One third of 15- to 24-year-olds cannot say where Jesus was born or what the Christian Church celebrates at Easter, according to an opinion poll published today.
The poll was commissioned by the Iona Institute, a new Catholic-led pro-marriage organisation, and the Evangelical Alliance of Ireland, a cross-denominational movement that seeks to relate the Christian gospel to modern life.
In December and January, Lansdowne Market Research interviewed a representative sample of 946 people in the Republic.
The 15- to 24-year-olds were also more than twice as ignorant as the pensioners when it came to naming the Holy Trinity, with 53% of the younger group failing to answer correctly.
But the younger group outscored the older one by 48% to 44%when it came to naming the first book of the bible.
Sean Mullan of the 35,000-strong Evangelical Alliance said the data - along with answers to six other questions - show that the notion of Ireland having a Christian culture is becoming a thing of the past.
