POLAND

A. THE COUNTRY

The Republic of Poland, in Europe, was historically an agricultural economy until the past Communist rule added heavy industry.  Challenges include an exodus of young workers and skilled labour combined with unemployment for many remaining.  The multiparty democracy faced further challenges when the president and other senior leaders were killed in an air crash in April, 2010.

B. THE PEOPLE

The population is ~38,164,000 and is mainly Polish (96.7%).  Minority population size is uncertain due to an historic suppression of Ukrainian and Belarusian identity; also, in the latest census, twice as many declined to answer the ethnicity question.  Official language is Polish. ~98.8% are Slavic (Polish, Belarusian, Ukranian, Silesian, Kashubian, Slovak, Russian, others) ~1.2% are Others (German, Armenian, Romani, Greek, others).

C. RELIGIONS AND CHRISTIANITY/PENTECOSTALISM

Poland is one of the most religious states in Europe and all religions have equal rights before the law.  The Catholic Church was long the guardian of Polish culture and nationalism in the face of Russian imperialism and Soviet Communism.  In recent years, the Catholic Church’s popularity decreases with every attempt to control or influence the politics and society.

~89.63% claim Christianity, ~10.13% Non-religious, ~0.1% Muslim, ~0.1%

Other, ~0.02% Buddhist, ~0.01% Jewish, ~0.01% Hindu.

In the Christian category:

~85.69% are Catholic, ~1.44% Orthodox, ~1.31% Unaffiliated, ~0.44%

Protestant, ~0.17% Independent.

Evangelicals are ~0.3% of the population.

Charismatics are ~0.6% and of those 0.1% are Pentecostals.

Pagan, Wicca and especially New Age Groups steadily gain followers, with many practitioners comfortably combining these with Catholicism.

 

 

Donna Siemens

 

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org

Operation World, Jason Mandryk. Colorado Springs: Biblica Publishing, 2010.