Islam is the main religion in Kyrgyzstan and the constitution guarantees freedom of religion.
Kyrgyzstan is a multicultural and multi-religious country with Islam, Buddhism, Baháʼí, Christianity (including Russian Orthodox Church, Catholic Church, Seventh-day Adventist Church and Jehovah's Witnesses), Judaism, and other religions all having a presence in the country. Muslims constitute the main religious group in Kyrgyzstan with about 90% of the population as of 2017.
Religious demography
Islam is the most widely held faith. The CIA World Factbook estimates that as of 2017, 90% of the population is Muslim, with the majority being Sunni. According to SARA, as of May 2007 there were 1,650 mosques, of which 1,623 were registered. There also were seven institutes for higher Islamic teaching.
According to a survey by World Values Survey, in 2019, 90.7% of the population is Muslim, 7.1% is Christian, 0.3% believes in other religions, 6% has no religious affiliation, and 1.1% refused to answer or does not know.
The CIA Factbook estimates 7 percent of the population are Christian, including 3 percent Russian Orthodox. The country has 44 Russian Orthodox churches, 1 Russian Orthodox monastery for women, 1 parochial school and 1 purpose built Catholic church.
Other religious groups account for a very small percentage of the population. The Seventh-day Adventist Church operates 30 churches throughout the country. The Roman Catholics hold services mainly in family homes converted into churches, with the Talas church of St. Nicholas of Flüe being the first purpose built Catholic church in Kyrgyzstan and the sole exception. These churches are organised into 6 parishes with missionary priests serving as parish priests since there are currently no native Catholic priests in Kyrgyzstan. The small Jewish community operates one synagogue in Bishkek, and it organizes internal cultural studies and humanitarian services, chiefly food assistance for the elderly and persons with disabilities regardless of faith. One Buddhist temple known as "Chamsen" which exists since 1996 to serves the local small Buddhist community. There are 12 registered houses of worship for the Baháʼí Faith. In addition, there are 240 registered Protestant houses of worship. There is no official estimate of the number of atheists.
Islam is practiced widely throughout the country in both urban and rural areas. Russian Orthodoxy typically is concentrated in cities with a larger ethnic Russian population. Other religious groups more commonly practice in the cities where their smaller communities tend to be concentrated. There is a correlation between ethnicity and religion; primarily Muslim ethnic groups are Kyrgyz (73.5% of the whole population); Uzbeks (14.7%); and Dungans (1.1%); with Uyghurs and others in the remaining 5.2%. Ethnic Russians usually belong to either the Russian Orthodox Church or one of the Protestant denominations. However, some Christian pastors noted that the number of ethnic Kyrgyz converts to Christianity grew significantly during the year covered by this report. Religious practice in the south of the country is more traditional and devout than in the north part. Some scholars estimated the total number of Muslim background Kyrgyz converts to Christianity between 25,000Religion and the Secular State in Kyrgyzstan (Silk Road Studies website, 2020) to 50,000.BBC website, Kyrgyzstan keeps a tight grip on religion
Missionary groups operate freely in the country. SARA has registered missionaries from all over the world representing an estimated 20 religious groups and denominations. According to SARA, since 1996 it has registered 1,133 missionaries, of whom 263 were Muslim and the rest represented other, mostly Christian, religious groups. During the period covered by this report, there were 111 registered missionaries, of whom 80 were Christian and 31 were Muslim. Missionaries disseminating dogma inconsistent with the traditional customs of local Muslims are subject to expulsion. According to SARA, of the approximately 20 missionaries expelled since 1991, all represented various "totalitarian sects", groups the SCRA considered incompatible with the standard principles of traditional world religious groups.
Status of religious freedom
Legal and policy framework The Constitution and the law provide for freedom of religion; however, the Government restricted the activities of radical Islamic groups it considered to be threats to security. The Constitution provides for the separation of religion and state. The new Constitution, adopted on 30 December 2006, defines the country as a sovereign, unitary, democratic social state based on the rule of law; the previous Constitution had also defined the country as "secular". A 6 May 2006 decree recognized Islam and Russian Orthodoxy as "traditional religious groups".
Article 5 of the "Law On Religious Freedom and Religious Organizations" affirms that "the State does not interfere with the activity of religious organizations that adhere to established laws; does not allow for establishing advantages or restrictions of one religion over another; does not finance the activity of religious organizations and activity of propagating Atheism."
Article 8 of the Constitution prohibits the formation of political parties on religious and ethnic grounds, as well as activities of religious organizations that jeopardize the state, constitutional system, or national security. Article 85 of the Constitution provides the Constitutional Court with the authority to determine the constitutionality of a religious organization's activities.
