The decline of religion in Toronto?
A city like Toronto, rich in multiculturalism and diversity, is bound to be the home of many different religions and houses of worship. However, since 1985 there has been a rise in Torontonians stating that they have no religious affiliations at all. Does this mean that houses of worship in Toronto are suffering a decline in members?
Peter Nojd, a youth pastor of six years at Long Branch Baptist Church in Etobicoke-Lakeshore, says that while there is a rise in people claiming no religious affiliations within Toronto, his church is not suffering. “We’ve stayed pretty consistent in the time that I’ve been here,” says Nojd, “There was a little bit of a dip for a while, but we’ve always been around 125–150 members of the church and at our lowest point we were maybe at 100.”
Long Branch Baptist Church is 102 years old, and has only changed location by a couple of blocks since its opening. Nojd describes the congregation as very multi-ethnic, and that there is a slightly larger amount of older people as opposed to younger. Most of the church’s members have deep roots there. Attending the church is a longstanding tradition that many generations follow. Nojd says, “our congregation is really multigenerational. The same families have been coming here forever.”
The church also has activities throughout the week that people outside of the congregation can attend. There are youth groups, and clothing outlets run from the church. Nojd says that activities like these attract groups, such as immigrants new to Toronto, and that while not everyone who attends will end up coming to church on Sunday morning, some of them do.
“People who have just moved in the area maybe aren’t specifically looking for a church, but they’re looking for a place where they can meet people and get involved in something”, says Nojd, “Not all of the people we see at things like the clothing outlet will come back but there are some who we see again.”
Imam Dr. Wael Shehab of Masjid Toronto in the middle of Downtown says that he feels the community of Muslims who attend Masjid Toronto is thriving. “We have all kinds of Muslims visit us everyday,” says Shehab, “We’re centrally located in the city so people come for the daily prayers.”
Like Long Branch Baptist Church, Masjid Toronto makes an effort to reach out to people in the area. “We also hold events for the Muslim community we also have a children’s school on the weekends. We welcome all Muslim and non-Muslim.” Shehab does not feel as if Masjid Toronto is suffering any losses due to people not affiliating with religion, stating “our community has grown. More and more people come here.”
Though there has been a drop in people claiming religious affiliation in Toronto, many different houses of worship seem to operate steadily despite the decline and all regions are bountiful in different religions. Students of Humber College who live all over Toronto, also claim to be of many different faiths. One student living in Etobicoke identifies as Islamic, but worships at home. Another with no affiliation says they live in a condominium with diverse ethnicities and religions, and a Christian student living in the Jane and Wilson area says that there is an equal representation of religions the area of his home.
Some say that the drop in religious affiliations in Canadian society is good. In response to an editorial from The Toronto Star, about pulling children out of schools during the teaching of the new sex-ed curriculum, many posted their negative feelings towards the act to The Toronto Star’s opinion page. Gilda Berger from Toronto says “It should be a grave concern to all Canadians that these parents are using religion in order to deny their children the exposure to Canadian views that will help their children to counter the bigoted education that their families and places of worship are giving them”.
Others, however, think that due to the growing lack of interest in religion that people, specifically youth, are becoming uninformed. Another Toronto Star article entitled “Canada adrift in religious world”, written by James Ron in 2010, speaks on this. He argues that due to a very secular society, many students know nothing about any form of religion or culture and that they are therefore becoming ignorant to the ways of people around the world and within their community who are not like them. He states, “In the superb graduate program where I now teach, Canada’s finest global affairs students seem virtually illiterate when it comes to their own religion, or to the religions of others. Although they eagerly achieve competence in secular politics, they express little interest in learning the basics of Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism or Judaism.”
It appears that while there are many who do not affiliate with religion, and think that a completely secular society is appropriate, there are also many people who still believe in the importance of religion and its role in society. Houses of worship like Long Branch Baptist Church, and Masjid Toronto still having steady congregations and followers, in a time where religious affiliation is on the decline only prove that religion is something that will always be important to some people, even though the decline itself shows that that number of people is gradually growing smaller.
(Written April 2016)
