Religious revival in Romania: Between cohort replacement and contextual changes

During the first decade of post-communist transition, Romania registered an important religious revival (Muller 2004; Pollack 2001, 2003, 2004; Voicu 2007). Both, religious practices and beliefs have increased, Romanian population sharing the same level of religious beliefs as people from Poland or Ireland, while church attendance is the highest among Orthodox European countries (Halman/Draulans, 2006; Pollack/Pickel, 2009). Romanian case is not a special one, religious revival being reported in other communist societies as well (Pickel 2009a). However, the magnitude of change is very high as compared to other countries in the region (Voicu, 2007: 54). Moreover, in some cases, like Slovenia or Poland, the positive trend has reached a peak during the first years of transition, followed by a descending trend (Pickel 2009a: 117, 2009b: 18).