09-22-2009, 10:51 AM
Quote:Well, yea, all countries (expect perhaps Vatican City, dunnow about them, but they do have 100% Christians as a population, unsurprisingly) have freedom of religion in Europe. But the dechurching is proceeding at a steady pace in all European countries. Here in the Netherlands it's proceeding at a high pace in most regions, and we see that a few pockets of heavy religious communities remain. But even in traditionally religious countries like Italy dechurching is taking place.
However, We will always have Christianity influence our culture, as it has been part of it for millenia, thus a lot of aspects are taken over. Although we're thankfully rid of some of the more barbaric aspects of Christianity like the literal eye for an eye (by killing murderers, etc) and the unequality of men and women.
You can't ignore the difference between the north and the south of europe. Altough in the Netherlands we have some villages in which the social pressure of being non-protestant is very high this is a very small factor. In Italy, Spain, Greece but also Poland etc. it is still a big social problem to not be a christian. And this clearly influences the way these countries are governed. Of course things are also changing in the south but we are talking about a whole different timeline here.