Religion in Germany
There are no official statistics on religious groups. Unofficial estimates and figures provided by religious organizations indicate the Roman Catholic Church has a membership of approximately 25 million, and the Protestant Church (which is a confederation of the Lutheran, Uniate, and Reformed Protestant denominations) has approximately 24 million members. Together, these two churches account for more than three-fifths of the population. Other Protestant denominations include the New Apostolic Church with approximately 360,000 members, Baptist communities (Evangelical Christian Baptists, International Baptist Convention, Reformed Baptists, Bible Baptists, and others) with approximately 75,000 to 100,000 members, and evangelical nondenominational Baptists with approximately 85,000 members.
Muslims number approximately 4 million, including 2.9 million Sunnis, 500,000 Alevis, and 280,000 Shia. Orthodox Christians number approximately 1.4 million. Buddhists number 245,000 and Hindus 97,500. Other religious groups in the country include Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Church of Scientology (COS), and a Jewish community of approximately 200,000 members. Approximately 28 million persons (one-third of the population) either have no religious affiliation or are members of unrecorded religious organizations.
Roman Catholicism, one of Germany's two principal religions, traces its origins there to the eighth-century missionary work of Saint Boniface. In the next centuries, Roman Catholicism made more converts and spread eastward. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the Knights of the Teutonic Order spread German and Roman Catholic influence by force of arms along the southern Baltic Coast and into Russia. In 1517, however, Martin Luther challenged papal authority and what he saw as the commercialization of his faith. In the process, Luther changed the course of European and world history and established the second major faith in Germany--Protestantism.
Religious differences played a decisive role in the Thirty Years' War. An enduring legacy of the Protestant Reformation and this conflict was the division of Germany into fairly distinct regions of religious practice. Roman Catholicism remained the preeminent faith in the southern and western German states, while Protestantism became firmly established in the northeastern and central regions. Pockets of Roman Catholicism existed in Oldenburg in the north and in areas of Hesse. Protestant congregations could be found in north Baden and northeastern Bavaria.
The unification of Germany in 1871 under Prussian leadership led to the strengthening of Protestantism. Otto von Bismarck sought to weaken Roman Catholic influence through an anti-Roman Catholic campaign, the Kulturkampf, in the early 1870s. The Jesuit order was prohibited in Germany, and its members were expelled from the country. In Prussia the "Falk laws," named for Adalbert Falk, Bismarck's minister of culture, mandated German citizenship and attendance at German universities for clergymen, state inspection of schools, and state confirmation of parish and episcopal appointments. Although relations between the Roman Catholic Church and the state were subsequently improved through negotiations with the Vatican, the Kulturkampf engendered in Roman Catholics a deep distrust of the empire and enmity toward Prussia.
Prior to World War II, about two-thirds of the German population was Protestant and the remainder Roman Catholic. Bavaria was a Roman Catholic stronghold. Roman Catholics were also well represented in the populations of Baden-Württemberg, the Saarland, and in much of the Rhineland. Elsewhere in Germany, especially in the north and northeast, Protestants were in the majority.
During the Hitler regime, except for individual acts of resistance, the established churches were unable or unwilling to mount a serious challenge to the supremacy of the state (see The Third Reich, 1933-45, ch. 1). A Nazi, Ludwig Müller, was installed as the Lutheran bishop in Berlin. Although raised a Roman Catholic, Hitler respected only the power and organization of the Roman Catholic Church, not its tenets. In July 1933, shortly after coming to power, the Nazis scored their first diplomatic success by concluding a concordat with the Vatican, regulating church-state relations. In return for keeping the right to maintain denominational schools nationwide, the Vatican assured the Nazis that Roman Catholic clergy would refrain from political activity, that the government would have a say in the choice of bishops, and that changes in diocesan boundaries would be subject to government approval. However, the Nazis soon violated the concordat's terms, and by the late 1930s almost all denominational schools had been abolished.
Toward the end of 1933, an opposition group under the leadership of Lutheran pastors Martin Niemöller and Dietrich Bonhoeffer formed the "Confessing Church." The members of this church opposed the takeover of the Lutheran Church by the Nazis. Many of its members were eventually arrested, and some were executed--among them, Bonhoeffer--by the end of World War II.
The postwar division of Germany left roughly equal numbers of Roman Catholics and Protestants in West Germany. East Germany had five times as many Protestants as Roman Catholics. There the authorities waged a persistent and largely successful campaign to minimize the influence and authority of the Protestant and Roman Catholic churches.
In the Federal Republic, freedom of religion is guaranteed by Article 4 of the Basic Law, and the churches enjoy a special legal status as corporate bodies. In theory, there is constitutional separation of church and state, but church financing complicates this separation. To support churches and their work, most Germans in the old Länder pay a voluntary church tax, amounting to an 8 or 9 percent surcharge on income tax paid. Living in a society known for consensus and conformity, few West Germans formally withdrew from the established churches before the 1980s and hence continued to pay the tax.
Beginning in the 1980s, negative attitudes toward the tax and the churches become more common, and people began leaving the churches in significant numbers. Between 1980 and 1992, about 1.0 million Roman Catholics and 1.2 million Protestants gave up their church memberships. A faltering economy and increased taxes caused many to withdraw for financial reasons. In a 1992 poll, approximately 42 percent of those queried stated that the church tax was "much too high"; 64 percent favored abolishing the tax and supporting the churches through voluntary contributions. Fourteen percent of those Roman Catholics and Protestants polled stated that they were likely to withdraw or definitely would withdraw from their church.
