What caused the decline of Christianity in Europe since 1675? Find the answer here! This paper focuses on the reasons for Christian religion decline in Europe and worldwide. It provides examples and statistics.
Introduction
A century ago, Europe was the only continent that was famous for Christianity religion. It is from this continent that missionaries had ventured into other continents globally to reach out to those who had not been converted to Christianity. Most of the missionaries who went to evangelize to people in other continents were very effective and succeeded in converting numerous people to Christianity.
However, the current situation of Christianity is not as it was centuries ago. While Europe was the one sending missionaries to convert people to Christianity, it is the one that needs massive evangelism. Christianity has declined drastically, and most people have departed from the basic teachings of this religion.
This paper shall look at the reasons that led to the decline of Christianity in Europe. The paper shall particularly look at the events that led to the decline of Christianity in the last century.
The paper shall identify religious tolerance and secular humanism as the main causes of the drastic decline of Christianity in Europe. These have resulted to revolutions in the areas of politics, religion and the social lives of people in Europe since the reformation period.
Decline of Christianity in Europe
Tolerance
Decline of Christianity in Europe is believed to have started during the period of the reformation. Reformation as well as religious wars that followed it is believed to have divided Christianity.
Consequently, there arose sub divisions and sects as Europe leaders fought against the dominance of a single doctrine over others. For the European leaders, this reformation and divisions were inevitable. They impressed upon people to accept the diversity in Christianity that had come up (Wilson 1999, 30).
This is the period that what is now referred to as the modern era began. This is the era when people are supposed to be tolerant to divergent religious and political views. During this era, people are encouraged to be tolerant to divergent vies in beliefs, practices and religious views.
This has led to a decline in Christianity in Europe because people are now being forced to be tolerant to religious views that are contrary to the fundamental Christian beliefs. Teachings and doctrines that could not be previously condoned by the Christians are now being taught and people told to be tolerant.
Tolerance has therefore led to acceptance of beliefs and practices that are inherently unbiblical and contrary to the traditions of Christianity.
Religious tolerance first began in the sixteenth century. This was the period after reformation and wars of religion. After these events, people had the choice to follow the religion of their kings (Wilson 2003, 67). People embraced the concept of religious tolerance especially during the sixteenth century. Germany is an example to a country that practiced religious tolerance during this period.
Some parts of this country allowed people from the Catholic Church and the Lutheran church to have equal rights without being discriminated upon because of their denominational difference. In France, the practice of tolerance was encouraged also. However, this was done fully as Protestants were only partially tolerated.
During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Europe moved towards another kind of tolerance. This time, it was not just tolerance among various Christian denominations but also tolerance towards other religious beliefs was advocated for. Religious and non religious tolerance began to be encouraged. Some of the countries went a step further and formulated toleration laws.
They include Austria, France, and parts of Germany. Others like Spain had these laws enacted in the mid nineteenth century. Despite advocating for and enacting laws that encouraged both religious and non religious tolerance, Christianity was still the dominant religion in Europe at the beginning of the 19th century.
However, the concept of tolerance was deeply engraved in the minds of the people and the people also practiced rational thinking. This influenced greatly the way people in Europe looked at Christianity.
Secular Humanism
Natural sciences emerged and many people believed in whatever it propagated because this seemed to be a prestigious school of thought compared to Christian teachings and doctrines (McManners 1990, 100). Science was viewed as a way of thinking that was prestigious and superior to Christian doctrines, therefore, many people abandoned the Christian faith for science.
A research that was done revealed that during this time of introduction of natural science, people’s faith in Christianity had declined drastically. This can be evidenced in the number of people who believed in the bible story about Noah in 1914 and prior to this year. Most of the people, who had previously believed in the story, did not believe in it any more.
By the beginning of 20th century, ideas of naturalism and tolerance were dominant among many people in Europe. This is what resulted to the ideology of secular humanism that has also contributed to the decline of Christianity in Europe.
Secular humanism is a practice that advocates for moral relativism and suggests that God does not exist. It is advocated for by many people including writers, scientists and entertainers among others (Bush 1984, 47). This ideology purports that there is no universally agreed definition of what is moral. Secular humanism in Europe took place in two ways.
During the beginning to mid twentieth century, there was a rise in radical social regimes. These regimes had a very negative opinion about Christianity. They regarded the religion as a tool for oppression that was used by people in the upper social status. These regimes claimed that these people used Christianity to oppress the poor and retain their social class.
This school of though held by the socialists arose as a result of ideologies of secular humanism and natural science. This was evidenced in the way those who held these ideologies lacked respect for human life, practiced racism and were very biased in their opinion about Christianity.
At first, no one thought that these anti-religious Socialist regimes were a threat to the security until they plunged the continent into several world wars. No one thought that these ideologies were a big threat to the Christian religion particularly in Europe because it was the stronghold of the Christian religion.
The second way that secularism entered Europe was through the sexual revolution, which started around 1960. This movement had no regard for Christian teachings. Most of the European governments began to legislation that had no regard for Christian beliefs such as legalizing abortion and homosexuality, among other practices (McLeod and Werner 2003, 120).
Although some Christian leaders objected to these practices, they were bound by the old ideology of tolerance. Therefore, there is nothing much that could have been done by the Christian leaders to stop these acts.
The Christian leaders also did not have a lot of support from other leaders in government as most of them were secularists who advocated for change. It seems that, at some point, Christians and their leaders were tired of fighting against these ideologies. As a result, they resigned from the fight. They seemed to have settled for tolerance as a way of accommodating divergent views that were against the teachings of the bible.
These changes that have been witnessed in Europe over the years have affected the Christian religion very much. There has been a decline in Christian affiliation in Europe since the 1950’s. For instance, the number of parents who took their babies to be baptized in catholic churches in France declined drastically. It was estimated that the number decreased from 91 percent to only 51 percent.
This was between 1950’s and 1990’s. The number of people who had church weddings also declined. Between the 1950’s and 1990’s, the number had declined from 79 percent to 51 percent. Two thirds of the population in Germany believed that the bible was without error as it was the true word from God to His people.
However, in 1992 the percent had gone down with only half of the population believing that the bible is the word of God (Shand 1990, 50). The rate of church attendance has also declined from 25 percent attending church every Sunday in 1975 to 10 percent in 1992.
It is not only in Germany and France that these declines have been noted but also in other European countries. These statistics are an indicator of how a significant portion of the population has rejected any kind of Christian doctrine.
Conclusion
The decline of Christianity did not happen after just a single event. It has been a long process that was influenced by wrong ideologies such as tolerance and secular humanism. This first began among the various Christian sects. However, the ideology spilled over to other non religious forms of tolerance such as natural science and secular humanism that have led to the decline of Christianity.
Reference List
Bush, Russ. 1984. What is secularism? Southwestern Journal of Theology 26, no. 2.
McLeod, Hugh and Werner, Ustorf. Decline of Christendom in Western Europe, 1750- 2000. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003.
McManners, John. The Oxford Illustrated History of Christianity. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990.
Shand, Jack.1998. The Decline of Traditional Christian Beliefs in Germany. Sociology of Religion 59, no. 2.
Wilson, Brian. Christianity. London: Routledge, 1999.