A major 2002 Stats Canada study on religion in Canada bears out recent Ispo Reid polls.
The Stats Can survey includes a larger group and more in depth questions.
These statistics suggest that “Canadians attach a higher degree of importance to religion than religious attendance figures alone would indicate,” StatsCan says.
The study also looked at “religiosity” among Canadians, which is made up of four dimensions — affiliation, attendance, personal practices and importance of religion.
Older women and some immigrants groups such as Asians tend to attend church more than others. Contrary to popular opinion Alberta is not the Canadian bible belt ( different from the US ,which has specific geographical and population data to define a bible belt) We have buckles with Atlantic provinces meeting the above criteria slightly more than the rest of the country.
Stats Can found that about 32%Â showed up for church at least once a month.
And this study bears out private polling – Canadians are private about their faith.
The study, based on data from 2002, found that among Canadians who said they had not attended any religious services over the previous year, 27 per cent reported worshipping at home.
Of those who said they attended religious services infrequently in the year prior to the survey, 37 per cent said they engaged in religious practices on their own on a weekly basis.
“We found that there is a large percentage of people who don’t go to religious services on a regular basis, but do practice in their own home,” Warren Clark of Statistics Canada told CTV News.
“That was a bit surprising to us.”
Based on the ‘religiosity’ definitions:
…29 per cent of Canadians are highly religious. However, 40 per cent of Canadians have a low degree of religiosity, and 31 per cent are moderately religious.
