format_quote Originally Posted by
Rou
Islam is the fastest growing religon in the world today, based on statistics its is the only growing religon today many religons are in decline however islam is growing...
"We receive many Emails from Muslims and Hindus who honestly believe that their religion is the largest in the world. The available data seems to indicate that they are wrong. However, at current rates, Islam will overtake Christianity as the world's dominant religion later in the 21st century."
This is from a site i happend upon and thought might be intresting for others to view...
33% christianity - declining
19% Islam - growing
13% Hindusiam - Stable
1% Judaisam - N/A
http://www.religioustolerance.org/worldrel.htm
Although interestingly that refers to the percentages - Christianity is not shrinking as a whole, but as a percentage of world population. Birth rates are dropping as Christians are getting richer after all.
The rest of the article includes this, which I quite like,
Basic information on various religions:
Religion Date Founded Sacred Texts Membership 5 % of World 6
Christianity 30 CE The Bible 2,039 million 32% (dropping)
Islam 622 CE Qur'an & Hadith 1,226 million 19% (growing)
Hinduism 1,500 BCE Bhagavad-Gita, etc. 828 million 13% (stable)
No religion * No date None 775 million 12% (dropping)
Chinese folk rel. 270 BCE None 390 million 6%
Buddhism 523 BCE The Tripitaka & Sutras 364 million 6% (stable)
Tribal Religions, Shamanism, Animism Prehistory Oral tradition 232 million 4%
Atheists No date None 150 million 2%
New religions. Various Various 103 million 2%
Sikhism 1500 CE Guru Granth Sahib 23.8 million <1%
Judaism No consensus Torah, Tanach, & Talmud 14.5 million <1%
Spiritism 12.6 million <1%
Baha'i Faith 1863 CE Alkitab Alaqdas 7.4 million <1%
Confucianism 520 BCE Lun Yu 6.3 million <1%
Jainism 570 BCE Siddhanta, Pakrit 4.3 million <1%
Zoroastrianism No consensus Avesta 2.7 million <1%
Shinto 500 CE Kojiki, Nohon Shoki 2.7 million <1%
Taoism 550 BCE Tao-te-Ching 2.7 million <1%
Other Various Various 1.1 million <1%
Wicca 800 BCE, 1940 CE None 0.5 million? <1%
Although there is still an odd absence of Chinese people. There are 1.3 billion of them you know.