Talk:Religion in Belgium

message: Why haven't any sources been cited for this article?
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Why didn't you sign your post? But some sources seem to have been cited, though no inline citation for the 2004 percentages of religious demography, which conflict with other texts on Wikipedia. I'm not so sure either way but if someone could do something with that then I'd be happy! (Sbutler (talk) 18:12, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: His edit was from 2006, when I and others had not yet seen this thing. As far I can see the figures you are alluding to are the two mentioned at the start of "The Status of Recognized Denominations". The figure for Islam is more or less confirmed by the Evangelical link I added, but the Roman Catholic attendance is probably based on the yearly figures given by the Roman Catholic bishops. Two problems there: I do not know which year is meant exactly (it could be 2003 or 2004, but I cannot find the figures) and the sharp discrepancy between 8% and 4 % - there could be two reasons for this: a) in the past there has been a complaint by both secular organisations and by evangelicals that the count is usually made on a "good" week-end (the figure incorporates both Saturday and Sunday attendance) and may include non-Roman Catholics who attend a marriage, birth or funeral service or a service with chanting by a famous choir (no, I am not kidding) b) some parishes in inner towns, where a lot of Muslims live, may base their percentage of attendance not on the total population living in the parish but rather on the smaller total number of Belgian nationals living there, which means 8% of all Belgians may correspond to 4% of all inhabitants, in some parishes.  I think it may actually be easier to get more recent attendance figures than to explain what actually happened in 2004. We must also be careful to compare like with like: as a result of the ethnic muslim phenomenon, the attendance rate of Roman Catholics and Muslims (but also of Jews, I think) will be comparable. The "established protestant" and orthodox attendance rate is probably a bit higher, while the evangelical one is probably much higher still: you do not become a protestant after being raised a Roman Catholic for many years to stay away from your hall or chapel. The 4% the evangelicals quote for themselves (even though they admit it is NOT an attendance rate) is probably exaggerated. 2%, with half of those attending, looks more credible to me.--Paul Pieniezny (talk) 12:10, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks Paul. I'll do some more digging. (Sbutler (talk) 13:22, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  By the way, the 4% is mentioned here: "De protestantse kerk is vanuit de historie is België zeer klein. De laatste 30 jaar is deze amper gegroeid. De groei die er was vond veelal plaats in evangelische/charismatische gemeenten. Zij zijn niet zichtbaar in de cijfers van figuur 1 maar maken zo’n 4% van de bevolking uit. Pinkstergemeenten groeien het hardst met 8% per jaar. De verhouding tussen de protestantse en de evangelische/charismatische kerken is vrij moeizaam. Het feit dat de Pinkster gemeentes als sekten worden gezien doet de situatie geen goed. De laatste jaren lijkt er wat meer wederzijds respect te ontstaan." Translated: 'The Protestant church in Belgium has always been small, due to history. The church has hardly grown during the last 30 years. The growth that was there happened mostly in the evangelical and charismatic congregations. They are not visible in the figures of graphic 1 but form about 4% of the population. Pentecostal congregations grow fastest, at an 8% yearly rate. The relationship between protestant and evangelical/charismatic churches is rtaher tedious. It is not helped by the fact that Pentecostal congregations are seen as sects. There has been growing mutual respect in recent years.' Funny, how they avoid the term "protestant" for these new congregations (even more funny, if you realizee that they now get subsidies because Belgian law now files them under "protestant"). The statistic and graphic they produced have 1.49 for "other" (I suppose meaning "other Christian") and 7.32 for "Niet verbonden" which probably means "Christian, but not linked to an established denomination". 1.49 looks rather high for what you may expect it to be: a combination of Anglican and Orthodox (though both have been steadily growing in recent years because of immigration from Central Africa and Eastern Europe) and in 2001 probably included some protestants outside the established protestant group but not linked to the evangelicals either, like Korean protestants, Kimbanguists,  and little groups like Iranian (!) and Brazilian protestants ... These now belong to CACPE. The "niet-verbonden" group obviously includes a number of groups that are still out: Yehova's Witnesses and Mormons, but also and probably mainly a lot of people who were baptized Roman Catholics, have left the church, continue claiming to be Christians, but refuse to have anything to do with any church. Of course they are NOT in CACPE. Subtracting 1.5 for the evangelicals (that is based on my 2% figure, remember, some of them were alreasdy included under "other" and 1% for Witnesses and Mormons, we have about 5% Christians outside any Christian church. If you add those to the 58% that said they felt Roman Catholic, you get 63%, which you must compare to the 75% who declared themeselves "nominal Roman Catholics" in 1987. That is less than one percent loss on a yearly basis, and does not look so disastrous for the RC or unbelievable to statisticians as a decline from 75% to 58%. The same confusing phenomenon may hold for the Muslim side of the graphic: the 28% non-believers in 2001 probably included some ethic muslims already. But on that side people were not asked "do you feel a muslim but would never go to one of the existing mosques?" (Come to think of it, that question may actually induce Baha'i to answer "yes" ... ) I am rather interested in the new figures for protestants and especially for muslims, since the controversy on headscarves may have resulted in awakening dormant muslims. Immigration of muslims has almost halted, but there is clearly a strong natural increase through higher birth rates, as most of the muslim population is very young. --Paul Pieniezny (talk) 15:51, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Untitled

