Religiousness of Young People in Poland as a Challenge to Catholic Education: Analyses Based on a Survey

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to perform a sociological and pastoral analysis of the religiousness of young people in Poland, which is a challenge to Catholic education. The authors analyse this issue based on the empirical study conducted in 2019 and 2020. The study employed an online survey questionnaire. The study included 1171 people, students in grades 7 and 8 of primary schools and of secondary schools in the Małopolskie and Podkarpackie Voivodships in Poland. The paper focuses on young people’s self-declarations concerning: the religion they profess, faith, affiliation with a religious community, a bond to the community, the respondents’ and their parents’ attending religious services, celebrations/masses and praying individually. It was regarded as important to determine the correlations between the self-declarations of affiliation with a religious community and self-declaration of the religion professed and between the self-declarations of faith and bond to a religious community and self-declaration of the religion professed. These issues are enriched with the respondents’ opinions on religion as a school subject. They provide an insight into not only the respondents’ religiousness but also a diagnosis of young people’s attitudes towards religion as a school subject. They allow for conclusions to be drawn on Catholic education in the secularising society, especially with young people increasingly often quitting religious lessons in schools.