Earlier this summer, on World Population Day, we explained that half of the world’s population lives in just six countries. In many cases, the world’s major religious groups are even more concentrated, with half or more of their followers living in one or a handful of countries. For several years, demographers at the Pew Research Center have been studying the demographic characteristics of eight groups: Buddhists, Christians, adherents of folk religions, Hindus, Jews, Muslims, the religiously unaffiliated and followers of other religions. While Christians and Muslims are more widely distributed around the world, the other groups have a majority of their populations in just one or two nations, according to 2010 estimates from our Global Religious Landscape report.More maps are at the link.
While there continues to be much attention paid to the growth of the religiously unaffiliated population in Europe and North America, more than half (62%) of the world’s 1.1 billion unaffiliated people live in one Asian country: China. China also is home to 50% of the world’s 488 million Buddhists and 73% of the 405 million global adherents of folk religions. Since China is the world’s most populous nation, it may not be altogether unexpected that it has a lot of people in a variety of categories. While China accounts for 19% of the world’s overall population, it is home to majorities of all Buddhists, unaffiliated people and adherents of folk religions.
Pierce confirmed the video's details to the Huffington Post on Thursday, adding that he initially came out to his parents in October. But when his father, stepmother and grandparents attempted to stage a "delayed intervention" on Wednesday, things quickly went awry, which resulted in Pierce being attacked, disowned and thrown out of his house. "You're full of shit," Pierce's stepmother can be heard saying in the video. "You told me on the phone that you made that choice. You know you wasn't born that way. You know damn good and well you made that choice. You know that [your father] has done everything he can to raise you. ... He didn't need to blame himself." "Their reaction was pretty much expected [once] I chose to leave instead of pray because they have always been very vocal about not supporting the gay lifestyle," Pierce told the Huffington Post. "My [stepmother's] reaction was the most surprising and hurtful." Sadly, Pierce's story is not unique. While Pierce has confirmed that he is now safely staying with supportive friends and family members, there are many LGBT youths in America who face even more unfortunate circumstances. A 2012 study by UCLA's Williams Institute found that around 40% of homeless youths identify as LGBT, many of them having been rejected or abused by their family members over their gender or sexual orientation.While Pierce appears to be in safe hands now, countless other LGBT youth remain in peril. Please consider supporting the Ali Forney Center or a similar organization near you.
