During the Ottoman rule, the majority of Albanians converted to the Muslim affiliation (Sunni and Bektashi). However, decades of state atheism which ended in 1991 brought a decline in religious practice in all traditions.
A recent Pew Research Center demographic study put the percentage of Muslims in Albania at 79.9%. However, the Albanian government gives the percentages of religious affiliations with only 38% Muslim, 16% Eastern Orthodox, 17% Catholic and 25% atheist or nonreligious.
Famous quotes containing the words islam in and/or islam:
“The exact objectives of Islam Inc. are obscure. Needless to say everyone involved has a different angle, and they all intend to cross each other up somewhere along the line.”
—William Burroughs (b. 1914)
“During the first formative centuries of its existence, Christianity was separated from and indeed antagonistic to the state, with which it only later became involved. From the lifetime of its founder, Islam was the state, and the identity of religion and government is indelibly stamped on the memories and awareness of the faithful from their own sacred writings, history, and experience.”
—Bernard Lewis, U.S. Middle Eastern specialist. Islam and the West, ch. 8, Oxford University Press (1993)