Chinese Buddhist population

In today's world, how many people believe in religion, how many firm atheists are there, and what their regional distribution and development trends are, this is a question that must be answered in analyzing the international religious situation.Since people of different countries and beliefs have differences on basic issues such as which cultural phenomena belong to religion, which ideological behavior belong to religion, and how to give numerous classifications of ideological beliefs, it is difficult to find a unified answer to the above questions.

At present, there are three main types of influential international statistical data. Their focus is different and the issues attempted to be explained are also different. We need to conduct scientific analysis based on the characteristics of the organization, the concerns, and the methods used to make rational judgments.One is a sampling survey conducted by international polling agencies in different countries and regions using statistical principles, represented by the Gallup International Survey Alliance (Gallop International Association) headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland, focusing on explaining the proportion of the global religious population;One is a summary statistics conducted by Western missionary research institutions based on missionary needs, represented by the United States International Missionary Research Bulletin, focusing on explaining the population changes of major religions around the world;One is the conclusion drawn by Western research institutions after collecting various data for summary research, represented by the Pew Research Center in the United States, focusing on explaining the population size and geographical distribution of major religious groups.

Global religious population proportion

The most valuable and trustworthy data comes from the Gallup International Survey Alliance’s “Global Religious Beliefs and Atheism Index.”From November 2011 to January 2012, some members of the agency organized interviews with more than 50,000 people from 57 countries and asked the question: "Whether you have been to a place of worship or not, you would say you are a religious person, not a religious person or a firm atheist?""As a result, 59% said they were religious, 23% said they were not religious, 13% said they were firm atheists, and 5% did not answer.According to reports, the above data are weighted according to the share of the covered adult population in the country under investigation, allowing an error rate of 3%-5%, and a confidence level of 95%.According to the latest reports, the agency conducted the same survey on more than 60,000 people in 65 countries at the end of 2014, and 63 were found. ％People say they are religious believers, 22 ％People say they are not religious, 11% say they are firm atheists, 4 ％The person does not answer.Because the time, method and data of the two surveys are relatively close, we can take the average, then 61% of the world's population believes in religion, 12% of the population is firm atheists, and 27% of the population is in the middle or lurking state.

The reason why the above data is credible is that it has the characteristics of organizational authority, rigorous problems and scientific methods.Institutional authority - Gallup International Survey Alliance is a famous international polling agency with members covering more than 70 countries and regions.The problem is rigorous - there is only one sentence, clear meaning, which can avoid misunderstandings and repeated statistics caused by cultural differences.Method science - Select representative countries and regions for sampling surveys, weighted according to the share of the covered adult population in the relevant countries and regions, and give error rates and confidence levels.Take China as an example. According to the sample survey conducted by the institution in early 2012, 14% of people in China claim to be religious, 30% claim to be religious, 47% claim to be firm atheists, and 9% do not answer.According to the agency's sample survey at the end of 2014, 7% of people in China claim to be religious, 61% claim to be firm atheists. Taking the average, 10.5% of people in China claim to be religious, 54% claim to be atheists, and 35.5% are in the middle or lurking state, which is quite consistent with our customary statements and daily feelings.According to the data from the 2012 "China Family Tracking Survey" of the China Social Science Survey Center of Peking University and the 2011 "China Comprehensive Social Survey" of Renmin University of China, the population of my country who believe in the five major religions accounts for about 11% of the total population, which is highly consistent.

