Loading...
Loading...
Click here if you don’t see subscription options
People gather near the damaged Shalom Church after deadly bombing in 2012 in the northern Nigerian city of Kaduna. (CNS photo/Stringer via Reuters)

A Pew Research Center study issued on Jan. 14 shows another increase in hostility toward religion by most of the world’s 198 nations. The share of countries with a high or very high level of social hostility involving religion reached a six-year peak in 2012, the study said. The number of nations showing hostility toward Christians rose from 106 to 110, according to the study. “Overall, across the six years of this study, religious groups were harassed in a total of 185 countries at one time or another,” the study said. “Members of the world’s two largest religious groups—Christians and Muslims, who together comprise more than half of the global population—were harassed in the largest number of countries, 151 and 135, respectively.” On a scale of hostile incidents involving religion, the Middle East-North Africa region had a score of 6.4 out of 10, more than twice that of the next-most-hostile region. The Americas had the lowest score, at 0.4. The United States received its third straight year of “moderate” for both government restrictions on religion and social hostility toward religion.

Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.
Walter Sandell
11 years 4 months ago
The animosity between religions and within religious groups is the source of much of this violence.

The latest from america

Pope Leo XIV has appointed Auxiliary Bishop Michael M. Pham of San Diego to head the diocese.
OSV NewsMay 22, 2025
Our country is not only in a constitutional crisis; we are in a biblical crisis.
Terence SweeneyMay 21, 2025
A Homily for the Sixth Sunday of Easter, by Father Terrance Klein
Terrance KleinMay 21, 2025
Pope Leo XIV meets with Vice President JD Vance after the formal inauguration of his pontificate at the Vatican on May 18. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)
Pope Leo I helped to ensure that Catholicism would outlast the Roman Empire. His name is a reminder that our faith rises above contemporary politics and temporal authority.