Iceland was one of the most irreligious countries in the world accord to Gallup. A Gallup poll conducted in 2012 found that 57% of Icelanders considered themselves "a religious person", 31% consider themselves "a non religious person", while 10% define themselves as "a convinced atheist", placing Iceland in the top 10 atheist populations in the world.
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Both Protestant and Roman Catholic communities have been in decline since the late 20th century, due to the rise of irreligion in New England. It is the most irreligious region of the country, along with the Western United States. A significant Jewish population immigrated to the Boston and Springfield areas between 1880 and 1920. Jews currently make up 3% of the population.
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In 1898, Ament had a paper "The Religions of China" published in The Student Missionary Appeal: Addresses at the Third International Convention of the Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions, in which he indicated: "Some one has said that you cannot tell the truth about the Chinese without lying. They are the most irreligious people on the face of the earth."The Student Missionary Appeal: Addresses at the Third International Convention of the Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions (Student volunteer movement for foreign missions, 1898): 336ff. In December 1898, Ament was notified that Oberlin College, his alma mater, had decided to award him an honorary Doctor of Divinity (D.
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The success of the USSR and establishment of the Eastern Bloc followed. While the Czech lands have never been as much of a military or political power during the region's history as Poland and Russia have, it was arguably seen by some as one of the most cultured of the North Slavic lands and the first to accept their new religion. The Czechs were the first in the east to be Christianised in the 9th century, they later became arguably the most religiously tolerant of the Slavonic nation-states thanks to the Bohemian Reformation. However today, the Czech Republic is one of the most irreligious countries in the world.
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The region has historically been associated with the Lutheran faith, but under Communist rule, church membership was strongly discouraged and much of the population disassociated itself from any religious body. Saxony-Anhalt contains many sites tied to Martin Luther's life, including Lutherstadt Eisleben and Lutherstadt Wittenberg. In 2018, the majority of citizens in Saxony-Anhalt were irreligious and more were leaving the churches than entering them – in fact, Saxony-Anhalt is the most irreligious state in Germany. 15.2% of the Saxon-Anhaltish adhered to the major denominations of Christianity (11.9% were members of the Evangelical Church in Germany and 3.3% were Catholics),Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland – Kirchemitgliederzahlen Stand 31.
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Major religions practised in France include Christianity (Catholicism, various branches of Protestantism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Armenian Orthodoxy), Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Sikhism amongst others, making it a multiconfessional country. Sunday mass attendance has fallen to 5% for the Catholics, and the overall level of observance is considerably lower than was the past. According to a Eurobarometer survey conducted in 2010, 27% of French citizens responded that they "believe there is a God", 27% answered that they "believe there is some sort of spirit or life force", and 40% answered that they "do not believe there is any sort of spirit, God, or life force". This makes France one of the most irreligious countries in the world.
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Greater Rio de Janeiro, not including the city proper, is the most irreligious and least Roman Catholic Brazilian periphery, while Greater Porto Alegre and Greater Fortaleza are on the opposite sides of the lists, respectively. In October 2009, the Brazilian Senate approved and enacted by the President of Brazil in February 2010, an agreement with the Vatican, in which the Legal Statute of the Catholic Church in Brazil is recognized. The agreement confirmed norms that were normally complied with regarding religious education in public elementary schools (which also ensures the teaching of other beliefs), marriage and spiritual assistance in prisons and hospitals. The project was criticized by parliamentarians who understood the end of the secular state with the approval of the agreement.
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Church attendance in the western states of Oregon, Washington, and California was only slightly higher. A 2008 Gallup poll comparing belief in God among U.S. regions found that only 59% of residents in the Western United States believe in God, compared to 80% in the East, 83% in the Midwest, and 86% in the South. A 2011 Gallup poll showed that when it comes to the number of people seeing religion as important in everyday life, New Hampshire and Vermont were the least religious, both with 23%, followed up with 25% in Maine. There has been debate as to whether the Western United States is still the most irreligious part of the United States, due to New England surpassing it as the region with the highest percentage of residents unaffiliated with any religion.
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