The Pew Research Center’s “Size and Distribution Report on the World’s Major Religious Groups” is questionable.In December 2012, the agency released a research report on the population size and geographical distribution of the world's "8 major religious groups" in 2010.It is said that: "In more than 230 countries and regions around the world, 5.8 billion adults and children believe in a certain religion, accounting for 84 of the world's 6.9 billion population in 2010. ％。”The most fundamental reason why this data is suspicious is that the method is unscientific.According to him, the conclusion was drawn by collecting more than 2,500 data from different countries and regions for a comprehensive summary.With so many sources of data, whether the relevant survey institutions are authoritative, whether the questions raised are rigorous, and whether the methods used are scientific, it is unknown.This study also includes children whose worldview has not yet been formed into the religious population, and it is unscientific to divide them into age groups such as 0-4 years old and 5-9 years old.The research funder Pew Charity Foundation and Templeton Foundation have obvious religious backgrounds and missionary motivations that may affect the objectivity of the study.Taking China as an example, according to the study, there are 700 million "religious unaffiliated" groups in China (accounting for 52.2% of the national population), 294 million "folk religions" groups (accounting for 21.9% of the national population), 244 million Buddhists (accounting for 18.2% of the national population), 68.41 million Christians (including Protestants, Catholics and Orthodox people, accounting for 5.1% of the national population), 24.69 million Muslims (accounting for 1.8% of the national population), and 9.08 million "other religions" believers (which should refer to Taoists, accounting for 0.7% of the national population).This conclusion is not only very different from our customary statements and daily feelings, but also far from the aforementioned survey data of the same period between Peking University and Renmin University of China, and also far from the relevant survey data of the Institute of World Religion, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.It can be seen that the data in the above research report of Pew Research Center has a large error and low credibility.

The data from the US "International Missionary Research Bulletin" cannot be ignored.Because since the 1990s, the statistical data of this institution has had a great influence in the religious circle in my country.According to the data released by the newspaper in 2009, the world's population in 2000 was 6.12 billion, the unbeliever population was 910 million, and the religious population accounted for 85%;In 2009, the world's population was 6.83 billion, and the non-religious population was 920 million, and the religious population accounted for 86%.How this data was obtained is unknown, it is difficult to comment on, and it is reasonable to speculate that it is summarized from the data collected by various missionary organizations.

Regional distribution of religious population

The only available data comes from the Gallup International Survey Alliance’s “Global Religious Beliefs and Atheism Index.”According to data obtained by the agency's 2012 sample survey, the proportion of religious populations in the world from high to low is Africa (89%), Latin America (84%), South Asia (83%), Arab world (77%), Eastern Europe (66%), West Asia (64%), North America (57%), Western Europe (51%), East Asia (39%) and North Asia (17%).Countries with a higher proportion of religious population are Ghana (96%), Nigeria (93%), Armenia (92%), Fiji (92%), Macedonia (90%), Romania (89%), Iraq (88%), Kenya (88%), Peru (86%), Brazil (85%), etc.Countries and regions with a low proportion of religious population are mainland China (14%), Japan (16%), Czech Republic (20%), Turkey (23%), Sweden (29%), Vietnam (30%), Australia (37%), France (37%), Hong Kong (38%), Austria (42%), etc.Countries and regions with a high proportion of firm atheists are mainland China (47%), Japan (31%), Czech Republic (30%), France (29%), South Korea (15%), Germany (15%), Netherlands (14%), Austria (10%), Iceland (10%), Australia (10%), etc.According to the sample survey conducted by the agency at the end of 2014, the countries with the highest proportion of religious population were Thailand (94%), Armenia (93%), Bangladesh (93%), Georgia (93%), Morocco (93%), etc., and the countries and regions with the lowest proportion of religious population were mainland China (7%), Japan (13%), Sweden (19%), Czech Republic (23%), Netherlands (26%), United Kingdom (30%), etc.

It can be seen that the proportion of religious believers in developed and more developed regions and countries is lower, while the proportion of atheists is higher, the proportion of religious believers in underdeveloped regions and countries is higher, while the proportion of religious believers in underdeveloped regions and countries is lower, and the proportion of religious believers in socialist countries is lower.The survey also shows that the proportion of religious belief is closely related to personal income and education level.Low-income people with religious beliefs were 17% higher than those with higher-income people, and 16% higher than those with higher-income people with religious beliefs were 16% higher than those with higher-income people.Specifically, 66% of the 20% of the low-income people believe in religion, 65% of the 20% of the low-income people believe in religion, 56% of the 20% of the middle-income people believe in religion, 51% of the 20% of the high-income people believe in religion, and 49% of the 20% of the high-income people believe in religion;68% of people below primary education level believe in religion, 61% of people with secondary education level believe in religion, and 52% of people with higher education level believe in religion.

