Le projet de carte religieuse catalane

The website of the Catalan Religious Map has just been launched. The Catalan Religious Map is a research project started in 2000 with the aim of mapping the places of worship of the religious minorities in Catalonia. This research, commissioned by the Catalan Government to the Research Group ISOR “Research in Sociology of Religion” at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, was directed by Dr. Joan Estruch and Dr. Mar Griera. Data concerning the congregations of the religious minorities throughout the territory are collected continuously, therefore, the database is kept up-to-date. Data are regularly presented in press-releases, the last one done in 2015.

This tool is used by researchers as well as policy-makers and other stakeholders. It has become a valuable resource for tracking the transformations in the religious situation. It provides insights into the composition of the Catalan religious map, its evolution over time, and the geographic distribution of the different confessions both at the regional and the local level.

In 2014 there were 1360 non-Catholic places of worship in Barcelona, a figure that has grown over the recent years. The most important religious minority in terms of places of worship are the Protestant Churches (725), followed by Islam (256), the Jehovah’s Witnesses (118), Buddhism (68) and Orthodox Churches (55). Other minorities such as the Seventh-day Adventist Church and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) have 24 and 15 churches, respectively. Finally, smaller minorities such as Hinduism, Sikhism, the Baha’i Faith, Taoism and Judaism count on a much smaller numbers of places of worship.