Southern Ukraine
According to a 2016 survey of religion in Ukraine conducted by the Razumkov Center, around 65.7% of the population of southern Ukraine declared to be believers in any religion, while 7.4% declared to be non-believers, and 3.2% declared to be atheists and agnostics. the study also found that 77.6% of the total Southern Ukraine population declared to be Christians (71.0% Eastern Orthodox, 5.1% simply Christians, 0.5% Latin Rite Catholics, 0.53% members of various Protestant churches, 0.5% members of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church), and 0.5% were Jewish. Not religious and other believers not identifying with any of the listed major religious institutions constituted about 24.7% of the population.
History of Christianity in Ukraine
Statistics on the number of parishes may be more reliable and consistent, even though they may not necessarily directly translate into the numbers of adherents. By number of parishes and quantity of church buildings, the UOC(MP)'s strong base is central and northernwestern Ukraine. However, percentage wise (with respect to rival Orthodox Churches) its share of parishes there varies from 60 to 70 percent. At the same time, by percentage alone (with respect to rival Orthodox Churches) the UOC(MP)'s share of church buildings peaks in the urban russophone southern and eastern Ukrainian provinces, being as high as 90%. The same can be said about Transcarpathia, although there the UOC(MP)'s main rival is the Greek Catholic Church and thus its share of "total" church buildings is only 40%. The capital Kiev is where the greatest Orthodox rivalry takes place, with the UOC(MP) holding about half of the Orthodox communities there. The only place where the UOC(MP) is a true minority, in both quantity, percentage and support are the former Galician provinces of Western Ukraine. There the total share of parishes does not exceed more than five percent. The UOC(MP) does not have any parishes abroad, as its followers identify themselves under the same umbrella as those of the Russian Orthodox Church.