Trends of change in religious population

（I) Trends of Changes in the Global Population of Religious People in the 20th Century

According to the data released by the US International Missionary Research Bulletin in 1991, 1996 and 2009: In 1900, 3.25 million people in the world had disbeliefs, accounting for 99.81% of the religious population;In 1970, 2.9 billion of the 3.61 billion people around the world believed in religion, accounting for 80.38%;In 1980, 3.46 billion people of the world's 4.37 billion people believed in religion, accounting for 79.18%;In 1985, 3.76 billion people of the world's 4.78 billion people believed in religion, accounting for 78.74%;In 1990, 4.2 billion people in the world believed in religion, accounting for 79.22%;In 1996, 1.1 billion of the world's 5.8 billion people were not religious, and the religious population accounted for 81%;In 2000, 910 million of the world's 6.12 billion people were not religious, and the religious population accounted for 85%.It can be seen that in the first 85 years of the last century, the global religious population declined rapidly, and stopped falling and rebounded after 1985.It is unknown how the above data was obtained, and it is difficult to judge the credibility and accuracy.If we follow relevant judgments in China, there may be an overestimation problem.For example, in 1979, Mr. Ren Jiyu said that 2.5 billion people in the world believed in religion, accounting for 59.5%. Later, people used 2 more /3general statement;In 2001, Comrade Jiang Zemin said that about 80% of the world's 6.1 billion people were religious.But the trends reflected are consistent.

（II) Trends of global religious population change in the 21st century

According to the weighted average of the two sample surveys of the Gallup International Survey Alliance in 2005 and early 2012, the proportion of religious believers worldwide fell from 77% to 59%, a decrease of 18%, while the proportion of atheists increased from 4% to 13%, a increase of 9%.Judging from the weighted average of the 39 countries and regions involved in both surveys, the proportion of religious believers has dropped from 77% to 68%, a decrease of 9% in seven years, while the proportion of atheists has increased from 10% to 13%, an increase of 3%. Among them, the population of religious believers has decreased to varying degrees, with the largest decrease of 23%, the minimum decrease of 1%, and the average decrease of 9.5%.Only seven countries have seen religious populations rise to varying degrees, with the maximum increase of 6%, the minimum increase of 1%, and the average increase of 2.14%.If the error rate of 3%-5% is taken into account that the survey allows for an error rate of 3% and the increase within 5%, the proportion of religious population in 15 countries will decline, with a decrease of 12.47%;The proportion of religious population in only four countries increased, an increase of 4.2%.Countries whose proportion of religious believers has decreased more than three times that of countries whose proportion of religious believers has increased.

It can be seen that after entering this century, the proportion of the global religious population has stopped rising and has returned to the downward track.If we look at the latest from the two sample surveys at the beginning of 2012 and at the end of 2014, the proportion of global religious population has increased from 59% to 63%, while the proportion of atheists has dropped from 13% to 11%.If the countries with two samplings are excluded from different error rates and a 3%-5% error rate, then the proportion of the global religious population has stopped falling and hovering.

（III) Declining trend of religious population in developed countries

In the last century, the religious population in developed Western countries has been decreasing.According to the Cambridge Guidelines for Atheism, in the half century from the mid-last century to the beginning of this century, Sweden decreased by 33%, the Netherlands decreased by 22%, Australia decreased by 20%, Norway decreased by 19%, Denmark decreased by 18%, Britain decreased by 16.5%, Greece decreased by 12%, Belgium decreased by 11%, Canada decreased by 7%, and Japan decreased by 3%.The unbeliever population of Canada increased from 23% in 1985 to 30% in 1999, the United Kingdom rose from 24% in 1979 to 39% in 1999, Sweden rose from 8% in 1947 to 46% in 1991, and the United States has risen from 8% in 1990 to 14% in 2001.

