Australian Religion (A Few Generalizations) At left is a photo I took of beautiful St. Mary's Cathedral (Catholic), Syndey, NSW, Australia. It looms large over Australia's largest and most well-known city. Although the actual building is imposing on the Sydney skyline, how much does the Catholic Faith, or general Christianity for that matter, influence Australia? In the interest of disclosure I haven't studied Australian religious trends in depth. This article is just based on my personal observations after three trips to Australia, incidentally a country I admire and love very much. According to adherents.com Australia, at least in 1996, was 70% Christian. That statistic isn't too bad. The second place "religion" was surprisingly not Islam (1.12%) or Judaism (.45%), but Non-religious at 16.48%. This includes diehard athiests, agnostics, rationalists, and the vast majority, not surprising in post-modernism: no religion. Other surprises: Australia had 7,615 witches/neopagans and 8,140 spiritualists. Another site, reporting 2001 census trends, describes 73% of Australians affiliating with a religion (any religion). This contrasts to the pre-1971 rate of around 90% and the 1976 rate of 80%. That's an amazing drop in only 30 years. Another interesting Australian statistic is that only 23% of adults surveyed had participated in a church/religious service within the three months prior to the interview. So, not only is Australia less religious in general now only 23% can be found in a formal religious setting on a given sunday throughout a three month period. During my time in Australia, I took notice of this lack of interest in Christianity. One area this manifested itself was in everyday life. I noticed while having coffee at Starbucks the books the Aussies were reading. I saw several people reading New Age type books and one reading the DaVinci code. At nearly every bookstore I visited (and I enjoy visiting many), the New Age section was much larger, often by several shelves, than the Christianity one. At one bookstore, Christianity got half a shelf while the Dalai Lama's works alone took up one full shelf. These are not indicative of anything in and of themselves, but are consistent with Australian religious trends. As mentioned in an earlier post, I enjoy visiting churches. There was a steady stream of people at many of the churches, but most of them (by their accents and cameras) were tourists. I attended a eucharist service at St. Paul's Cathedral (Anglican), Melbourne, VIC. While the staff was friendly and the congregation was diverse (old, young, poor, rich), it was pretty empty for a cathedral. It was obvious 2004 wasn't their zenith. With only 23% of Aussies in church, this situation is pretty typical. It sounds like the major draw from the churches in Australia isn't some strange cult, but rather people just staying home to sleep in or watch TV. It does seem that seeking Australians are looking to more unorthodox religious expressions like New Age, Buddhism, and even Wicca. I don't intend this as a criticism of Australian Christianity. The same problems plague the USA and Europe (the latter even more so). I think it shows that Western society is generally becoming post-Christian and all of us who espouse the Faith need to think of ways to evangelize and reach out in this new environment. It doesn't mean altering the ancient message, rather it means proclaiming it in a way that reaches the new generation. We should not dumb down or give in to secular trends, but recognize that we are no longer in a setting where everyone is a Christian because he is an Australian (or American). We need to learn how to evangelize in a skeptical and often hostile society at large. This isn't a new problem, but an old one. The earliest Church Fathers and Mothers were in the exact same situation. They can be our guides. Given the changing nature of our world, these are issues the Church must confront if we wish to truly fulfill the Great Commission. Outside of St. Mary's, the open courtyard is often full of skateboarders (in spite of a carefully placed sign prohibiting it). I often thought that if we could reach them we could reach anyone in the post-Christian generation.