Census

[Maguire01]

Thought this might be worth a thread. I find stats interesting and there's a good supplement in today's Irish Times.

Religious stats are particularly interesting:
84% of people are Catholic; up 4.89% (estimated up 2% in native Irish) to 3.86m
320.3% increase in atheists (up to 3,531) and 132.4% increase in agnostics (up to 1,515) - although there were no 'tick boxes' for either of these - this is what was filled in in the 'other' box
44.8% increase in people of no religion (to 269,800) - a further 72,914 did not state their religion
and...
Monaghan had the lowest percentage of people who stated that they had no religion (2.42%) 

Given the falling Mass attendance, one of the paper's columnists suggests people are identifying with Catholicism more for cultural than religious reasons. I find that a strange analysis though - surely given what has happened in the Church, unless you're devout in your religion, why would you want to identify with such an institution?

(BTW, the spell-check on this thing is a Protestant - it suggested I change 'Monaghan' to 'Monacan'.)

[The Worker]

when are the census results for the north released?

[laoislad]

Laois had the highest growth in population of any county.

[Maguire01]

when are the census results for the north released?

Sometime during the summer.

[Ulick]

Given the falling Mass attendance, one of the paper's columnists suggests people are identifying with Catholicism more for cultural than religious reasons. I find that a strange analysis though - surely given what has happened in the Church, unless you're devout in your religion, why would you want to identify with such an institution?

Have there been falling attendances though, i.e. relative to the last census? I read somewhere recently about a Catholic Church survey from two or three years back reporting attendances growing again. Thought it was interesting that fastest growing religion is Orthodox, granted from small numbers, but certainly puts into perspective the nut-jobs that think we're about to overwhelmed by the Islamic onslaught.

[Orior]

Given the falling Mass attendance, one of the paper's columnists suggests people are identifying with Catholicism more for cultural than religious reasons. I find that a strange analysis though - surely given what has happened in the Church, unless you're devout in your religion, why would you want to identify with such an institution?

Have there been falling attendances though, i.e. relative to the last census? I read somewhere recently about a Catholic Church survey from two or three years back reporting attendances growing again. Thought it was interesting that fastest growing religion is Orthodox, granted from small numbers, but certainly puts into perspective the nut-jobs that think we're about to overwhelmed by the Islamic onslaught.

Ration between congregation and priest is certainly growing.

[Maguire01]

Given the falling Mass attendance, one of the paper's columnists suggests people are identifying with Catholicism more for cultural than religious reasons. I find that a strange analysis though - surely given what has happened in the Church, unless you're devout in your religion, why would you want to identify with such an institution?

Have there been falling attendances though, i.e. relative to the last census? I read somewhere recently about a Catholic Church survey from two or three years back reporting attendances growing again. Thought it was interesting that fastest growing religion is Orthodox, granted from small numbers, but certainly puts into perspective the nut-jobs that think we're about to overwhelmed by the Islamic onslaught.

There doesn't have to be falling attendances realative to the last census, does there? The long-term trend is falling attendance - I haven't seen any new statistics to suggest that trend is reversing. 84% of the population is Catholic, according to the census, and a significant proportion of those people don't attend Mass.

[Maguire01]

It will be interesting to see how this impacts on the review of electoral boundaries as well. Looks like there could be significant changes in a number of the Dublin constituencies - hard to know how this could affect different parties, given that the might change the number of seats and/or the actual boundaries.

[armaghniac]

Lots of population increase (see http://airomaps.nuim.ie/flexviewer/?config=Census2011.xml for visual stuff)
Galway is interesting. Large increases near the city and small declines in the outlying parts of the county.

[Ulick]

There doesn't have to be falling attendances realative to the last census, does there? The long-term trend is falling attendance - I haven't seen any new statistics to suggest that trend is reversing. 84% of the population is Catholic, according to the census, and a significant proportion of those people don't attend Mass.

No but it makes sense to give context. Sure if you want to compare this census with the 5th century them I'm sure the long term trend for Mass attendance is upwards but that wouldn't really tell us much would it?

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/1102/1224257901174.html

[haranguerer]

Monaghan had the lowest percentage of people who stated that they had no religion (2.42%) 

Given the falling Mass attendance, one of the paper's columnists suggests people are identifying with Catholicism more for cultural than religious reasons. I find that a strange analysis though - surely given what has happened in the Church, unless you're devout in your religion, why would you want to identify with such an institution?

I think for the likes of monaghan (and cavan and donegal), being a border county would be a major factor in the above, that is, there would be a greater tendency to identify themselves as catholic for cultural reasons than religous, compared to counties further south where there perhaps wouldnt be the same cultural significance attached to religion.

[Myles Na G.]

Thought this might be worth a thread. I find stats interesting and there's a good supplement in today's Irish Times.

Religious stats are particularly interesting:
84% of people are Catholic; up 4.89% (estimated up 2% in native Irish) to 3.86m
320.3% increase in atheists (up to 3,531) and 132.4% increase in agnostics (up to 1,515) - although there were no 'tick boxes' for either of these - this is what was filled in in the 'other' box
44.8% increase in people of no religion (to 269,800) - a further 72,914 did not state their religion
and...
Monaghan had the lowest percentage of people who stated that they had no religion (2.42%) 

Given the falling Mass attendance, one of the paper's columnists suggests people are identifying with Catholicism more for cultural than religious reasons. I find that a strange analysis though - surely given what has happened in the Church, unless you're devout in your religion, why would you want to identify with such an institution?

(BTW, the spell-check on this thing is a Protestant - it suggested I change 'Monaghan' to 'Monacan'.)

A few months ago I ran a poll to help determine the religious make up of the board, and I deliberately split Catholic into practising and lapsed, the reason for it being that while many in the former will attend mass on  no more than an odd occasion, their lives tend to still fit into the cultural element of the religion and in terms of social teaching etc. The closest I can think of to this is Judaism where someone who may not actively practice it for some time still follows its cultural norms. Protestant churches however tend to have far fewer people who regard themselves as lapsed, such people tend to make a clean break from those churches in question with the exception in some places those whom were once active in Anglicanism.

I haven't been a believer or a regular mass goer for over 20 years, but I would still put a tick against the Catholic box in official forms. Partly that's simply an acknowledgement of how I'm perceived, whether I welcome that perception or not, but also something to do with the old 'once a Catholic, always a Catholic' adage. I think your comparison with Judaism is close enough to the mark.

[Myles Na G.]

Here's another thing. There are more Polish speakers than Irish speakers in Ireland. In the north, there are more people for whom Mandarin Chinese is their first language. Do we need to do something about the road signs??

[Ulick]

Here's another thing. There are more Polish speakers than Irish speakers in Ireland. In the north, there are more people for whom Mandarin Chinese is their first language. Do we need to do something about the road signs??

No, you should go back and read the results again.

[Ulick]

http://www.cso.ie/en/census/census2011reports/census2011thisisirelandpart1/


Irish Speakers (Number) Census Year 2011 Both sexes All ages
1,774,437

Polish Speakers (Number) Census Year 2011 Both sexes All ages
119,526