Over 40% of the public students of Vienna, the capital of Austria — once a celebrated center of art, culture, and music, and the capital of the Christian Holy Roman Empire — are now Muslim.
Conversely, only 17% percent are Catholic — even though Catholicism is Austria’s historic religion and once accounted for nearly 100% of the populace’s religion.
This demographic change was recently brought up to* Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, *Archbishop of Vienna from 1995 to 2025. He was 𝕏asked by a reporter:
Islam is the largest religion among Vienna’s schoolchildren. Does that worry you?
Schönborn’s response:
Whoever has the children, has the future. That’s my simple answer.
This is true. What remains to be seen — or said — is what *kind *of children will make for a sizeable chunk of Vienna’s future? Previous reports are not encouraging.
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