15 May 2025

The Bible Society commissioned the ‘Patmos World Bible Attitudes Survey’. It was based on face to face interviews with no less than 90,000 people across the world  and undertaken by Gallup. It was summarised by Madeleine Davies in the Church Times.

The report divides the eighty-five countries and areas into seven clusters. Cluster Five is made up of twenty-four economically developed historically Christian countries in Europe, North America and Australasia. In this cluster,  four in ten said that religion was an important part of their daily lives.

Unsurprisingly, this was less than half the global average. In Cluster One which includes the Sahel, it was almost 100% even among Muslims who were rated as ‘inactive’. On the positive side, there were some results worth celebrating in the Western world.

Three things. Firstly, forty-seven per cent  of the people in Western countries said that the Bible had something meaningful to say about life today. It had not been consigned to the dustbin nor considered out-of-date nor even irrelevant.

Secondly, thirty-six per cent believed it was relevant to them personally. This is more than a third of the population. Thirdly, thirty-two per cent declared that they used the Bible at least once a month. It was a book which people possessed, opened and read with anticipation.

One interesting result had to do with children. Seventy per cent of all the correspondents across the world agreed that it was good for children to know Bible stories. To appreciate our history and our culture, it is vital and should constitute a distinctive part of the school curriculum without prejudice to any other religion.