Since the beginning of this century, the proportion of religious population in developed Western countries has declined faster.According to the sample survey by the Gallup International Survey Alliance, the proportion of religious population, the United States dropped from 73% in 2005 to 60% in 2012 and then fell to 56% in 2014, Canada dropped from 58% in 2005 to 46% in 2012, France dropped from 58% in 2005 to 37% in 2012, Switzerland dropped from 71% in 2005 to 50% in 2012, and Germany dropped from 60% in 2005 to 51% in 2012.By the end of 2014, the proportion of religious believers in the UK dropped to 30%, and it has become one of the countries with the lowest proportion of religious believers.

（IV) Growth trend of religious population in underdeveloped countries

In recent years, due to poor governance and prominent ethnic and religious contradictions in a few developing countries, the proportion of religious believers has increased instead of falling, the proportion of atheists has decreased or even disappeared.As a socialist country, 30% of Vietnam claim to be religious, 65% claim to be religious, and almost no one claims to be atheist, which shows that atheism has no longer been suitable for the country's cultural atmosphere in recent years.Similar situations include Türkiye, Hong Kong and the United States.Only 23% of people in Türkiye claim to be religious, as many as 73% claim to be unbeliever, but only 2% claim to be atheists.38% of people in Hong Kong, China claim to be religious, 51% claim to be unreligious, and only 9% claim to be atheists.In the United States, mainstream public opinion regards believers as "good people", believes that non-believers are "not good people", and regards atheists as "bad people" or "unpatriotic". Therefore, although 44% of people claim to be unbeliever, only 6% claim to be firm atheists.

Changes in the population of various religions

There are very complex and diverse religious phenomena in today's world, which can be divided into two categories: traditional religion and emerging religion.Traditional religions include world religions, ethnic religions and tribal religions, world religions include Christianity, Islam and Buddhism, ethnic religions include Judaism, Hinduism, Sikhism, Taoism, Shintoism, etc. Tribal religions include African traditional religions, American Indian religions, Australian indigenous religions and Chinese ethnic minority religions.Emerging religions are new sects created after the mid-19th century, such as Mormonism, Baha'iism, and Prism Creation Society.Regarding the population of faith in various religions, the Gallup International Survey Alliance has no data, and the US "International Missionary Research Bulletin" and the Pew Research Center have summarized data, but the error is large.

According to the historical data provided by the US International Missionary Research Bulletin in 2009, from 1800 to 1900, the global atheists and non-religious believers increased from 10,000 and 300,000 (total 310,000, accounting for 0.03% of the world's population) to 230,000 and 3.03 million (total 3.26 million, accounting for 0.2% of the world's population), emerging religious believers increased from 5.95 million (total 0.36% of the world's population), Islamic believers increased from 90 million (10%) to 200 million (12.34%), and Hindu believers increased from 108 million (12% ) grew to 203 million (12.53%), Sikh believers grew from 1.8 million (0.19%) to 2.96 million (0.18%), Christian believers grew from 205 million (22.68%) to 558 million (34.46%), Buddhist believers grew from 69 million (7.67%) to 127 million (7.83%), Jewish believers grew from 9 million (0.1%) to 12 million (0.08%), and Chinese folk religious believers grew from 310 million (34.3%) to 380 million (23.47%).It can be seen that the characteristics of the development and changes of the global religious population in the 19th century were: atheists grew by 23 times, those without religious beliefs increased by 10 times, emerging religions grew from nothing to something, Christian believers and their proportion of the world population increased significantly, Islamic believers and Hindu believers increased exponentially, while Buddhist believers and Sikh believers increased significantly, while the proportion of the world population decreased slightly, and Judaism and Chinese folk religion believers increased slightly, while the proportion of the world population decreased significantly.

