Aussies turning farther and farther from God

 

The 2026 Census Will Show Australians Are Still Turning Away From Christianity

Jul 17, 2026 11:00 am By Mark Rowley23 Comments

In the 2021 Australian Census, 9,886,957 people (or 38.9% of the population) ticked “no religion.”

The population selecting no religious affiliation grew from roughly 7 million people in 2016 to nearly 9.9 million people in 2021.

Australians identifying as “no religion” rose to 38.9% from 30.1% at the 2016 census and 22.3% in 2011 – an increase of 16.6% in a decade.

The data indicates a massive, multi-generational shift away from Christianity in Australia.

For the first time in Australian Census history, the 2021 results revealed that fewer than half of all Australians (43.9%) identify as Christian, a steep drop from 52.1% in 2016 and 61.1% in 2011.

Fifty years ago, in 1971, that figure was 86.2%.

St Mary’s Cathedral, Sydney, Dxwkx, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0

The implications of this are massive, especially when growing populations who practice expansionist, proselytizing religions such as Islam are filling the void.

We can fully expect to see the Muslim population reach 1.2 million and 4.3% of Australia’s population in this year’s census.

It has been roughly doubling every decade, and Shady Alsuleiman, president of the Australian National Imams Council, has been rejoicing at the trend.

“We as a Muslim community, right now, according to the pattern and the trend, we double every 11-12 years,” he said on a podcast in 2025.

“We need to be a part of the decision making,” he said.

“Halal, for example, hijab, for example, masajid [mosques], for example. We need to plan for the next 50-100 years.”

Conversely, Sydney Catholic Schools’ manager and Network Catholic Identity, Dr. Robert Haddad, said overall the religious affiliation numbers for the 2021 Census make very “disturbing reading.”

He said the huge increase in the number of those describing themselves as “no religion” evidences that we are losing the battle for the hearts and minds of upcoming “millennials.”

“For the second census in a row, the number of Catholics has fallen both as a raw number and as a percentage of the Australian population,” he said.

“Unless something dramatic is done, we Catholics and Christians in general, run the risk of becoming an aging and shrinking minority in our own country, putting at further risk our religious freedoms. However, we must resist any temptation to fall back into the ‘bunkerm’ and redouble our efforts to evangelize the culture and emerging generations. We have to promote the faith in ways that are faithful, relevant and joyful all at the same time, which is not an easy task, but definitely a necessary one.”

So what will Australia’s 2026 Census reveal? At this point, the outcome seems painfully predictable.

A further shunning of the foundational pillar of Christianity sounds another death knell for Australia.

How responsible is the Royal Commission into Institutionalized Child Sexual Abuse for the movement away from Catholicism and Christianity? I have no doubt there is a correlation, as there should be.

My concern is that as Aussies turn farther from God, they will gravitate toward wokeism and antisemitism, both of which run hand in hand with godlessness.

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This Day in Islamic History > The fall of the great Hagia Sophia, the center of Orthodox Christianity for a millennium

 

Erdogan Celebrates the Triumph of Savagery

May 31, 2026 7:00 am By Robert Spencer3 Comments

Sainte-Sophie by Anthony Baratier, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0

“Today,” said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday, “is Friday, May 29, and we had the opportunity to pray at Hagia. Attendance at Hagia Sophia was also very beautiful, magnificent. Today there was a march from Fatih to Hagia Sophia.” Fatih, or “The Conqueror,” was Sultan Mehmed II, and on May 29, 1453, he did indeed march to Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, which had stood at that time for nearly a thousand years as the grandest church in the Christian world.

His march, however, was not a serene victory march. It was a pitiless display of bloodlust and inhumanity, as the conquering Muslims laid waste to the great city and joyfully continued their orgy of rape and murder even inside the great cathedral itself. Once Mehmed entered, he had a muezzin pronounce the Islamic profession of faith and declared that the great cathedral was now a mosque. After over a thousand years, the Roman Empire was no more.

There is more. Read the rest here. It is behind a paywall.

