Religious Survey Suggests Search for Spirituality Outside Christian Churches

The Monday edition of the Herald newspaper reveals some figures of a recent survey on spirituality and religious belief in the Health and Wellbeing supplement, which shows increasing number of people claiming that they have no religion.

The Herald newspaper’s survey interviewed a total of 970 people. According to the survey, the percentage of those who are practising members of a religion (53.4%) is very close to that of those who are not (45.7%). This result once again reaffirms the finding of the 2001 UK national census that Scots are more likely than people in England, Wales or Northern Ireland to say they have no religion.

In the census, 27.5% of Scots said they had no religion, compared with a UK average of 15.4%, quoted the Herald newspaper.

Despite the high portion of people without religion, 70.9% of respondents described themselves as spiritual; 60.5% said they believe in God; 67.7% in a higher life force; and 62.9% in life after death. It has clearly showed that people who are searching for spirituality are shifting their focus from church or organised religions, to some other practices they consider that can quench their "spiritual needs" - a trend that has been widespread in post-Christendom Europe.

In response to the survey, Callum Brown, professor of religious and cultural history at Dundee University said to the Herald, "The figure suggests Scotland is a leading part of the very pronounced collapse of traditional Christian culture in Europe. In a recent survey of the people of the EU, 42% claimed that religion did not occupy an important place in their life."

Peter Kearney, spokesman for the Catholic Church in Scotland, however, argued that "the demise of religious belief in Scotland has been greatly exaggerated".

Speaking to the Herald, Kearney believed that "belief and practice are not the same thing, many more believe than actively worship and this does not mean that religion is dead". He insisted that "belief in God clearly remains a fundamental truth for an overwhelming majority of Scots."

Rev Alex Millar, who is involved with mission and evangelism in the Church of Scotland, echoed, "There is at large a spiritual search being conducted by modern men and women in search of happiness and fulfilment which materialism does not offer."

"The old pattern of measuring religious affiliation is not necessarily the best indication of the strength of religion. Parish ministers up and down the country increasingly have people attending regularly, but who don't belong in the formal sense of membership."