message: I think a few areas need to be improved but my French is poor and my Flemish is non-existent. In particular
* Protestantism - It is noted as being officially recognized but what exactly is recognized?  Is it the United Protestant Church in Belgium?  Or are there several churches recognized within this category?
* Orthodoxy - the same.  Seems to be primarily Greek Orthodox.  Is this correct?
* The organisations laïques/vrijzinnige levensbeschouwelijke organisaties.  There seems to be an overarching Centre D'Action Laique which claims 28 regional groups (and which details a founding in the L'Innovation Department Store fire which killed 323 and injured many more when many of the bereaved being non-religious failed to find comfort from the religious services held.http://www.laicite.be/lalaicite/histoire  However is it the only group?
* What is the current status of Buddhism?  The bit about applying dates to 2005 or so.
* What summary should be incorporated from History of the Jews in Belgium? 
Any suggestions? --Erp (talk) 03:22, 21 June 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Overhaul 

message: and , I think it might be wise to look for a clearer source than this for the percentage estimates. It's not clear what year the Christian figures in it are from, unless I'm missing something, and the source cited in the footnote there is a broken URL. Cordless Larry (talk) 20:47, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: To be honest, I'm finding the pie chart and other information gleaned from Eurobarometer problematic. It's fine as a supplementary source, but it is not WP:RS and contradicts information further into the article. Personally, I think the pie chart and the assured language in the lead should be scrapped until better/more sources (per WP:SCHOLARSHIP) are found. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 21:12, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: It's probably going to be necessary to cite a range of estimates. Out of interest, what makes you say that the Eurobarometer is not a reliable source? Cordless Larry (talk) 21:15, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Eurobarometer is a cover-all public opinion polling system. The process is not transparent, and it should not be used without intext attribution just for starters. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 21:22, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: OK - understood. I agree that if it's used it should be attributed as a survey in the text. Cordless Larry (talk) 21:26, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Cheers. Any thoughts on the elimination of the pie chart until better sources are found? I say this bearing in mind that it's been established that most readers quickly look at the lead, the/an infobox (if it exists), and (erhem) prominent graphs/maps at the beginning of an article rather than read the article in its entirety. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 21:37, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd support its removal while the range of possible sources is scoped out. Cordless Larry (talk) 21:43, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

text: The introduction probably isn't the place for a pie chart in any case. Cordless Larry (talk) 21:45, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: I think it is ok to remove the pie chart until better sources are found. Yes, "The introduction probably isn't the place for a pie chart in any case." Most "Religion in country X" articles have already been decorated with pie charts in the lead. These are a popular targets for pov-pushing editors.  JimRenge (talk) 23:03, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text:  Agree remove until and unless a single reliable source. I note that http://www.thearda.com/internationalData/Countries/Country_22_2.asp has some sources With the King Baudouin Foundation report 2007 looking on the surface to be the best available. --Erp (talk) 03:59, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

text: Agree remove until and unless a single reliable source.--Jobas (talk) 17:57, 3 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: There's a huge disparity amongst sources. I note that The World Factbook puts Roman Catholics at 75%, but provides no sources or dates for wherever they gleaned their estimates... --Iryna Harpy (talk) 20:10, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

text: I noted also that Pew puts Christians at 64.1% a very similar to the Eurobarometer, the pew estimates for Belgium to account for the religious groups was based on 2008 European Values Survey and 2010 Annuario Pontificio and 2010 World Religion Database.--Jobas (talk) 20:23, 3 April 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Estimate year 

message: I am an aware atheist. I am not agnostic or generically non-religious. The data are correct!  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:587:4109:E000:3091:9F84:5653:DE5E (talk) 05:00, 25 May 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Many thanks!!! 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: I have tried to find this eurobarometer: Eurobarometer 90.4: Attitudes of Europeans towards Biodiversity, Awareness and Perceptions of EU customs, and Perceptions of Antisemitism. European Commission. Retrieved 9 August 2019 – via GESIS. to fix the dead link. I have only found this page that seems to be about this poll. I have gone through all the zip files to find a question about religion. I have not found one, even though this document says there should be. The other citation added for the same data is to eurobarometer 91.4 which does have a religion question for 2019. So I will use that data. 2A02:1810:BCA9:3A00:788A:601C:9B88:69B (talk) 10:26, 20 May 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: I have found the study, it was under Perceptions of Antisemitism, while I was apperently only looking at the Biodiversity part. I will readd the EB 2018. 2A02:1810:BCA9:3A00:788A:601C:9B88:69B (talk) 16:48, 20 May 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Eurobarometer 2018 

message: There is a very long vertical display of images that causes the table in section "Chronological statistics" to be pushed even further down the page, leaving an extraordinarily long vertical white space to be shown. Perhaps put these images in a gallery, or put them somewhere else... like in the section to which that religion is being discussed.    ▶ I am Grorp ◀  03:00, 20 November 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Images