Religion in the Netherlands was dominated by Christianity between the 10th and 20th centuries. In the late 19th century, roughly 60% of the population was Calvinist and 35% was Catholic. Also, until The Holocaust, there was a noticeable Jewish minority. Since World War II, there has been a significant decline in Catholic and especially Protestant Christianity, with Protestantism declining to such a degree that Catholicism became the foremost form of the Christian religion. The majority of the Dutch population is secular; however, historic societal pillarisation (verzuiling) based on religious lines continue to influence parts of Dutch society. Relatively sizable Muslim and Hindu minorities also exist.
In 2015, Statistics Netherlands, the government institute that gathers statistical information about the Netherlands, found that 50.1% of the adult (18+) population declared no religious affiliation. Christians comprised 43.8% of the total population; by denomination, Catholicism was 23.7%, the members of the Protestant Church of the Netherlands were 15.5%, and members of other Christian denominations were 4.6%. Islam comprised 4.9% of the total population, Hinduism 0.6%, Buddhism 0.4%, and Judaism 0.1%. There are large geographic disparities between the concentration of Protestants and Catholics, mostly divided by the Grote Rivieren, while a high concentration of Calvinists live in a long strip of land known as the Bible Belt.
The Constitution of the Netherlands guarantees freedom of education, which means that all schools that adhere to general quality criteria receive the same government funding. This includes schools based on religious principles by religious groups. Three out of nineteen political parties in the States General (CDA, CU and SGP) are based upon Christian belief. Several Christian religious holidays are national holidays (Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, and the Ascension of Jesus). Atheism, agnosticism, and Christian atheism are on the rise and are widely accepted and considered to be non-controversial. Even among those who formally adhere to Christianity, there are high percentages of atheists, agnostics, and ietsists, since affiliation with a Christian denomination is also used in a way of cultural identification in various parts of the Netherlands.H. Knippenberg, "The Changing Religious Landscape of Europe", Het Spinhuis, Amsterdam 2005 Many Dutch people believe religion should not have a significant role in politics and education. Religion is also primarily considered a personal matter which should not be discussed in public.
In 2015, 82% of the Netherlands' population said they never or almost never visited a church, and 59% stated that they had never been to a church of any kind. Of all the people questioned, 24% saw themselves as atheist, an increase of 11% compared to the previous study done in 2006. Ietsism, or spirituality, is rising according to research done in 2015. In 2017 non-religious people were in the majority for the first time. Only 49% of people older than 15 years identified as religious, compared to 54% in 2012. The largest denomination was still Catholicism at 24%, while 5% identified with Islam. Because of the decline of Christianity, the CBS stopped making a distinction between different protestant groups, the last detailed distinction being that of 2019. The 2023-2024 European Social Survey found that 13% identified as Protestant and 11% as Catholic.
History
Antiquity: polytheism
The oldest data on the profession of religion by the inhabitants of the regions that are now the "Netherlands" are passed down by the Romans. Contrary to what ancient sources seem to suggest, the Rhine, which clearly formed the boundary of the Roman Empire, did not appear to form the boundary between residential areas of Celts and Germans. There were Germans south of it (Germani Cisrhenani) and many place names and archaeological finds indicate the presence of Celts north of the Rhine.
Between these Celtic and Germanic peoples, and later the Roman conquerors (romanization), a cultural exchange took place. The tribes adapted one another's myths and polytheistic deities, resulting in a synthesis of Germanic, Celtic, and Roman mythology. Gods such as Nehalennia, Hiudana and Sandraudiga are of indigenous (Celtic) origin, while gods such as Wodan, Donar and Frigg/Freija (see Freya) came from Germanic origin. Others, such as Jupiter, Minerva and Venus, were introduced by the Romans. Tacitus also described the creation myth of Mannus, a primitive man from which all Germanic tribes would have emerged. The Celts and Germans in the Low Countries had tree shrines, following the example of the Old Norse Yggdrasil, the Saxon Irminsul, and Donar's oak. Temples were probably only built during and after the romanization, and have been preserved in places such as Empel and Elst.
Middle Ages: Christianisation and theocentrism
From the 4th to the 6th century AD The Great Migration took place, in which the small Celtic-Germanic-Roman tribes in the Low Countries were gradually supplanted by three major Germanic tribes: the Franks, the Frisians and Saxons. Around 500 of the Franks, initially residing between the Rhine and the Somme, converted to Christianity following the conversion of their king Chlodovech. A large part of the area south of the Maas (Meuse) belonged from the early Middle Ages to 1559 to Archdeacon Kempenland, which was part of the Diocese of Tongeren-Maastricht-Luik (Liege). From the center of the diocese, successively the cities of Tongeren, Maastricht and Luik, this part of the Netherlands was probably Christianized.
