Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
7 Figures: Restrictions on religion around the globe
7 Figures: Restrictions on religion around the globe
Aug 14, 2026 10:07 AM

Anew study by the Pew Charitable Trusts and the John Templeton Foundation reports on the extent to which governments and societies around the world impinge on religious beliefs and practices. Here are seven figures you should know from the latest study ontrends in religious hostilities:

1. Of the 198 countries included in the study—covering 99.5 percent of the world’s population—105 (53 percent) experienced widespread government harassment of religious groups, up from 85 (43 percent) in 2014 and 96 (48 percent) in 2013. Cases of harrassment that were isolated or affected a small number of groups also rose, taking place in 52 countries (26 percent) in 2015 (up from 44, or 22 percent of countries, in 2014).(Note: North Korea is not included in the study.)

2.Government use of force against religious groups increased as well, with 23 countries (12%) experiencing more than 200 cases of government force in 2015, up from 21 (11%) in 2014. There was an even bigger increase in the number of countries with at least one, but no more than 200 incidents of government use of force against religious groups: 83 nations (42%) fell into this category in 2015, an increase from 60 countries (30%) in 2014.

3. Nearly all Muslims, Jews, Hindus live in countries where their group was harassed in 2015: 128 for Christians, 125 for Muslims, and 74 for Jews. Hindus were harassed in 14 countries and Buddhists in seven. Religiously unaffiliated people – including atheists, agnostics and those who do not identify with any religion – were harassed in 14 countries.

4.Christians were harassed by governments in 97countries in 2015, up from 79 in 2014. They were targeted by the highest number of governments in the Asia-Pacific region, where 33 countries harassed Christians in 2015.

5.Jews continue to be harassed by individuals and social groups in many more countries than by governments, although the number of countries where individuals or social groups harassed Jews decreased (from 80 in 2014 to 67 in 2015) while the number of countries where governments harassed Jews increased (from 31 to 43).

6.There was a large increase in the number of countries where governments harassed Muslims in 2015, from 80 in 2014 to 106 in 2015. The governments of 32 countries in Europe harassed Muslims in 2015 – up from 27 in 2014.

7.

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
Radio Free Acton: Victoria Coates on the art of democracy
In this edition of Radio Free Acton, we speak with cultural historian and author Victoria Coates on the capacity of democracy to inspire great works of art. Coates is the author of David’s Sling: The History of Democracy in Ten Works of Art, and spoke on the topic as part of the 2016 Acton Lecture Series. You can listen to the podcast via the audio player below, and her full Acton Lecture Series presentation is available here. ...
Brexit: national borders, democracy, jurisdiction
In a recent article for The Telegraph, Sir Roger Scruton discusses the importance of national borders in Europe and the threat that the EU poses to them. He explains how religion once united Europe but since religion began to fade in the 17th century, territory took over as the principle that Europeansturn to in order to find unity. Scruton says this: European civilisation has been steadilyreplacing religion with territory as the sourceof political unity. The process began in the 17th...
Dakota access pipeline’s real moral problem
“Environmental protests that spring up around development projects on tribal lands point to an underlying systematic injustice,” says Rev. Gregory Jensen in this week’s Acton Commentary. “Native Americans often lack property rights to their traditional lands and waters. The protests now going on over the Dakota Access Pipeline are in part symptomatic of this gap.” Resolving environmental conflicts between Native Peoples and developers is a good thing. But if the legal ownership of indigenous people to their own lands is...
Rev. Robert A. Sirico: Pope Francis and the condemnation of money
The following article is the Acton Institute’s English translation from the Italian “Il Papa e la condanna dei soldi. Parla Padre Robert Sirico” written by Matteo Matzuzzi and published inthe Rome-based daily Il Foglio on November 8. Readers should note that there is no official English translation of Pope Francis’ November 5 address to leaders of lay movements gathering inside the Vatican. The original speech in Italian, Spanish and Portuguese can be found here. “It certainly would be absurd to...
Pope Francis to entrepreneurs: Do good, despite what culture says
Rather than speaking about the risk of not doing, avoiding or failing at something in order to succeed, the pope coaxed the business executives to consider risking doing something positive for mon good – as if to encourage them to live out their faith proactively, through bold intentional free choices, despite the strong countercurrents of a materialistic, godless and self-serving secular society. Read More… Yesterday, Pope Francis hosted a private audience in his Apostolic Palace for a few hundred international...
Gaining the world, keeping your soul
Recently, RossDouthat gave a talk at St. Michael’s College at the University of Toronto on the question, “Can You Be a Harvard Catholic?” The Harvard grad and New York Times columnist said he has always found religion to be a personal and professional asset to his career, not a hindrance. He mused that this may be particularly the case because of his distinctive path as a journalist. “Weirdness is good,” he said. “It connects you to the mass of human...
What is biblical stewardship?
Here on the Acton PowerBlog we frequently talk about stewardship. But what is stewardship? And what does it mean in a Christian context? As R.C. Sproul explains, stewardship is a concept in the New Testament that describes and defines what it means to be a servant before Christ: Economics and the ethical and emotional issues that surround it are frequent topics of discussion and front-page news items. This is particularly true in an election year, when much of the debate...
Now that Republicans control the government, here’s what we can expect
Because of the recent election, Republicans now control the White House, the U.S. Senate (51 percent), the House of Representatives (54 percent), 31 of the 50 state governorships (62 percent), and a record 67 of the 98 partisan state legislative chambers in the nation (68 percent). What will they do with all that power and influence? To predict what policies the GOP will champion over the next two to four years we can turn to the most recent party platform....
How Donald Trump’s chief strategist thinks about capitalism and Christianity
Soon after winning the election, President-elect Donald Trump created waves of controversyby naming Steve Bannon, his former campaign CEO, as chief strategist and Senior Counselor in the new administration. Yet while Bannon’s harsh and opportunistic brand of bat and questionable role as a catalyst for the alt-rightare well-documented and rightly critiqued, his personal worldview is abit more blurry.Much has been written of Bannon’s self-described “Leninist” political sensibilities and his quest to tear down the GOP establishment, but at the level...
What are ‘transatlantic’ values?
President Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela MerkelPresident Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel held their last joint press conference as heads of state on Thursday, pressing national leaders – in President Obama’s words – “not to take for granted the importance of the transatlantic alliance.” And they grounded that longstanding partnership on their conception of the bedrock principles that they believe unite North America and the EU. mitment of the United States to Europe is enduring and it’s...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2026 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved