Just how religious is Iceland?

Since moving to Iceland and trying to learn about my homeland again, the one question which often comes up for me is Iceland's religiosity. When living in Canada, a rather secular and rationalist nation, I was always under the impression Iceland was much like its brothers in Norway, Sweden and Denmark whom are all very secularist and are often cited as the most unreligious nations in the world.

Religiosity is a complicated issue, its not simple a question anymore of "do you believe in God?" Rather we need to be specific about what people say they believe in. A great example of this is Christian's whom believe in heaven, but not hell. How many Christians believe in adam and eve, noah's ark, and many of the more unbelievable stories from the bible. I know for certain that many Christian´s in Iceland don't believe in a lot of the bible, yet if you told this to American Christians's they would simply say you are not a believer.

This is the biggest problem of questionares and polls done in modern societies, a deeper look is needed to truly see what people actually believe. If we look at Capacent's most recent poll done on this issue you'll see some simplicity on the polling questions. The problem we have is the definition of 'God' can vary widely from a personal God to a term used to describe something behind all of the known universe. Its often said Einstein was a man who believed in a force that would be behind all of the laws of physics and he used the term God. 

The problem with statistics that show such high numbers of 'believers' such as in this recent Capacent poll gives political capital to the state Church and religious groups in Iceland to speak for the majority of Icelanders. Siðmennt and many groups in Iceland are currently fighting to get the church out of our public schools and move forward on making sure our new constitution includes the all important seperation of church and state.

Iceland is still pretty new to me, but there is a great deal of promise with statistics showing overwhelming support for the seperation of church and state, but then I read a story about how many believe in little people who live in the lava fields. Its a strange country, it has all the signs of being a modern secular society, but its a country that has a state religion, high belief in invisible people, and a place where big placebo (homeopathy and such nonsense) seem to be doing rather well in the absense of evidence or rational thinking.

A book I would highly recommend, is "A society without God, what the least religious nations can tell us about contentment."  Here is the author speaking about his book, including a brief discussion about Iceland.

Athugasemdir

[DoctorE (IP-tala skráð) 9.8.2011 kl. 12:00]

I think most are cultural christians, don't really believe in the magic man.
Elves are real, comon ;)

[Þór Viðar Jónsson, 9.8.2011 kl. 12:04]

Haha, yeah I think the Elves idea is just fun for Icelanders and the polls that have been done should be taken tongue firmly held in cheek. As for the cultural Christians I 100% agree, but I am very curious to what specific beliefs those people hold. Associating yourself as a Christian gives power to Christian churches in Iceland.

[Valdimar Samúelsson, 9.8.2011 kl. 12:45]

Þór Ísland fékk undanþágu árið 1000AD sem er í gildi ennþá. Við erum kristnir menn en ekki með neina öfga. Við kveðjum látna að kristinmanna sið og skýrum , fermum og þessháttar. Ef einhvað er erfitt þá biðjum við guð að hjálpa okkur en að öðruleiti erum við ekkert að pæla í guði semsakt við erum ekki guðhræddir því við vitum að hann er góður maður. Mikið að trúuðu fólki erlendis óttast guð sína. Þetta þekkist ekki hérna.   

[Arnar, 9.8.2011 kl. 15:40]

The 'statistical problem' we have been having here in Iceland is that everyone has been registered into the state church (mothers religion actually) at birth so the majority of Icelanders are registered as 'christians' even if they don't believe.

Recently people have been coming more aware of this and the 'population' of the state church is shrinking.  Secular (or 'utan trúfélaga') has been the fastest growing group for the last couple of years and I think secular / 'not-member-of-any-religion' is the third largest group today.

[Þór Viðar Jónsson, 9.8.2011 kl. 16:21]

Yeah those are very positive signs, certainly the scandals with the church have not done them any favours. I do agree Valdi that Iceland truly has a very 'mild' form of Christianity, after having to endure the evangelical Christianity in Canada via our neighours in the south for 30 years; its very refreshing to see our politics mostly devoid of religious interference and rational people ruling the day.