While Christianity is still the world's largest religion, that religion plays a smaller part in the lives of Canadians that claim it as their own. 

That's according to a new study from the Pew Research Center. The study sought to discover Christians' levels of commitment to their faith. Barely one-third of Christians in Canada attend worship services regularly, pray daily, or view their faith as an important part of their lives, according to the study.

The study was conducted in 84 countries "with sizable Christian populations," according to Pew.

When asked if their religion was important in their lives, only 39% of Canadian Christians responded in the affirmative.

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It's all part of what Pew calls "Christianity's 'march southward' from wealthy countries to developing ones. This phenomenon is particularly evident in sub-Saharan Africa, where Christianity is rapidly growing, largely due to high fertility rates."

The research also discovered that a large majority of Christians in Canada do not pray daily, or attend worship services weekly.

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Those numbers are especially higher in younger Christians, and not just in Canada.

Pew says their research showed that younger Christians are typically less committed to their faith, or feel it plays an important part in their life.

And when it comes to the correlation between age and faith being less important to young people, further research found that it's a common occurrence across all religions. 

African countries lead in commitment

Only 12 per cent of Christian adults in Germany and 11 per cent in the United Kingdom say religion is very important in their lives.

However, Africa has astounding numbers of commitment to faith.

Ethiopia has a staggering rate of 98 per cent of Christians who say religion is important to them.

Ghana and Nigeria follow at 89 per cent and 82 per cent respectively.

Latin America also has impressively high numbers. Bot areas also have very high percentages of Christians who practice prayer daily and attend worship services weekly.