Irish Christians rising in number

For the first time since the 1922 founding of what was then called the Irish Free State, the numbers of non-Roman Catholic Christians have risen, according to the 2002 census of the Republic of Ireland.

Anglicans- members of the church of Ireland- increased from 89,187 in the 1991 census to 115,611 in 2002, or 3 percent of the population.

Presbyterians increased from 13,199 to 20,582; Methodists from 5,037 to 10,033; and Orthodox from a mere 358 to 10,437.

There are now Russian Orthodox parishes in Cork, Galway and Monaghan as well as Dublin.

 Meanwhile Ireland’s Muslim population has also shown a substantial increase, from 3,875 in 1991 to 19,147 in 2002, while the Jewish community recorded a modest increase from 1,581 to 1,790.

However, Roman Catholics still predominate, forming 88.4 percent of the population with 3,462,606 people.

(RNS)