data mess there's the same user Jobas.--87.4.78.50 (talk) 19:59, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

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Proportion? And children.

The Note in the By country section tells us "The proportion of Christians is based on the proportion of the population in each country who are members of a Christian denomination or who identify themselves as Christian."

Firstly, I imagine the clumsily repeated word "proportion" should be "number". I intend to fix it.

Secondly, as an Australian, I can say that the number shown for my country cannot be members of denominations. That would be a much lower figure. So it must be from what people say on the national census. I can broadly accept that, but given that parents fill in the census form on behalf of their children, the figure must include children whose parents declared them to be Christian. That is not the same as those "who identify themselves as Christian". Those kids are people who someone else has declared to be Christian. They haven't had a say. (How many other countries does that apply to?) And there would be several million of them. The statement in the article is wrong. I'm not sure how to fix it. But it must be fixed. HiLo48 (talk) 08:57, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Two months and no response. It seems that maintaining the big number for how many claimed Christians there are is more important to the editors of this article than having it tell the truth. Or doesn't anyone look at the Talk page? HiLo48 (talk) 07:19, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

BUMP!! Can we make this article better please? HiLo48 (talk) 00:08, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

I'm following this page and I see your issue. However there are only a few countries, which limit the surveys to 15+ citizens, e.g. Switzerland. All others count baptized church members of any age or scale the poll data up to the whole population. At least, this fact should be mentioned in the article. --Nillurcheier (talk) 07:21, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

GDP?

Why on Earth is Gross Domestic Product included in the table here? I don't think I've ever seen a more out of place statistic in my life. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.80.189.236 (talk) 22:13, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

Excellent question. A search shows that the only place the term "GDP" is used is in the heading of that column of the table. I suspect it arose from some attempt, perhaps in the original source of the data, to link religious belief (or lack of) with wealth. But it hasn't made it into the article. I would agree with getting rid of it. HiLo48 (talk) 22:41, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

inquiry

why is Palestine listed as non recognized? and why its it listed outside the UN?

Kawhilaugh42 (talk) 23:08, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

missing countries

Hi there, I noticed several countries are missing from the list: Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Samoa, São Tomé and Príncipe, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Vanuatu,

I am not very familiar with the editing system and don't know how to add new tables for these countries myself so hopefully someone else can correct this.

Reinstating the disputed tag

Four years ago, I added a disputed tag since much of the data appears to be inaccurate and cited from dubious sources. Taking a look at the page now, the problem clearly persists. Therefore I am reinstating the disputed tag. It appears that some users (including Jobas, who has since been banned) have been inflating the numbers for some political agenda. Elephantplot (talk) 21:17, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

Well ok, but please give examples of dubious sources or inflated numbers.Nillurcheier (talk) 08:26, 13 January 2021 (UTC)

Have a look at the section Proportion? And children above.

The word "adherents" is used here to represent the numbers. An adherent is someone who believes. At least in my country, and I would suggest in most countries, there is no accurate way of determining how many people actually believe. The Australian Census asks the question ""What is the person's religion?". The answer to that question DOES NOT demonstrate belief or adherence, but it can be the only source for the country's figures that contribute to this article. It's not even a compulsory question! The methodology here is simply wrong. HiLo48 (talk) 09:13, 13 January 2021 (UTC)

This article contradicts Wikipedias own numbers on individual country articles sometimes by a lot, individual article of Wiki on Russia states 47.3% Christian which seems logical considering the huge and growing Muslim population there as well as a very large atheist population, while it lists over 75% here? Note Ukraine in its individual article is listed as 87.3% yet here several points below that. I strongly suspect politically motivated manipulation by those in Russia. 2601:1C2:4F01:3A10:0:0:0:F346 (talk) 23:31, 8 April 2022 (UTC)

I fully agree with Elephantplot. This article was heavily manipulated by the user Jobas and his most recent incarnation Eliko007, and possibly other accounts. Not only this article, actually, but all the articles strictly related to Christianity, including: Christianity (especially the section #Demographics), Christian population growth, Growth of religion (especially the section #Christianity), Decline of Christianity. Most of the sources used are unreliable newspaper articles or papers published by evangelical Christian authors and organizations of the American evangelical Christian right-wing; many do not support what is reported in the text (this was characteristic of user Jobas: using sources to support his own synthesis). For instance, the same figure of "2.4 billion Christians in 2020" is a projection of the 2010 percentage estimated by the Pew Research Center (31.2%) on the 2020 world population, and is therefore pure invention. Moreover, apart from being pro-Christian his edits were heavily anti-Muslim, and he disseminated these and other articles with a paper published by a Christian organization reporting unreliable invented numbers of Muslims converts to Christianity in each country. These articles should be rewritten, merged and possibly deleted (as the damage is so extensive that it would take a lot of work to clean it up) per WP:SOCKSTRIKE and WP:G5.--37.161.35.65 (talk) 11:55, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

The statistics for the Oceania collated results are referenced by a Taekwondo site of all things!?

The Oceania statistics claim that 73.3% of the population is Christian, which is impressive considering that the two most populous cited countries (Australia at 43.9% and New Zealand at 37.0%, both using official statistics) have Christianity as a minority (and those two countries are two of the three most populous countries in Oceania). The citation of Oceania points to a Wayback link to https://web.archive.org/web/20130815184022/http://wwwgordonconwell.com/netcommunity/CSGCResources/ChristianityinitsGlobalContext.pdf . However, the top level domain of this is a Taikwondo website. This PDF is also highly inaccurate, claiming 65.6% Christian membership in Australia/New Zealand in 2020 [67.3% in Australia, 57.2% in New Zealand]. The PDF does not seem to provide any citations for those statistics, and no explanation why they wildly differ from the official New Zealand 2018 census results (or even the 2013 census results which seem to report a number closer to 47.7% [ https://nzdotstat.stats.govt.nz/wbos/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=TABLECODE8071 ] ) 114.23.150.43 (talk) 06:39, 5 September 2022 (UTC)

Out of date (and dubious validity) figures

The UK is no longer a majority Christian country. Latest 2021 census figures shows only 46% of people consider themselves Christian in the UK. The UK census figures are a joke anyway, as less than 10% of people actually get their children christened in the UK and the vast majority of those people are not even practicing Christians. A lot of them don't even believe in any religion at all. So the figures in this article are highly suspect in the first instance as depending on the exact source for each country they may have zero correlation to the actual religious beliefs of the population. If the UK is anything to go by probably the true Christian population of the world is far far lower than this article would have people believe. 94.175.102.211 (talk) 23:43, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Introduction to Community Economic and Social Development II

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 9 January 2024 and 12 April 2024. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Ange Berenice (article contribs).

— Assignment last updated by Ange Berenice (talk) 17:39, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Protestantism is not a single denomination

I think most people would agree that Protestantism is made up of seperate denominations as they contain very different theologies from quaker to anglicsism. It's useful to lump them together but they are not a single denomination. BUSHMAN1024 (talk) 15:24, 2 July 2024 (UTC)