Åtta röster om kristendomens framtid
med utgångspunkt i Österbotten
The future of Christianity is something that has been, and still is, discussed all over the world. Atthe first sight it can look like this religion, that has former been so big all over Europe, isdiminishing. More and more people are leaving the church and the church-benches are very seldomfilled. In our society it is the individual that is important and the moral life is changing. But, this donot still have to be the end of Christianity, which some people believe. Even if Christianity as amyth would disappear or become weakened, it does not mean that the religion is completely gonefrom people?s lives. In this essay I will look at the future of Christianity in my home-areaOstrobotnia, in Finland. I have interviewed priests and ministers in the Lutheran Church and thePentecostal Church about Christianity as it is now and what we can expect from the future. Theessay starts with earlier studies and expectations of the future of Christianity in different areas of theworld and then in the result-part later I put the focus on the Christianity in Ostrobotnia, Finland. Itis not possible to surely say what the future for this religion will be like, but from this essay I wantto show the thoughts and expectations of the people today ? to make it possible for people later onto go back to this essay and see if the expectations of 2010 and 2011 became true or not.