The number of people ‘with no religion’ in Ireland has increased dramatically since the last Census

One in ten people in Republic of Ireland consider themselves to be non-religious.

A little under half a million people in Republic of Ireland identify themselves as having no religion, according to figures released in Part I of the summary results from the 2016 Census, released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) on Thursday. The number of people identifying themselves as having no religion increased from 269,800 in April 2011 to 468,400 in April 2016, an increase of a whopping 73.6% in just five years. People with no religion now comprise 9.8% of the population in Ireland, a little under one in ten people. Republic of Ireland still remains a predominantly Catholic country, although the number of Catholics fell to 3,729,100 in April 2016 from 3,861,300 in April 2011, with Catholics comprising 78.3% of the population compared to 84.2% at the time of the last Census. The number of Orthodox and Muslims in Ireland increased by 37.5 and 28.9 per cent respectively, while there has also been a steep rise in the number of people practising Hindu in Ireland after a 34.1% rise between April 2011 and April 2016. You can check out the population of every county in Republic of Ireland as revealed by the 2016 Census figures here and you read the report in full on the CSO website here.