Malta

The Maltese archipelago of islands is centrally situated in the Mediterranean Sea. Its strategic location made it an important trading post and point of cultural interaction in antiquity, and various Christian and Muslim powers vied for possession of the islands until Malta's independence from Britain in 1964. Nevertheless, since St. Paul founded its church in the mid-first century, Malta has remained a predominantly Christian nation. Its constitution establishes Roman Catholicism as the state religion but guarantees freedom of religion to the approximately 5% of non-Catholics on the islands, which include Protestants (mostly British expatriates and tourists), Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, Muslims, Jews, and very small populations of Zen Buddhists and Baha'is.

Malta's Muslims currently number less than 1% of the total population of approximately 415,000, a mere ...