Based on the data provided by the US International Missionary Research Bulletin in 1996 and 2009, from 1900 to 2000, the global atheists and non-religious believers increased from 230,000 and 3.03 million (total 3.26 million, accounting for 0.2% of the world's population) to 150 million and 760 million (total 910 million, accounting for 14.9% of the world's population);Emerging religious believers grew from 5.95 million (0.36% of the world's population) to 110 million (1.8%), Sikh believers grew from 2.96 million (0.18%) to 21 million (0.34%), Islamists grew from 200 million (12.34%) to 1.24 billion (20.2%), Hindu believers grew from 200 million (12.5%) to 800 million (14.6%), Christian believers grew from 560 million (34.5%) to 2.02 billion (33%) Buddhist believers grew from 130 million (7.9%) to 360 million (5.9%), religious believers of other ethnic groups increased from 120 million (7.25%) to 240 million (4%), Jewish believers increased from 12 million (0.76%) to 14 million (0.22%), tribal religious believers always fell from about 100 million (from 6.6% of the world's population to 1.8%), and Chinese folk religious believers decreased from 380 million (23.5%) to 370 million (6%).It can be seen that the development and changes of the global religious population in the last century were characterized by: the rapid growth of atheists and non-religious believers, 642 times and 251 times respectively;Emerging religious believers grew rapidly, 16 times;Sikh believers, Islamists, Hindu believers, Christian believers, Buddhist believers, and other ethnic groups have grown rapidly, with a growth of 6 times, 5.2 times, 3 times, 2.6 times, 1.8 times, and 1 times respectively;Jewish believers increased slightly, tribal religious believers had almost no growth, and Chinese folk religious believers decreased slightly.

2012In December 2010, the Pew Research Center in the United States released a research report on the population size and distribution of the world's "8 major religious groups".According to his introduction, the so-called "8 major religious groups" refer to Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, religious unaffiliated groups, folk or traditional religious groups, other religious believers and Jews. Among them, "religious unaffiliated groups" include atheists, agnostics and those who do not agree that they belong to any specific religious belief. "Folk or traditional religion" includes African traditional religions, Chinese folk religions (covering folk beliefs and related folk customs and superstitions, such as visiting to the Tsing Ming Dynasty, watching Feng Shui, etc.), Native American religions and Australian indigenous religions, and "other religions" include "Baha'i, Jain, Shinto, Sikhism, Taoism, Celestialism, Witchcraft, Zoroastrianism and many other religions" (covering some ethnic religions, some emerging religions, some folk beliefs, some folk customs and superstitions).Research reports show that in 2010, there were 2.2 billion Christians (32 of the world's population. ％，Of these, 50% are Catholics, 37 ％For Protestants, 12 ％For Orthodox, 1 ％For believers in emerging religions such as Mormonism and Jehovah’s Witnesses), Islamic believers 1.6 billion (23 of the world’s population ％，Of which 87 ％-90％For Sunni, 10%-13 ％It is Shi'ites), religion has no subordinate group of 1.1 billion (16 ％），Hindu believers 1 billion (15 ％），500 million Buddhist believers (7 ％），400 million people or traditional religious believers (6 ％），58 million believers in other religions (1 ％），14 million Jews (0.2 ％）。87%Christians in America, Europe and sub-Saharan Africa (37% of the world's population respectively, 26 ％、24％），98%Islamic believers in Asia-Pacific, Middle East, North and Sub-Saharan Africa (62 of the world's population respectively ％、20％、16％），99%Hindus, 99 ％Buddhists, 90 ％Believers of "Folk or Traditional Religion", 89 ％"Other Religions" believers, 76 ％The "religious no affiliation" group is in the Asia-Pacific region.

