Far from certain that the world would be a better place without religion

Last year, the marketing company Ipsos presented a major survey on religious beliefs, with 26 different countries surveyed. The study confirms the picture that is well established these days: the secularization prophets of the 20th century were wrong and religion is not experiencing the decline that was previously predicted.

On the contrary, in large parts of Europe we see that Generation Z is more inclined to visit churches, mosques, synagogues and temples than their parents’ generation.

This is an interesting finding. After all, there is a great deal of research showing that religion contributes positively to the community at large – and the results are particularly clear in the case of Christian and Jewish communities. For example, the world-renowned professor of sociology Rodney Stark has pointed to the following research findings from his US context:

• The higher the proportion of the population who are regular worshippers, the lower the average problems of burglary, theft, robbery, assault, rape, and murder.

• Regular worshippers live on average 7.6 years longer (!) than non-religious people. They also rate themselves higher in terms of life satisfaction and have fewer problems with depression and neuroses than the average American.

• Among regular churchgoers, more people get married, fewer people get divorced, and more people describe their marriages as “very happy” compared to the population at large.

Similar results have been found also in Europe: a recent Danish study, for example, found that religiously active men needed one-third fewer hospital visits than their secular peers.

Equally remarkable, when the Danish research team examined death rates, it found that individuals who participated in a religious organization had between 30 (men) and 44 (women) percent lower mortality rates than others who were hospitalized.

As historian of religion Mattias Gardell has demonstrated, more than 90 percent of all armed conflicts in the world between 1945 and 2001 had something other than religion as their primary driver

Now, these phenomena may not be what people have in mind when they say that religion causes more harm than good in the world at large. Rather, it has to do with things like religiously motivated wars and violence. But as the Swedish historian of religion Mattias Gardell has demonstrated, more than 90 percent of all armed conflicts in the world between 1945 and 2001 had something other than religion as their primary driver. To this we can add the findings of the American professor of sociology and political science Robert Woodberry, who in an award-winning article concluded that as much as half of the variation in democracy in regions like Africa, Asia, Latin America and Oceania can be traced back to the historical presence of Protestant Christian missionaries.

With all these facts taken together, it seems clear that the gut feeling of many Europeans – and certainly that of many Swedes – is pointing them in the wrong direction. It is far from certain that the world would be a better place without religion!

Olof Edsinger, general secretary of the Swedish Evangelical Alliance.