Religion_in_Europe | TriviaQuestions.online

⭐ Core Definition: Religion in Europe

Religion has been a major influence on the societies, cultures, traditions, philosophies, artistic expressions and laws within present-day Europe. The largest religion in Europe is Christianity. However, irreligion and practical secularisation are also prominent in some countries. In Southeastern Europe, three countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and Albania) have Muslim majorities, with Christianity being the second-largest religion in those countries. Transcontinental nations between Europe and Asia also have muslim majorities, such as Turkiye and Azerbaijan, or large muslim minorities, such as Cyprus (including a de facto majority in the generally unrecognised Northern Cyprus) and Georgia.

Little is known about the prehistoric religion of Neolithic Europe. Bronze and Iron Age religion in Europe as elsewhere was predominantly polytheistic and included Ancient Greek religion, Ancient Roman religion, Slavic paganism, Finnish paganism, Celtic polytheism and Germanic paganism. Modern revival movements of these religions, and religions influenced by them, include Heathenism, Rodnovery, Romuva, Druidry, Wicca, and Hetanism.

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Christianity is the predominant religion in Europe. Christianity has been practiced in Europe since the first century, and a number of the Pauline Epistles were addressed to Christians living in Greece, as well as other parts of the Roman Empire.

According to a 2010 study by the Pew Research Center, 76.2% of the European population identified themselves as Christians.

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Islam is the second-largest religion in Europe after Christianity. Although the majority of Muslim communities in Western Europe formed as a result of immigration, there are centuries-old indigenous European Muslim communities in the Balkans, Caucasus, Crimea, and Volga region. The term "Muslim Europe" is used to refer to the Muslim-majority countries in the Balkans and the Caucasus (Albania, Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, and Turkey) and parts of countries in Central and Eastern Europe with sizable Muslim minorities (Bulgaria, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and some republics of Russia) that constitute large populations of indigenous European Muslims, although the majority are secular.

Islam expanded into the Caucasus through the Muslim conquest of Persia in the 7th century and entered Southern Europe after the Umayyad conquest of Hispania in the 8th–10th centuries; Muslim political entities existed firmly in what is today Spain, Portugal, Sicily, and Malta during the Middle Ages. The Muslim populations in these territories were either converted to Christianity or expelled by the end of the 15th century by the indigenous Christian rulers (see Reconquista). The Ottoman Empire expanded into Southeastern Europe and consolidated its political power by invading and conquering huge portions of the Serbian and Bulgarian empires, and the remaining territories of the region, including the Albanian and Romanian principalities, and the kingdoms of Bosnia, Croatia, and Hungary between the 14th and 16th centuries. Over the centuries, the Ottoman Empire gradually lost its European territories. Islam was particularly influential in the territories of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Kosovo, and has remained the dominant religion in these countries.

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