Estonia
POPULATION 1,415,681
LUTHERAN 14.0 percent
ORTHODOX CHURCH 13.0 percent
OTHER CHRISTIAN 1.4 percent
JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES 0.3 percent
MUSLIM 0.1 percent
ANIMIST 0.1 percent
ATHEIST 6.1 percent
OTHER RELIGIONS 0.2 percent
RELIGIOUSLY INDIFFERENT OR UNDETERMINED 64.8 percent
Country Overview
Introduction
The Republic of Estonia is a small country in northern Europe on the coast of the Baltic Sea. To the north is the Gulf of Finland, to the east are Lake Peipus and Russia, and to the south is Latvia.
About 65 percent of the total population are ethnic Estonians. The second largest ethnic group is Russians (28 percent). Estonians belong to the Finno-Ugric linguistic family and have a language and ethnic identity different from their neighbors. Estonia was Christianized in the thirteenth century and became a part of Roman Catholic Europe until the Reformation when it converted to Lutheranism.
On 24 February 1918 Estonia declared itself independent from Russia. In 1940 Estonia was occupied by the Soviet Union. The Soviet state decimated the Estonian population through deportation and emigration, among other factors, leading to a loss of about a quarter of the total population. As a result of the several decades of Soviet occupation, with its atheist propaganda and hostility toward Christianity, most of the people became alienated from the church.
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