Muslims third largest religious group in the State

Religion:Muslims are the third largest religious group in the country, census figures show.

Roman Catholicism remains the dominant religion with 3.68 million followers, an increase of 218,000 between 2002 and 2006.

The Church of Ireland, too, is growing with the number of followers increasing by 10,000 to 115,600.

However, Islam is one of the fastest growing faiths increas- ing by 13,400 to over 32,400.

There are now more Muslims than Presbyterians (20,600), Methodists (10,000) or other Christian groups (21,400).

The biggest increase of all was recorded among members of the Orthodox community which doubled in size to 20,800 between 2002 and 2004.

The overall changes, CSO officials say, have been clearly influenced by recent trends in migration.

A total of 186,300 people - representing 4.4 per cent of the population - reported having no religion. This is an increase of 34 per cent over the last four years.

A further 70,000 people did not answer the question.

A total of 92 per cent of Irish nationals said they were Roman Catholics, compared to 51 per cent for non-Irish nationals.

The religious grouping with the highest proportion of non-Irish followers was Orthodox (84 per cent), with its members coming mainly from Eastern Europe.

Muslims, with 68 per cent of its followers foreign nationals, were mainly of African and Asian extraction.

Despite an increase in the numbers of Roman Catholics, driven largely by people from Eastern Europe, its overall share fell from 88.4 per cent of all religious followers to 86.8 per cent.

It recorded the lowest proportional increase for any religion over the last four years with an increase of 6 per cent.

It was followed by the Church of Ireland, which recorded an 8.7 per cent increase.