Less than half of England and Wales population Christian, Census 2021 shows 

[From By Rachel Russell for BBC News] 

Fewer than half of people in England and Wales describe themselves as Christian for the first time, the 2021 census has revealed. The proportion of people who said they were Christian was 46.2%, down from 59.3% in the last census in 2011. Meanwhile the number who said they had no religion increased to 37.2% of the population, up from a quarter. And people identifying as Muslim rose from 4.9% in 2011 to 6.5% last year. 

The census is carried out every 10 years by the Office for National Statistics (ONS). The ONS said the census question broadly asked "what is your religion" - referring to people's affiliation, rather than their beliefs or active religious practices. Professor Linda Woodhead, head of theology and religious studies at King's College London, said ticking "no religion" could still indicate a number of different beliefs. Some will be atheist, a lot will be agnostic - they just say, 'I don't really know' - and some will be spiritual and be doing spiritual things," she told BBC News. 

Meanwhile, London is the most religiously diverse region of England, with just over 25.3% of people reporting a religion other than Christianity. And south-west England is shown to be the least religiously diverse region, with 3.2% selecting a religion other than Christian. The figures also showed differences in nations - in England alone, 37.2% of people said they had no religion, while in Wales this rose to 46.5% from 32.1% in 2011. 

[Interesting! This has been a very long-running trend which will probably continue for decades to come. I wonder how low the religious numbers will go? 25%? Less? I think it’s HIGHLY unlikely it’ll get anywhere near zero. I’m guessing – with zero information to back it up – that somewhere in the region of 25-30% sounds reasonable. I guess we’ll see in the upcoming ONS results.]