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Christianity is the largest group of religions of France, but has recently stopped being a majority of the overall population. According to a survey held by Institut français d'opinion publique (Ifop) for the centre-right Institut Montaigne think-tank, 51.1% of the total population of France was Christian in 2016. [40]
Since 1905, France has had a law requiring separation of church and state, prohibiting the state from recognizing or funding any religion. Schools directly operated by the national or local governments must not endorse or promote any religious dogma (whether endorsing an existing religion or endorsing atheism or any other philosophy).
Freedom of religion in France is guaranteed by the constitutional rights set forth in the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. From the conversion of King Clovis I in 508, the Roman Catholic faith was the state religion for a thousand years, as was the case across Western Europe .
Looting of a church during the Revolution, by Swebach-Desfontaines (c. 1793). The aim of a number of separate policies conducted by various governments of France during the French Revolution ranged from the appropriation by the government of the great landed estates and the large amounts of money held by the Catholic Church to the termination of Christian religious practice and of the religion ...
Article 1 of the French Constitution is commonly interpreted as the separation of civil society and religious society. It discourages religious involvement in government affairs, especially in the determination of state policies as well as the recognition of a state religion.
[citation needed] The King of France was known as "His Most Christian Majesty". Following the Protestant Reformation, France was riven by sectarian conflict as the Huguenots and Catholics strove for supremacy in the Wars of Religion until the 1598 Edict of Nantes established a measure of religious toleration.
Protestantism in France has existed in its various forms, starting with Calvinism and Lutheranism since the Protestant Reformation. John Calvin was a Frenchman, as were numerous other Protestant Reformers including William Farel , Pierre Viret and Theodore Beza , who was Calvin's successor in Geneva .
History of religion in France (8 C, 2 P) I. Islam in France (8 C, 27 P) J. Judaism in France (4 C, 11 P) L. French religious leaders (14 C, 12 P) M.