Hawzah News Agency –Christianity has been the world’s most popular Abrahamic religion since its emergence over two thousand years ago, but it will lose its place to Islam at end of the 21st century according to the Pew Research Center.

At the beginning of the 20th century, Christianity had the largest number of followers numbering nearly 560 million while there were 200 million Muslims at the time. In 1900, Christians represented 34 percent of the global population while Muslims constituted 12 percent of all faiths across the globe.

But that margin between Christian and Muslim populations dramatically changed throughout the 20th century in favour of Islam as it became the fastest growing religion across the world. That trend has continued into the 21st century, according to the Pew Research Center.

By 2050, “the number of Muslims will nearly equal the number of Christians around the world,” if current population growth trends continue, Pew found in 2015. If it happens, for the first time in history, both faiths will have equal standing.

“Indeed, Muslims will grow more than twice as fast as the overall world population between 2015 and 2060 and, in the second half of this century, will likely surpass Christians as the world’s largest religious group,” said another study in 2017.