According to tradition, the first Bishop of Maastricht, Servatius was buried in this city in 384, though only from Bishop Domitianus (ca. 535) is it established that he resided in Maastricht. However, it would take at least until 1000 AD before all pagan people were actually Christianized and the Frisian and Saxon religions became extinct, and elements of the extinguished pagan religions were incorporated into the Christian religion even after conversion. In the following centuries, Catholicism was the only mainstream religion in the Netherlands. In the 14th and 15th century, the first calls were heard for religious reform.
Early Modern Era: Reformation
The rebellious Netherlands that had united in the Union of Utrecht (1579) declared their independence from Spain in 1581, during the Eighty Years' War; Spain finally accepted this in 1648. The Dutch revolt was partially religiously motivated, as during the Reformation many of the Dutch had adopted Lutheran, Anabaptist, Calvinist or Mennonite forms of Protestantism. These religious movements were suppressed by the Spanish, who supported the Counter Reformation. After independence, the Netherlands adopted Calvinism as an informal state religion, but practiced a degree of religious tolerance towards non-Calvinists. It cultivated a reputation as a safe refuge for Jewish and Protestant refugees from Flanders, France (Huguenots), Germany and England.
There have always been considerable differences between orthodox and liberal interpretations of Calvinism, such as those between Arminianism and Gomarism in the 17th century and those between the Dutch Reformed Church (Nederlands Hervormde Kerk) and the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (Gereformeerde Kerken in Nederland) in the late 19th century, which even led to a denominational difference between hervormd and gereformeerd, though linguistically both mean "reformed". Catholics, who dominated the southern provinces, were not allowed to practice their religion openly. They were emancipated during the late 19th and early 20th century through pillarization, by forming their own social communities. In 1947, 44.3% belonged to Protestant denominations, 38.7% belonged to the Catholic Church, and 17.1% were unaffiliated. In 1940–45, 75-80% of Dutch Jews were murdered in The Holocaust by the Nazis.
Since 1880 the major religions began to decline as secularism, socialism and liberalism grew; in the 1960s and 1970s Protestantism and Catholicism began to decline at a rapid rate. The major exception is Islam, which grew considerably largely as a result of immigration. In 2013, a Catholic became queen consort.
Modern era: secularization, decline of Christianity, and growth of religious minorities
Secularization in the Netherlands started around 1880, and major religions began to decline after the Second World War. Religion lost its influence on Dutch politics between the 1960s and 1980s, resulting in liberal Dutch policy. The increasing trend towards secularism is countered by a religious revival in the Protestant Bible Belt, and the growth of Muslim and Hindu communities resulting from immigration and high birth rates. As a result of the declining religious adherence, the two major strands of Calvinism, the Dutch Reformed Church and the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands, together with a small Lutheran group began to cooperate, first as the Samen op weg Kerken ("Together on the road churches") and since 2004 as the Protestant Church in the Netherlands, a united Protestant church.Hans Knippenberg, "Secularization in the Netherlands in its historical and geographical dimensions," GeoJournal (1998) 45#3 pp 209-220. onlineTomáš Sobotka and Feray Adigüzel, "Religiosity and spatial demographic differences in the Netherlands" (2002) online During the same period, Islam increased from essentially nonexistent to 5% of the population. The main sources of Muslim immigrants include Suriname and Indonesia from decolonization, Turkey and Morocco as migrant workers, and Iraq, Iran, Bosnia and Afghanistan as refugees. In the early 21st century, religious tensions between native Dutch people and migrant Muslims was increasing. After the rise of politician Pim Fortuyn, who sought to defend the Dutch liberal culture against what he saw as a "backwards religion", Fortuyn: grens dicht voor islamiet, Volkskrant, 2002-02-09 stricter immigration laws were enacted. Religious tensions increased after the murders of Pim Fortuyn in 2002 by environmental extremist Volkert van der Graaf, and Theo van Gogh in 2004.
In December 2014, for the first time there were more atheists (25%) than theists (17%) in the Netherlands, with majorities of the population being agnostic (31%) or spiritual but not religious (27%). Secular humanism has a notable presence in the Netherlands, with research in 2003 indicating about 9.4% of the population expressing affinity with the movement.
Pluralism Slightly more than half (52.8%) of the respondents to a research study about humanism in 2003 were affiliated with no religious or philosophical movement at all. In contrast, 8% reported following more than one movement. This form of pluralism occurs in all religious and philosophical Dutch movements but is strongest among supporters of non-Western religions. 75% of Dutch Buddhists also affiliate with other religious or philosophical movements. Among followers of Hinduism in the Netherlands, this ratio is even higher, at 91%. On the other hand, followers of Western religions and humanism, as well as movements in the 'other' category were least likely to affiliate with more than one religious or philosophical movement.
Within Western movements, the people affiliating with humanism were most likely to also adhere to one or more other movements (47%). Most of these humanists adhere to Catholicism (27%), Protestantism (14%) or Buddhism (12%). Also 9% of Catholics, 6% of Protestants, and 50% of the Buddhists counting themselves as humanists, as well as 25% of Muslims, 55% of the Hindu, 19% of the Jews, and 15% of the supporters of a movement other than these listed.
Cults, sects and new religious movements