Muslim Life in Germany - Deutsche Islam Konferenz

30 Introduction
unwilling or unable to provide any information about their
religious persuasion and 11 per cent stated that they belong to a
different Islamic orientation.
However, only those persons in the sample who expressly
called themselves Muslims were considered. As this procedure
excluded non-religious (former) Muslims from the survey, it can
be assumed that the results of the survey are distorted towards
a greater importance of religion. This restriction also means
that it is no longer possible to compare Muslims with the non-
Muslim resident population, including people without any religious
affiliation. Furthermore, the sample was drawn according
to language groups including Turkey, Bosnia, Arabia and Iran
as regions of origin. Muslims with a different migration background
were not considered.
In terms of content the Religionsmonitor and its special
study “Muslimische Religiosität in Deutschland” concentrated
on studying six key dimensions of religiousness as defined by
sociology of religion. They cover the areas of intellect (interest
in religious subjects), faith, public practice (e.g. community
prayer), private practice (e.g. prayer, meditation), religious experience
and consequences (general everyday relevance of religion).
In the analyses a centrality index is established to enable
a distinction between extremely religious people, religious people
and non-religious people. The authors of the Bertelsmann
study (2008b) conclude that Muslims in Germany clearly differ
from the general population surveyed in the Religionsmonitor.
However, the greater religiousness is not linked to a stronger
dogmatism or fundamentalism. Instead, the study paints a picture
of relatively pragmatic handling of religion in everyday life