Study: Religion Will Die Out in 9 Countries

This probably wasn’t what the Bible meant when it predicted “end of days.” Organized religion will soon become almost extinct in nine Western countries, a team of mathematicians announced in a new study. Researchers looked at census data and found that over the past 100 years, “unaffiliated” has grown in Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Austria, the Czech Republic, Finland and Switzerland. The researchers said they started with two assumptions: that people find it more attractive to be part of the majority and that as religious affiliation declines, it becomes more popular not to be a churchgoer than to be one. There’s one hitch: The researchers admitted that the increase in Muslim immigration could throw off the stats. The U.S. wasn’t included in the data because it doesn’t ask about religion on its Census forms, the researchers said.