Religion
In 2001, the religions of the town's residents were recorded as 73.9% Christian, 0.8% Muslim, 0.7% Hindu, 0.3% Buddhist, 0.14% Sikh and 0.11% Jewish. 15.8% were recorded as having no religion, 0.6% had an alternative religion, while 7.7% did not state their religion.
There are a number of churches and other religious congregational buildings within the town of varying denominations.
All Saints' Church in the centre of Maidstone was the collegiate church of the College of All Saints built in 1395 next to the Archbishop's Palace. It is a landmark building within the town and is notable for being one of the largest and widest Parish Churches in England. It contains a monument to Sir Jacob Astley, the Royalist Civil War soldier and a memorial to Lawrence Washington, great-uncle of George Washington's great-great-grandfather that includes the stars and stripes in the family coat of arms The college, the church, the palace and the palace's tithe barn are all Grade I listed buildings.
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Famous quotes containing the word religion:
“A religion so cheerless, a philosophy so sorrowful, could never have succeeded with the masses of mankind if presented only as a system of metaphysics. Buddhism owed its success to its catholic spirit and its beautiful morality.”
—W. Winwood Reade (1838–1875)
“Ethics and religion differ herein; that the one is the system of human duties commencing from man; the other, from God. Religion includes the personality of God; Ethics does not.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)