According to a new survey — the Ipsos poll, conducted for Global News — 51% of respondents agreed with the statement that religion does more harm than good in the world. That is good news especially because that number is rising. When Ipsos asked the same question in 2011, 44 per cent of respondents agreed and now there has been a growth of 7 percent.

On the one hand, there is a large number of incidents happening in the name of religion. Sean Simpson, vice-president of Ipsos Affairs, said: “Of course, ISIL being the primary example that’s using religion to justify what they’re doing.” On the other hand, we live in the information age and it enables us to hear about every single incident. “We’ve got 24-hour news cycles and social media and Twitter where we hear about every incident so it’s not surprising to me that a growing number of Canadians believe it does more harm than good,” Sean Simpson said.

What surprised Simpson is the fact that Quebec, once considered to be Canada’s most religious province, is now the most secular. Compared to the rest of Canada, Quebecers are significantly more likely than residents of other provinces to feel religion does more harm than good (62 per cent). They’re also more inclined (18 per cent) to lose respect for people when they find out they are religious.

Canadians are very tolerant to other’s religions even though most of them are not religious. Nine out of 10 respondents said they were “completely comfortable being around people who have different religious beliefs than me. ”Only a quarter of Canadians (24%) said they believe religion makes you a better person, while only a third (34%) believed religion and politics should mix.”

We can see that Canadians have a great trend because they are tolerant to other’s religion, they aren’t religious and they tend to be even less religious in the future.

Photo Credits: Fiti Oameni