Does religiosity make society more cohesive? A new German study indicates that religiously religious and religiously active people contribute to social cohesion to a greater extent than non-religious people.
This is what the new “Religions Observatory” report issued by the Bertelsmann Foundation shows. However, clear differences appear between religious sects. According to the study, the connection to society decreases significantly among Muslims, unlike followers of other religions, as their degree of religiosity increases.
The Bertelsmann Foundation's Religion Observatory report has been in existence for nearly 20 years. The report focuses mainly on different forms of religiosity and their impact on society. Since then there have been changes in the religious affiliation of Germans.
According to data from the two major churches, approximately 44 percent of Germans in 2025 still belong to the Catholic Church or the Evangelical Church. According to Bertelsmann's report, more than a third of Germans do not belong to any religious sect. The number of Muslims amounts to up to eight percent of Germans.
Over the past ten years, the number of Orthodox or Christians belonging to the Free Churches in Germany has increased, reaching several million in each category. There are smaller groups of Jews, Hindus and Buddhists. Germany has become less religious than it was ten or twenty years ago. But it has become more religiously diverse.
Stronger social relationships, however?
The Religion Observatory first highlights general social cohesion in Germany regardless of religious affiliation. The main indicators of this are the importance of social cohesion and concern for the public good, for example through personal involvement and connection to the local community. For the purposes of this representative survey, just over 5,200 people between the ages of 18 and 94 were surveyed in March 2026.
The years of the Corona pandemic have shown that the importance of social cohesion is not a constant. According to the study, those years caused a sharp decline in social cohesion indicators until 2023. Since then, social cohesion has improved again and is now again approaching the levels recorded until 2020.
However, it is noteworthy that only the values related to social relations and focus on the public good have witnessed a noticeable improvement at the level of society as a whole. On the other hand, the feeling of connection to society has not changed.
The report states verbatim: “Trust in the German government and a sense of justice are among the most vulnerable aspects.” This shows an “ongoing crisis of confidence” towards the political forces responsible for running the country, which also includes “a sense of injustice that has become particularly acute at the present time.”
Experts: Religiosity is a factor of cohesion
Experts concluded that religion represents an “important factor” promoting social cohesion, but its potential is not equally evident in all religious communities.
The study showed that social cohesion indicators increased for Catholics and Protestants as their degree of religiosity increased. But the picture is different for Muslims, as the connection with society was particularly low among very religious Muslims, male and female.
While the least religious or not at all religious Muslims scored 46 points regarding connection to the local community, and the moderately religious ones scored 42 points, the score for very religious Muslims did not exceed 28 points.
The study points to discrimination, lack of societal recognition and limited institutional representation as possible reasons for this. It is not a matter of withdrawal from society, but rather an erosion of trust in state institutions.
Muhannad Khorshid, dean of the Faculty of Islamic Religious Sciences at the University of Münster, told DW that this finding "must be taken seriously." But he criticizes the study's interpretation of this result, considering that it focuses on one reason: discrimination and lack of societal recognition, an interpretation he sees as one-sided.
He adds that the study did not examine another factor that he considers no less important, which is the influence of “ideological religious narratives that are often based on an Islamic background.”
Khorshid believes that these narratives portray the state, democracy, and majority society as alien or hostile to “true” Islam. Such narratives undermine trust in institutions.
Khorshid warns against the “victim narrative”
Khorshid talks about the narrative of the “Muslim victim” that has long since become self-contained as this “view” is adopted by many without even having a concrete experience with discrimination.
Khorshid notes, “When the victim narrative replaces reality, it creates precisely the same state of distrust that was ignored in the study.”
Khurshid refers to the Islamic religious sciences approach, as taught in Münster. It is based on the fact that faith and belonging to society are not incompatible.
It calls for confronting the “victim position” with an attitude based on responsibility and the ability to influence and make change. The researcher in Islamic studies believes that this is more effective than limiting the discussion to the issue of societal recognition.
Prepared in Arabic by: M.A.M
