Religion
Iraq has many devout followers of its religions. In 1968 the Iraqi constitution established Islam as the official religion of the state as the majority of Iraqis (97%) are Muslim (predominantly Shīʻah but also including minority Sunni).
In addition to Islam, many Iraqi people are Christians belonging to various Christian denominations, some of which are the Chaldean Catholic Church (Chaldean Christians), the Syriac Orthodox Church, and the Assyrian Church of the East. Their numbers inside Iraq have dwindled considerably and range between 500,000 and 800,000; around 2% of the population.
Other religious groups include Mandaeans, Shabaks, Yazidis and followers of other minority religions. Furthermore, Jews had also been present in Iraq in significant numbers historically, but their population dwindled, after virtually all of them fled to Israel between 1949 to 1952.
Read more about this topic: Iraqi People
Famous quotes containing the word religion:
“In this great association we know no North, no South, no East, no West. This has been our pride for all these years. We have no political party. We never have inquired what anybody’s religion is. All we ever have asked is simply, “Do you believe in perfect equality for women?” This is the one article in our creed.”
—Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906)
“Our religion vulgarly stands on numbers of believers. Whenever the appeal is made—no matter how indirectly—to numbers, proclamation is then and there made, that religion is not. He that finds God a sweet, enveloping presence, who shall dare to come in?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Those to whom God has imparted religion by feeling of the heart are very fortunate and are rightly convinced. But to those who do not have it, we can give it only by reasoning, waiting for God to give it by feeling of the heart—without which faith is only human and useless for salvation.”
—Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)