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While there are a number of religious communities operating in Poland, the majority of its population adheres to Christianity. Within this, the largest grouping is the Roman Catholic Church - with 87.5% of Poles in 2011 identifying as Roman Catholic,〔 (census conducted by the Central Statistics Office (GUS)).〔GUS, ''(Narodowy Spis Powszechny Ludnosci 2011: 4.4. Przynależność wyznaniowa (National Survey 2011: 4.4 Membership in faith communities) )'' p. 99/337 (PDF file, direct download 3.3 MB). ISBN 978-83-7027-521-1 〕〔 /〕〔 /〕 Nevertheless, only 65% of Polish believers attend church services on a regular basis.〔http://wiadomosci.gazeta.pl/wiadomosci/1,114871,17506668,CBOS__56_proc__Polakow_nie_ma_watpliwosci__ze_Bog.html?lokale=local#BoxNewsLink〕 Catholicism continues to play an important role in the lives of many Poles and the Roman Catholic Church in Poland enjoys social prestige and political influence, despite repression experienced under Communist rule.〔"(Encyclopædia Britannica - Religion in Poland )".〕 It is particularly regarded by its members as a repository of Polish heritage and culture.〔Microsoft Encarta Online Encyclopedia 2007. "(Poland )".〕 Poland lays claim to having the highest proportion of Catholic citizens than any country in Europe except for Malta (including more than in Italy, Spain and Ireland). This numerical dominance results from the Nazi German Holocaust of Polish Jews and the World War II casualties among Polish religious minorities,〔Project in Posterum, (Poland World War II casualties. ) Retrieved 20 September 2013.〕〔(Holocaust: Five Million Forgotten: Non-Jewish Victims of the Shoah. ) Remember.org.〕〔AFP/Expatica, ''(Polish experts lower nation's WWII death toll )'', Expatica.com, 30 August 2009〕〔Tomasz Szarota & Wojciech Materski, ''Polska 1939–1945. Straty osobowe i ofiary represji pod dwiema okupacjami'', Warsaw, IPN 2009, ISBN 978-83-7629-067-6 ((Introduction online. ))〕 as well as the flight of German Protestants from the Soviet army at the end of World War II. The rest of the population consists mainly of Eastern Orthodox (504,150 believers, Polish and Belarusian), various Protestant churches (about 145,600, with the largest being the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession in Poland with 61,738 members) and Jehovah's Witnesses (129,270). Other religions practiced in Poland include Islam and Judaism and to a lesser extent Hinduism and Buddhism. ==History== From the beginning of its statehood, different religions coexisted in Poland. With the baptism of Poland in 966, the old pagan religions were gradually eradicated over the next few centuries during the Christianization of Poland. By the 13th century Catholicism had become the dominant religion throughout the country. Nevertheless, Christian Poles coexisted with a significant Jewish segment of the population. In the 15th century, the Hussite Wars and the pressure from the papacy led to religious tensions between Catholics and the emergent Hussite and subsequent Protestant community; particularly after the Edict of Wieluń (1424).〔 The Protestant movement gained a significant following in Poland; and while Catholicism retained a dominant position, the liberal Warsaw Confederation (1573) guaranteed wide religious tolerance.〔 The resulting counter-reformation movement eventually succeeded in reducing the scope for tolerance by the late 17th and early 18th century - as evidenced by events such as the Tumult of Torun (1724). When Poland lost its independence to foreign invaders in 1795, Poles were subjected to religious discrimination in the expanded Germany and Imperial Russia.〔Anna M. Cienciala, (The Rebirth of Poland ), at http://web.ku.edu academic lectures.〕 Prior to Second World War there were 3,500,000 Jews in the Polish Second Republic, about 10% of the general population, living predominantly in the cities. Between the 1939 German invasion of Poland, and the end of World War II, over 90% of Polish Jewry perished.〔 The Holocaust, also known as Shoah took the lives of more than three million Polish Jews. Only a small percentage managed to survive in the German-occupied Poland or successfully escaped east into the territories of Poland annexed by the Soviet Union, beyond the reach of the Nazis. As elsewhere in Europe during the interwar period, there was both official and popular anti-Semitism in Poland, at times encouraged by the Catholic Church and by some political parties (particularly the right-wing ''endecja'' faction), but not directly by the government.〔 According to a 2011 survey by Ipsos MORI 85% of the Poles remain Christians, 8% are irreligious, atheist or agnostic, 2% adhere to unspecified other religions, and 5% did not give an answer to the question.〔''(Views on globalisation and faith )''. Ipsos MORI, 5 July 2011.〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Religion in Poland」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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