IMPORTING THE SUPERIOR CULTURE:

As in many western countries, the share of Canadian citizens who call themselves Christian is in long-term decline. Those who profess "no religion" (which does not necessarily mean an indifference to the spiritual) is rising. But compared with people born in Canada, newcomers to the country are much more likely to practise a faith, regardless of whether they were devout back in the homeland. Young immigrants are more inclined to engage in regular worship than their parents. And whatever they believe or practise, new Canadians seem to have a more positive attitude towards religion than longer-established ones. A poll commissioned this summer by Cardus, a think-tank, found that 57% of immigrants thought religion-based organisations had a good effect on society, while only 36% of Canadians in general held that view.

The results of all this are tangible in Vancouver, a port that attracts upwardly-mobile migrants from across the Pacific as well as Canadians from farther east who may be searching for a less conventional lifestyle. The city's Catholic churches are now packed. At popular mass times, it is hard to find room to sit or kneel. But the sermon will probably be in Tagalog, the language of the Philippines.  

Without the influx of pious Filipinos, it would be a different story. According to Pavel Reid of the Catholic archdiocese of Vancouver, the church would be closing parishes (as is the case elsewhere in Canada) were it not for the new arrivals from a land which is 80% Catholic. "Fifty years ago it was common to set up 'ethnic' parishes...but every parish is a Filipino parish now," he says.

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