Eastern Orthodox Christianity in Germany derives mainly from the hundreds of thousands of Serbs who came to the country in the 1960s and 1970s as Gastarbeiter. The breakup of the former Yugoslavia in the early 1990s caused thousands more Serbs to come to Germany. Many of the Slavs from other East European countries also belong to the Eastern Orthodox Church. Germany's large Greek population belongs mostly to the Greek Orthodox Church.
In a society increasingly materialist and secular, the spiritual and moral positions of the churches became irrelevant to many. Among the younger generation seeking autonomy and self-fulfillment, allegiance was no longer simply surrendered without question to institutions of authority. Attendance at services dropped off significantly, and the institution of the church quietly disappeared from the lives of many Germans.
The year 2017 saw a total of 660,228 fewer members in Germany's Protestant and Catholic churches, according to statistics released on 20 July 2018. The Protestant church in Germany (EKD) said that its membership dropped by 390,000 to 21.5 million in 2017, a decrease of 1.8 percent. The Catholic church noted a similar trend, with the German Bishops' Conference (DBK) reporting there were over 270,000 fewer members in 2017, putting its membership at 23.3 million. Over half of the German population are still members of one of Germany's two main Christian denominations, although numbers have dropped significantly in recent years. Around 54 percent of people living in Germany were part of either church in 2017, which is down significantly from 62 percent in 2005.
In East Germany, although the constitution theoretically provided for freedom of religion, the Marxist-Leninist state placed formidable obstacles before those seeking to exercise that basic right. Enormous pressure was exerted on citizens to renounce religion. East Germans who practiced their religion were denied educational and professional opportunities, for example. Consequently, at unification the majority of East Germans were either not baptized or had left their church.
In the 1990s, polls in the new Länder revealed that more than 70 percent of East Germans did not believe in God. Young people were even less religious. Some polls found that only 16 percent of East German schoolchildren believed in God. An entire generation had been raised without the religious rituals that traditionally had marked life's milestones. Secular rituals had been substituted. For example, the Jugendweihe (youth dedication) gradually supplanted the Christian practice of confirmation.
After unification in 1990, there were nominally 30.2 million Protestants and 26.7 million Roman Catholics in united Germany. Roman Catholics and Protestants combined amounted to about 76 percent of the German population and 71 percent of the country's total population.
Although less extreme than in the past, attitudes toward religion continue to polarize German society. In the 1990s, especially in the western Länder , attitudinal differences separate many younger Germans with humanistic values (concern for the environment, the rights of women and minorities, and peace and disarmament issues) from an older generation who hold traditional religious values. Many others of the postwar generations have accepted the values of popular culture and consumerism and have left the churches because they no longer seem significant. Millions of Germans of all ages, however, continue to profess a religion for a variety of reasons, among them strong religious beliefs, social pressure to conform, preservation of educational and employment opportunities, support for essential church social-welfare activities, and (in the western Länder ) the enduring appeal of Christian rituals surrounding baptism, marriage, and burial.
It was initially difficult to determine to what extent Germans in the new Länder would return to religion. In the early 1990s, popular magazines featured stories about the "heathenization" of Germany. Although such a provocative characterization of trends seems exaggerated, the incorporation of the former East Germany did dilute religious influence in united Germany. Conversely, however, the opening of eastern Germany gave missionaries from the old Länder and from around the world the chance to rekindle religious fervor. In the old Länder, the churches continued their vitally important work of operating an extensive network of hospitals, nursing homes, and other social institutions. The need for such services and facilities is greatest in the five new Länder , and the churches quickly stepped in to help.
The General Act on Equal Treatment prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, ethnic origin, race, religion, disability, age, and sexual identity. In 2002 the Federal Constitutional Court, however, ruled that the government can characterize “nontraditional” religions as “sects,” “youth religions,” and “youth sects,” and may report accurate information or warnings about them to the public. The ruling also states the government may not defame these religious groups by using terms such as “destructive,” “pseudo-religious,” or “manipulative.”
Scientologists reported instances of societal and governmental discrimination. The Constitutional Court and various courts at the state level have not explicitly ruled that Scientology is a religion, but have left the question unanswered. Various courts at the state and federal level have condemned the improper use of so-called “sect filters” that have been used to blacklist and boycott Scientologists in the public and private sectors.
Federal and some state authorities described Scientology as a potential threat to democratic order, which resulted in discrimination against Scientologists in both the public and private sectors. Several states published pamphlets detailing the church’s ideology and practice, warning of the “dangers” the religion allegedly poses to democracy, the legal system, and human rights. In addition, government agencies at the federal and state levels and some organizations in the private sector established rules and procedures that discriminated against Scientology as an organization and against its members.
The federal and state Offices for the Protection of the Constitution (OPCs) in Baden-Wuerttemberg, Bavaria, Berlin, Bremen, Hamburg, and Lower Saxony continued to monitor the activities of the COS, mainly focusing on evaluating Scientology publications and public activities to determine if they violated the German constitution. The OPCs did not impede the believers’ freedom to practice their religion. In 2010, the OPC report from Baden-Wuerttemberg stated that monitoring by the OPC “creates considerable problems in recruiting new members for Scientology and has limited their ability to expand successfully,” and that trend continued throughout the year. The COS reported during the year that the OPC regularly contacted its members to question them about their organization. The COS also reported the OPC regularly collected names of members from church publications and digitally archived this information to be used in citizenship and employment proceedings.
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