Is Poland a Catholic country?
Religion in Poland
While a number of religious communities operate in Poland, the majority of the country's 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 Statistical Office (GUS)).[1] According to the Institute for Catholic Church Statistics, 36.7% of Polish Catholic believers attended Sunday church services in 2016.[2]
Demographic history of Poland
Until the Reformation, the "szlachta" were mostly Catholic or Eastern Orthodox. However, many families quickly adopted the Reformed religion. After the Counter-Reformation, when the Roman Catholic Church regained power in Poland, the "szlachta" became almost exclusively Roman Catholic, despite the fact that Roman Catholicism was not a majority religion (the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches counted approximately 40% of the population each, while the remaining 20% were Jews and members of various Protestant churches). The Counter-Reformation in Poland, influenced by the Commonwealth tradition of religious tolerance, was based mostly on Jesuit propaganda, and was very peaceful when compared to excesses such as the Thirty Years' War elsewhere in Europe.