Bucharest, April 26, 2018

A new survey shows that nearly every Romanian professes belief in God, though there is a significant disparity between those who profess faith and those who actively live a religious life.

The study conducted by the Freidrich Ebert Romania Foundation shows that 95% of Romanians believe in God, but only 21% attend church weekly, reports the Romanian Orthodox Church’s Basilica News Agency, with reference to agerpres.ro.

While 95% believe in God, 89% consider themselves religious, 33% are “religious practitioners,” and 21% go to church weekly, although 44% responded that they pray daily.

“Thus, although there is an active strong religious minority, it has a rather diminished role for most part of the society, as declared faith is not converted to concrete social and political actions,” says the survey.

79% of those surveyed agree that “you need to believe in God in order to be moral and to have correct values,” and 67% agree that “homosexuality must be discouraged by society.” However, only 27% of responders stated that they believe the upcoming family referendum, which seeks to constitutionally define marriage as between one man and one woman, is necessary.

However, in 2016 the Coalition for Family collected three million signatures in support of a constitutional amendment to more strictly identify marriage as being only between one man and one woman—an initiative supported by the Romanian Orthodox Church. Only 500,000 signatures are needed to promote an initiative to parliament.

The proposed amendment to Article 48, paragraph 1 of the Romanian Constitution reads, “The family is founded on the freely consented marriage between a man and a woman, their full equality and the right and duty of parents to ensure the upbringing, education and instruction of children.”

The Constitutional Court of Romania approved the legislative proposal on the revision of the Constitution initiated by The Coalition for Family on July 20, 2016, noting that it met all constitutional demands.

46% of Romanians believe that the government should be involved in spreading religious values.

“Thus, it can be concluded that religiosity in Romania is a complex and multi-layered phenomenon, with many intermediate stages of positioning between generic self-identification as ‘religious’ and ‘activism/militancy,’” the survey concludes.

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