The Government recognizes two Muslim holy days (Kurman Ait or Eid al-Adha, and Orozo Ait or Eid al-Fitr) and one Russian Orthodox holy day (Orthodox Christmas) as national holidays. The President and the Government send greetings to Muslims and Orthodox adherents on their major holy days, and the greetings are printed in the mass media.
Established in 1993, the Muftiate (or Spiritual Administration of Muslims of Kyrgyzstan-SAMK) is the highest Islamic managing body in the country. The Muftiate oversees all Islamic entities, including institutes and madrassahs, mosques, and Islamic organizations. The Mufti is the official head of the Muftiate and is elected by the Council of Ulemas, which consists of 30 Islamic clerics and scholars. A Muftiate-established commission reviews and standardizes Islamic educational literature printed and distributed in the country and reviews new books on Islamic themes prior to publication. The Muftiate has the authority to ban publications that do not meet the established standards, an initiative it started and the Government supports.
SARA is responsible under the law for promoting religious tolerance, protecting freedom of conscience, and overseeing the application of laws on religion. The President appoints the Director, and the Prime Minister appoints the deputies of the agency. In June 2006 SARA moved its offices to the city of Osh in the south to be closer to the more religious part of the country.
A 1997 presidential decree requires the registration of all religious organizations with the Ministry of Justice (MOJ), following approval from SARA. SARA can deny or postpone the certification of a particular religious group if SARA believes the proposed activities of that group are not religious in character. Unregistered religious organizations are prohibited from actions such as renting space and holding religious services, although many hold regular services without government interference.
Organizations applying for registration must have at least 10 members who are adult citizens and must submit an application form, organizational charter, minutes of an institutional meeting, and a list of founding members to SARA for review. SARA then provides a recommendation to the MOJ for approval or rejection of the registration application. Recommendation for rejection occurs when a religious organization does not comply with the law or is a threat to national security, social stability, interethnic and interdenominational harmony, public order, health, or morality. An applicant whose registration is denied may reapply and may appeal to the courts. The registration process with SARA is often cumbersome, taking a month to several years for completion. Each congregation must register separately.
If approved, a religious organization then must complete the registration process with the MOJ to obtain status as a legal entity, which is necessary to own property, open bank accounts, and otherwise engage in contractual activities. If a religious organization engages in commercial activity, it is required to pay taxes. In practice the MOJ has never registered a religious organization without prior approval by SARA. SARA reported that its staff continued to travel around the country to help unregistered religious entities prepare applications for registration.
According to SARA, there were 2,113 registered religious entities, including mosques, churches, foundations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) of a religious nature, and religious educational institutions. SARA identified 1,742 Islamic entities, 46 entities of the Russian Orthodox Church, and 304 other "nontraditional" houses of worship, including 2 Russian churches of "Old Belief", 3 Catholic churches, 1 synagogue, 1 Buddhist temple, and 297 Protestant churches (48 Baptist, 21 Lutheran, 49 Pentecostal, 30 Adventist, 35 Presbyterian, 43 "Charismatic", 49 Jehovah's Witnesses, and 22 "other" Protestant churches). According to SARA, there are 21 "other religious entities" including 12 Baháʼí centers, 21 religious centers of "other foreign confessions", 13 religious schools, and 7 religious foundations and unions.
Members of registered religious groups may fulfill alternative military service; it was reported in the press in 2005 that approximately three thousand persons apply annually.
Missionaries of various religious groups operate freely, although they are required to register. Since 1996 SARA has registered more than 1,133 foreign citizens as religious missionaries. All religious entities founded by a foreigner must re-register each year with SARA, although the process is much less cumbersome than the initial registration. Missionaries are only required to register with SARA once.
The 1997 Law on Religious Freedom and Religious Organizations forbids the teaching of religion (or Atheism) in public schools. In 2001 the Government instructed the SCRA to draw up programs for training clergy and to prepare methodologies for teaching about religious groups in public schools. These instructions came in response to concerns about the spread of Wahhabism and what the Government considered unconventional religious sects. The SCRA turned to a number of religious organizations for their ideas on introducing religious education; their reaction generally was negative, as they preferred to retain responsibility for the religious education of their adherents. SARA indicated that it was still developing a curriculum to teach about religious groups, in cooperation with the Ministry of Education and several academic institutions. An 9 August 2006 press report indicated that the Government planned to introduce religious education into the secondary school curriculum; however, there had been no implementation of this plan by the end of 2007. Under the auspices of the Muftiate, volunteers called Davatchi visited villages in the south to teach traditional Islamic values.
The Islamic University oversees all Islamic schools, including madrassahs, to develop a standardized curriculum and curb the spread of extremist religious teaching.