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In post-communist Europe, we are currently privy to an unprecedented rise in the number of Catholic believers. It is a reaction against a half-century of forced atheism in some pretty backward social settings. They even banned Christmas for fourty years, do you imagine?
Of course the revival is hysterical and bigotted in nature, as revivals tend to be, and there have been some pretty far-out attempts at re-confirming Europe's Christian identity (my favourite is the attempt of the Polish parliament to elect Jesus king of their country), but they are all destined to fail since religion is always purely the matter of deep-rooted tradition and communal integration, and it's primary roles in the social structure have already been replaced by secular institutions.
The pelicularity which sets the USA apart from the EU is the fact that secularization never happened in your part of the globe, which is exactly why such a harsh and intellectualy harmful cultural war is being fought out. The reason why I have thrown myself directly into religious debate on these forums is that I have only recently come to grasp the magnitude of this acrimonious split in the american nation, having believed before that the 60s revolution was as good as the many twists and turns that have brought religion in a disadvantageous position on my own continent. But in fact, undereducation combined with the length and girth of the mideast/bible belt still seem to be eroding at your society's very core. Underinformation and the deregulation of the school system are familiar methods when it comes to theists vying for power, as are forced attempts at regimentalization of society. Frankly, I can't believe that atheism is actually something NEW in the 21st century, and that professing this worldview could actually lead to ostracism as early as three years ago. Or maybe I've gotten it wrong and atheism is emerging inan environment preconditioned by agnosticism and non-practitioning theists. But it still is a culture shock for someone who has fed on (obviously biased:P) countercultural material when attempting to learn more about your fascinating culture.
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