Did God create the universe? If you ask any Icelander under the age of 25, no.
According to a poll by the atheist organization Icelandic Ethical Humanist Association, 93.9 percent of people in Reykjavik under 25 believe that the universe was created by the Big Bang—the theory that a convergence of hot and dense gases caused an explosion that expanded the universe. The other 6.1 percent of young people questioned in the poll, reported by Iceland Magazine, either thought the universe came about by other means or simply had no opinion.
Zero percent of people under 25 surveyed believed God created the universe.
Additionally, the poll found that 46.4 percent of Icelanders identify as religious, which according to Iceland Magazine is the “lowest figure to date.”
Of course, Iceland isn’t necessarily the land of atheists. The poll also found that only 11.8 percent of people in Reykjavik older than 55 identified as atheist; 80.6 percent say they are Christian. Outside of the Icelandic capital, though, people tend to be more religious. Between 77 and 90 percent of people surveyed outside of Reykjavík identified as Christian, while less than 10 percent said they were atheist.
The study reflects a similar change in America's religious landscape, according to data from a Pew Research Center poll published in May 2015. That study found that in 2014, the number of Americans who identified as Christians dropped by almost 8 percent—from 78.6 percent in 2007 to 70.4 percent.
The number of nonreligious Americans, which includes atheists, jumped from 16.1 percent in 2007 to 22.8 percent by 2014.
According to Iceland Magazine, the poll found that a significant percentage of Icelanders (72 percent) support complete separation of church and state.
If the U.S. figures continue to shift away from Christianity, perhaps voters will bring in a U.S. Congress that feels the same.
