Poll: Only 50 percent of
Italians call themselves Catholic
JOSEPHINE MCKENNA Religion News Service
Mar 29 2016
Rome • Italy may be the spiritual home of 1.2 billion members of
the Catholic Church around the world, but a new poll shows only 50
percent of Italians consider themselves Catholic.
The poll, published in the liberal daily
L'Unita on Tuesday, challenges long-held perceptions that Italy is
a "Catholic" country — despite the popularity of Pope Francis and
the historic role of the Vatican City State in the heart of
Rome.
In addition to
the 50 percent who consider themselves Catholic, the poll,
conducted in Italy by research firm SWG, found that 13 percent
defined themselves as "Christian."
Of the 1,500
respondents, 4 percent said they were Orthodox or Protestant, 2
percent were Buddhist, 1 percent were Jewish and 1 percent were
Muslim.
But a surprising
20 percent said they were atheist, while 8 percent said they were
religiously unaffiliated.
Enzo Risso,
research director at SWG, said Italy has witnessed a weakening of
religious faith during the past 20 years and a growing trend toward
personal spiritual inquiry.
Sixty-four
percent of those surveyed said they did not feel part of a
religious community. Of those, some said they believed in destiny,
horoscopes, reincarnation, tarot readings and miracle
cures.
Monsignor Bruno
Forte, archbishop of Chieti-Vasto near the Adriatic Sea, and an
adviser to the pope, said the results were "worrying but not
surprising."
"It is not that
those who do not believe in God don't believe in anything; on the
contrary, they risk believing in everything, as a 'surrogate' to
faith," Forte, a prominent theologian, told news agency AdnKronos
on Tuesday.
In July 2014,
Francis appointed Forte as a consultant to the Congregation for
Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, the
Vatican group that oversees Catholic religious orders. In October,
he played a key role in the Synod on the Family.