You can also search this blog for "Hagia Sophia" for a few fascinating stories on the ancient church. You may also come across my piece, which suggests that Erdogan's preaching from the pulpit of the Hagia Sophia may well have been the incident referenced in Matt 24:14-16 - The Abomination of Desolation standing in the holy place. 

Christianity under attack in three African countries > Egypt, Algeria, and Nigeria

 

Egypt: Coptic Christian scholar convicted of blasphemy for videos defending and explaining Christian faith

May 2, 2026 9:00 am By Robert Spencer9 Comments

It’s a brittle religion and culture that can’t stand scrutiny and questioning, and has to shut it down by force.

Augustinos Samaan, Alliance Defending Freedom

Coptic Christian YouTuber sentenced to five years in Egypt over faith-based online videos

by Obianuju Mbah, Christian Today, April 29, 2026:

A man has been sentenced to five years in prison with hard labour in Egypt after posting online videos about Christianity, according to Christian legal advocacy group ADF International.

Augustinos Samaan, a Coptic Christian scholar and content creator with more than 100,000 subscribers on YouTube, was convicted under Egypt’s blasphemy laws for videos defending and explaining the Christian faith.

According to ADF International, Egyptian authorities charged him under Article 98(f) of the Egyptian Penal Code – a provision commonly used in blasphemy-related prosecutions.

He also faced accusations of “misuse of social media” and “contempt of religion,” offences linked to content considered insulting to Islam.

Samaan lodged an appeal on April 24 in an effort to quash the ruling on the grounds that it is a violation of his religious freedom….

ADF International said Samaan was initially detained in October 2025 over videos it described as “largely academic,” many of which sought “to answer common questions about Christianity.”

Some also examined theological and philosophical differences between Christianity and Islam….

 

Algeria shuts churches as Christians are forced underground

May 1, 2026 9:00 am By Robert Spencer12 Comments

Pope Leo was just in Algeria, appealing for peace and tolerance. His appeal seems to have fallen upon deaf ears. Now, who could have predicted that?

Algeria shuts protestant churches as Christians are pushed underground

by Vincent Matinde, Christian Daily International, April 27, 2026:

Nearly all Protestant churches in Algeria have been forced to close, pushing thousands of Christians into private homes and informal gatherings as authorities tighten control over non-Muslim worship.

The closures, which have been systematic from 2017, are not isolated incidents but part of what a 2026 report by the European Centre for Law and Justice (ECLJ) describes as “a restrictive legal and administrative system incompatible with international standards on freedom of religion.”

The report documents what it calls a widening gap between Algeria’s constitutional guarantees and the lived reality of its Christian minority.

Since 2006, at least 58 Protestant churches have been shut down by authorities, including nearly all those affiliated with the Protestant Church of Algeria (EPA). By January 2025, the last remaining evangelical churches had effectively ceased operations.

The result is a quiet but sweeping transformation of Christian life. Prayer meetings now take place in private homes, improvised spaces or outdoors. Some believers gather in what the report describes as “house churches,” while others meet in remote areas, “churches under olive trees.” …

Nigeria: Islamic State jihadis murder at least 29 Christians, torch a church

May 1, 2026 8:00 am By Robert Spencer4 Comments

The objective is to terrorize the Christians into fleeing the area, and then making that area Islamic land. This is how the jihad has proceeded since the beginning.

Isis kills dozens of Christians and torches church in sickening terrorist attack

by Peter Stevens, GB News, April 28, 2026:

The Islamic State has claimed responsibility for killing dozens of Christians and torching a church in a terrorist attack in Nigeria.

The attack in the country’s northeast killed at least 29 people, with a group of young people assembling at a football pitch were targeted.

The attack occurred in Adamawa state, which borders Cameroon – a hotspot for terrorist violence.

One local, Joshua Usman, said the dead included “youths, including some ladies that were watching football”.

He told said houses, churches, and motorcycles were burned in the attack.

Footage from local reporters showed a torched building, upturned furniture, and charred motorcycles stacked on their side.

Philip Agabus, a local resident, said: “Our people converged at a football pitch in Guyaku community… and were attacked by insurgents who entered with guns and began shooting randomly.”…