Pope Benedict's recent visit to Britain has been just as controversial as John Paul II's tour of 1982. But the 180-degree shift in the axis of conflict reveals how British society has changed over the past 28 years.

John Paul, the first pontiff to set foot on British soil, raised Protestant hackles. Today, Benedict riles Britain's rising secularists, who decry Catholic paedophilia, conservatism and superstition. Among the few Protestants who still practise, many now see Catholics as their religious allies and support the papal visit. The faithful fear, and seculars cheer, the idea that the end of Christianity is nigh. But is it?

On the face of it, the trends seem unassailable: the Eurobarometer finds that across 10 west European countries between 1975 and 1998, the proportion of weekly attenders plummeted from 38 per cent to 16 per cent. In Britain, where just 7 per cent of Christians attend church each week, half of those between the age of 18 and 34 say they have no religion compared to just 20 per cent of over-55s.

Even in the United States, where 85 per cent report a religious faith, Robert Putnam recently discovered the share of young white Americans claiming ''no religion'' has reached 35-40 per cent.

A victory for secularism? Not so fast. Young white Americans may be more secular than their parents, but while whites made up nearly 90 per cent of the US population in 1965, this will drop to 50 per cent by the 2040s. Immigrants and their children - largely Catholic - will bulk ever larger.