Theoretical explanation of global religious population changes

19In the century, with the progress of science and technology and the advancement of the industrial revolution, especially due to the victory of the bourgeois revolution and the advancement of the liberation of the proletariat, the number of atheists and non-religious believers around the world has grown rapidly, emerging religions have gone from nothing to something, and European and American capitalist countries have shown a downward trend in the population of religious believers.In the 20th century, with the rapid development of science and technology and the acceleration of modernization and secularization, especially due to the powerful influence of the two world wars and the Cold War in the East and West, the number of atheists and non-religious believers grew rapidly, and the number of believers of emerging religious believers grew rapidly.With the rapid growth of the world's total population, tribal and religious believers have stopped growing, the number of Chinese folk believers has begun to decline, and although the number of believers in other traditional religious believers has grown rapidly, the proportion of the global total population has decreased.In the 1980s, especially after the end of the Cold War, due to the prevalence of Western neoliberalism and neoconservatism, the path of secular nationalism in non-Western countries failed, especially due to the drastic changes in Eastern Europe and the disintegration of the Soviet Union, world socialism fell to a low point, religion became active around the world, and there was a situation of "traditional religious revival, emerging religions, rampant cult organizations, and expanding religious influence". Western scholars called it "God's revenge" (God's reversal of the trend of secularization of society) and "religious revival".

Since the beginning of this century, affected by the "9/11" incident, the war on terrorism and the international financial crisis, especially by violent terrorism incidents created by Islamic extremist organizations and the use of the "crusades" in history to compare the war on terrorism, rare anti-religious sentiment in developed Western countries has emerged, triggering a "new atheism" movement called Enlightenment 2.0. Some famous biologists, physicists, philosophers, writers, film producers, TV debaters and journalists have carried out anti-religious propaganda through various means such as publishing books, publishing advertisements, making movies and TV documentaries, holding debates, hosting websites, and resorting to the law. In addition, the scandals of Catholic clergy have greatly reduced the credibility of religion, resulting in a sharp decline in the Western religious population.On the other hand, some developing countries have suffered setbacks due to the failure of secular nationalism and traditional socialism, which has led to the rise of religious nationalism and cultural nationalism, which has continuously expanded the influence of religion and continued to give people the impression of "religious revival".Especially the rampant religious extremism and the disappearance of atheists in some areas with more conflicts give people a feeling of returning to the medieval times.

Overall, the development trend of religion in the 21st century shows the following prominent characteristics: First, the proportion of the global religious population has dropped rapidly, from about 80% in 2001 (see Jiang Zemin's "On Religion") to about 60% at present (see data from the aforementioned Gallup International Survey Alliance).Second, the number of believers in several mainstream religions continues to grow. The number of Christian believers around the world has increased from about 2 billion in 2001 to about 2.2 billion, the number of Islam has increased from about 1.2 billion in 2001 to about 1.5 billion, the number of Hindu believers has increased from about 800 million in 2001 to about 1 billion, and the number of Buddhist believers has increased from about 360 million in 2001 to about 490 million (the data in 2001 comes from Jiang Zemin's "On Religion Issues". In the current data, Islam comes from the mainstream statement of Middle Eastern countries, and other religions come from the data of the Pew Research Center mentioned above).Third, the international pattern of religion continues to change, Christianity continues to spread outside Europe and the Americas, and Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc. continues to spread to Europe and the United States, but the center and focus of major religions have not changed.Fourth, the international influence of religion continues to expand. As the end of the Cold War led to the sudden weakening of secular ideological disputes, the political participation and social influence of religion suddenly expanded, becoming an important factor in local wars, conflicts of civilizations, international politics and human rights struggles.

Overall, the basic characteristics of the current international religious situation are: the accelerated development of secularization, fundamentalism emerges, religious extremism is viciously expanding, religious networking is unstoppable, and religious non-governmental organizations are becoming increasingly active.The current regional characteristics of the international religious situation are: secularization in Europe accelerates, "Iraphobia" is prominent, new atheism in the United States rises, new Christian right wing outdated, Russian Orthodox religion revives, Islam develops, Latin American Catholicism is strong, Protestant growth, traditional African religions decline, Christianity and Islam compete, radical forces in the Middle East are rising, religious contradictions are prominent, "three forces" in Central Asia rise and challenge the governance capabilities of secular regimes, Hindu forces in South Asia rise and religious conflicts intensify, Southeast Asia's South China Buddhism is active and Islam is plateau, East Asia's religious nationalism is rising, and overseas missionary is strong.