Muslims a Fourth of World’s Population

The internationality of Islam is emphasized by a new Pew Research study that found one in four people in the world to be Muslim. With 1.57 billion adherents, Islam ranks second only to 2.25 billion-strong Christianity. The study’s findings counter the disparaging, stereotyping notions that many in the West have of “the Muslim World.”  —JCL

The Guardian:

Islam may be most closely associated with the Middle East, where it emerged in Arabia in the seventh century, but today the region is home to only one in five of the world’s Muslims, according to a study of the religion’s global distribution.

The world’s Muslim population stands at 1.57 billion, meaning that nearly one in four people practise Islam, according to the US Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, which published the survey. This compares to 2.25 billion Christians.

The top five Muslim countries in the world include only one in the Middle East—Egypt—behind Indonesia, Pakistan, India and Bangladesh, in that order. Russia, the survey shows, has more Muslims than the populations of Libya and Jordan combined. Germany has more Muslims than Lebanon. China has a bigger Muslim population than Syria.

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Mosques, like this one in Paris, are common in almost all parts of the world.