Agnosticism and People Without Religion in Brazil

The “No Religion” in Government Censuses of Population in Brazil

Over the period of governmental censuses of the population carried out in Brazil, in the question about citizens’ religion, a growth of what has been called “no religion” has been noted. From 0.5% in 1960, 0.8% in 1970, 1.6% in 1980, 4.8% in 1990, 7.4% in 2000, the figure reached 8% in 2010. This corresponds to 15.3 million of the population of Brazil. “No religion” is a category created by census makers to allocate responses that did not express religious adherence, but which, since the 1990 Census, has become a theme that mirrors the existence of a relevant social segment (Nicolini 2017). Nonetheless, it would be a mistake to contend that this means a growth of atheism in the country (Rodrigues 2012). Of these 15.3 million, only 615,000 declared themselves atheists (0.32%) and 124,000 agnostics (0.07%) (Novaes 2013).

They are mostly young people with an average age of 26. And although the number of “no religion” was 8%...