POPULATION 4,525,116
EVANGELICAL LUTHERAN 86 percent
OTHER PROTESTANT 2 percent
ROMAN CATHOLIC 1 percent
OTHER RELIGIONS (INCLUDING MUSLIM, JEWISH, BUDDHIST) 2 percent
NONE 9 percent

Country Overview

Introduction

The Kingdom of Norway is located on the western side of the rugged, mountainous Scandinavian Peninsula. It is bordered by the Norwegian and North Seas to the west, the Barents Sea to the north, and Sweden, Finland, and Russia to the east.

Norway came to Christianity rather late compared with much of the rest of Europe. Late in the Viking Age (c. 800–1050 C.E.), Anglo-Saxon Christian missionaries struggled to convert the residents from their belief in Norse gods. King Olav I (reigned 995–c. 1000), a Viking who embraced Christianity while in England, returned to Norway to Christianize his subjects. King Olav II (reigned 1015–30), later canonized Saint Olav, consolidated the whole of Norway into a single realm and converted the population to Christianity, by force when necessary, toward...