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Yugoslavia Demography and Distribution
The distribution of Yugoslavia's major religions followed the
country's internal borders only roughly. Serbia and Montenegro
were under the ecclesiastical authority of the Serbian Orthodox
Church. Macedonia had its own Macedonian Orthodox Church after
1967, but that republic also included many Muslim ethnic
Albanians. Croatia and Slovenia were predominantly Roman
Catholic, but many Orthodox Serbs also lived in Croatia, and the
Muslim Slav and ethnic Albanian populations of Slovenia were
growing. Bosnia and Hercegovina contained a mixture of Muslim
Slavs, Orthodox Serbs, and Catholic Croats. Vojvodina had
significant numbers of Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and
Protestant believers; Kosovo was predominantly Muslim, although
about 10 percent of the province's ethnic Albanians were Roman
Catholic and virtually all its Serbs were Eastern Orthodox.
Besides Eastern Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism, and Islam,
about forty other religious groups were represented in
Yugoslavia. They included the Jews, Old Catholic Church, Church
of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints, Hare Krishnas, and
other eastern religions. Major Protestant groups were the
Calvinist Reformed Church, Evangelical Church, Baptist Church,
Methodist Church, Seventh-Day Adventists, Jehovah's Witnesses,
and Pentecostal Church of Christ.
The connection between religious belief and nationality posed
a special threat to the postwar Communist government's official
policies of national unity and a federal state structure.
Although postwar constitutions provided for separation of church
and state and guaranteed freedom of religion, church-state
relations in the postwar period were often tense when the
government attempted to reduce church influence. From 1945 to the
early-1950s, the authorities carried out antichurch campaigns
that imprisoned, tortured, and killed many members of the clergy.
The government subsequently established a general policy of
rapprochement, but until the 1980s the state still exerted
pressure on many religious communities. Yugoslavs who openly
practiced a religious faith often were limited to low-paying,
low-status jobs. After Tito's death in 1980, the Yugoslav
government no longer pursued a consistent policy toward the
country's churches. After that time, each republic and province
followed policies toward religion that were acceptable at home
but sometimes unacceptable in other parts of the country.
Political liberalization in the late 1980s brought
Yugoslavia's religious communities a level of freedom
unprecedented in the postwar period. The spring of 1990 marked
the beginning of a religious revival throughout the country. On
Easter 1990, television stations throughout the country covered
Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic services for the first time;
two weeks later, Belgrade television broadcast prayers marking
the end of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month. With the rebirth of
Western-style democracy in Yugoslavia, fundamental amendments
were expected in laws banning church involvement in politics,
education, social and interethnic affairs, and military training.
Religious belief declined significantly in Yugoslavia after
World War II, but the drop was not uniform throughout the
country. In the censuses of 1921 and 1948, religious believers
accounted for over 99 percent of the population. Secularization
followed closely the postwar government programs of
modernization, urbanization, and vigorous antireligious
propaganda. A 1964 survey (Yugoslavia's last nationwide study of
religion through 1990) described 70.3 percent of Yugoslavs as
religious believers. The areas with the highest percentage of
religious believers were Kosovo (91 percent of the population)
and Bosnia and Hercegovina (83.8 percent); those with the lowest
were Slovenia (65.4 percent), Serbia (63.7 percent), and Croatia
(63.6 percent). Although hard figures were not available, in the
late 1980s signs indicated a resurgence of religious belief,
especially among young people.
Data as of December 1990
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