Latest: Canadians Describe Jesus as Loving but Christianity as Judgmental, 3000-Person Survey Finds 2026

Shaila Visser looked at the first numbers and felt her heart sink. She is the National Director of Alpha Canada, and she told the Sharing Jesus webinar on 15 October 2026 that her first thought was plain and frightened: how are we ever going to reach people? The survey behind her had spoken to 3,000 Canadians, and what it found was not a simple story of faith fading away.

Canadians, it turned out, were far warmer toward Jesus than toward Christianity itself. The research, called Sharing Jesus, was carried out by Angus Reid Group for Alpha Canada and The Message Canada, and its findings were released on 15 October 2026. A report on the survey appeared on 2 November 2026, carrying the same striking contrast to a wider audience.

Canadians Describe Jesus as Loving but Christianity as Judgmental

Asked to describe Jesus, 76% of Canadians called him loving and 73% called him selfless, the survey found, according to the release from Alpha Canada. Asked to describe Christianity, the words flipped. A full 64% called Christianity judgmental, 57% called it controlling, and 55% called it divisive.

That gap is the heart of the study. Bill Hogg, President of The Message Canada, put it bluntly in the booklet that grew out of the research, as reported by Church for Vancouver. Canadian Christ followers, he wrote, must be mindful of the credibility gap between Jesus and Christianity.

The same survey found a country still hungry for meaning. About 64% of Canadians described themselves as spiritual, but in their own way, and 56% said they were open to spiritual or transcendent experiences. About 7 in 10 adults said they actively seek understanding and conversations about meaning, purpose, beliefs and spirituality.

Sharing Jesus Survey Canada Trust Before Theology

The most practical finding was about trust. A full 61% of Canadians said they would be likely to have a respectful and open conversation about the Christian faith with someone they trust, the release reports. That openness, the release stressed, does not mean a person plans to adopt a faith or agree with another person's beliefs.

The pattern was not the same in every part of Canada. Spiritual openness varied across the country, Hogg wrote in the Sharing Jesus booklet, as reported by Church for Vancouver. British Columbia showed stronger than average spiritual curiosity with low attachment to institutions, while Christianity was a familiar story for Albertans who were unsure where they stood.

Among non-Christians, the numbers drew a clear line between talking and attending. About 50% said they would be likely to have a respectful conversation about faith with someone they trust, Church for Vancouver reports, compared with only about a quarter who would attend a service if invited.

Yet contact is already common. About 81% of non-Christians know a practising Christian, and 67% have had at least one conversation about faith with a churchgoing Christian, Church for Vancouver reports. Most of those conversations happen in person, but the same report found most practising Christians feel ill-equipped to share their faith.

"We believe that everyone deserves a safe and welcoming space to explore life's questions. This data tells us this is what Canadians are looking for, and we want to support churches in creating that space."

Those are Visser's words from the release, and they carry the study's challenge in one line. The space has to feel safe before it feels persuasive, and the welcome has to come before the pitch. Churches that get that order wrong will hear the judgmental label in the survey and wonder why it sticks.

What Canadian Churches Do Next With Sharing Jesus Findings

Hogg offered hospitality as the answer to polarisation, not louder argument. Trust is earned through authentic relationships, he said in the release, and the antidote to polarisation is hospitality. He described it as welcoming honest questions, listening without defensiveness, and respecting people without pressuring them to agree.

The work will need to be done in seperate conversations, one trusted relationship at a time, rather than in one national campaign. A neighbour who trusts the person across the fence is more likely to talk about death, purpose and belief than a stranger with a leaflet.

Angus Reid Group ran the survey online from 10 to 18 February 2026, with a nationally representative sample of 3,000 Canadians aged 18 and older, the release states. The findings concern Canadian adults overall or non-Christians, as self-identified. Those limits matter, because a survey taken in February cannot speak for every shift since, and self-identification is not the same as church attendance.

Readers can follow a personal turn toward faith in Toluwanisings saying leaving Islam for Christianity was his best decision, and the call to prepare for growth in Blackburn Bishop Philip North calling Lancashire churches to prepare for growth. A turn to faith later in life is covered in Matt Barnes finding faith at 45 after an old church invitation, and worship that grew from pain in Chinwe Zoe saying pain taught her to worship.

Visser closed her part of the webinar with hope, not with a warning. She prayed, Church for Vancouver reports, that listeners would leave encouraged and filled with deep hope for how God is moving in Canada. The next test of that hope will not be another survey, but the next ordinary conversation, when a Canadian who loves Jesus and distrusts Christianity decides whether the Christian in front of them sounds like either one.

But the most surprising part of this story is yet to come — keep reading.