The 2011 census results were released today with some fairly unexpected statistics for religion in Exeter;
According to the results Exeter has the second highest Satanist to population ratio in the UK.
The city had a total 0.0125% of the 117,773 population register their religion as Satanism second only to Bolsover in Derbyshire with 0.022%.
The results of the census also show that Exeter has the 6th highest concentration of Agnostics with 145 registering and the highest amount of No Religion registered in Devon with a total of 39,996.
In relation to this Exeter has the lowest population percentage registered as Christian in Devon with 53.9% compared to 62.8% in Torridge and 58.1% in Plymouth.
In the South West there was a decrease of 12% in the proportion of people who stated their religious affiliation as 'Christian', as in most regions of England and Wales between 2001 and 2011. In 2011, 60% of residents in this region were Christian.
Results from the Census have shown Jedi is still the most practised of the "other" religions in England and Wales.
The Star Wars based belief became a religion in 2001 after the last census revealed that 390,127 people had listed it as their religion following a campaign.
The latest official population survey of people in England and Wales found 176,632 people still practise Jedi, followed by paganism (56,620), spiritualism (39,061) and gnostic (32,382). 6,242 people said heavy metal was their religion.
The number of people following scientology in the UK increased from 1,781 in 2001 to 2,418 in 2011.
See below for a rundown of religion statistics in Exeter taken from the 2011 census results:
Exeter total population: 117,773
Christian: 63,486 – 53.9%
No Religion: 40,862 – 34.7% (including Agnostic: 145, Atheist: 106, Heavy Metal: 26, Humanist: 42, Jedi Knight: 547)
Religion not stated: 9,529 - 8.1%
Muslim: 1,855 – 1.6%
Buddhist: 683 – 0.6%
Hindu: 372 – 0.3%
Sikh: 155 – 0.1%
Jewish: 155 – 0.1%
Other: 671 – 0.6%
Other religions include:
Pagan: 200
Mixed religion: 80
Rastafarian: 27
Believe in God: 9
Deist: 9
Own belief system: 7
Witchcraft: 6
Druid: 5
Scientology: 3
Church of all religion: 1
Video: Office for National statistics on the UK religion results:
Keep checking thisisexeter.co.uk for updated results of the 2011 census in Exeter.
