Differing Views on Social Issues and assisting poor people

Although the Catholic Church opposes abortion and marriage that is same-sex Catholics in Latin America are generally less conservative than Protestants on most of these social problems. An average of, Catholics are less morally opposed to abortion, homosexuality, synthetic way of contraception, intercourse outside of wedding, drinking and divorce alcohol than are Protestants.

The distinctions between Catholics and Protestants of all among these presssing dilemmas hold real even though accounting for quantities of religious observance. For instance, Protestants whom be involved in spiritual solutions one or more times a week are notably almost certainly going to oppose abortion and breakup – and considerably more prone to oppose homosexuality, intercourse away from marriage and alcohol consumption – than are catholics who attend mass at the very least regular. 2 These differing views on social problems might help explain why numerous former Catholics who’ve become Protestants state these were shopping for a church that “places greater value on residing a life that is moral (a median of 60%).

Both catholics and Protestants generally say it is incumbent on Christians to help the poor in their societies, but they give somewhat different answers on how best to achieve this goal across the region. Whenever asked what’s the many way that is important might help the bad and needy, Protestants tend to be more most most likely than Catholics to aim toward bringing the indegent to Christ, while Catholics tend to be more likely to state that performing charity work for poor people is primary.

Yet throughout the nations surveyed, a significantly greater share of Protestants than Catholics state that they by themselves or the church they attend participate in charity work – assisting people find jobs, supplying food and clothes for all those in need of assistance or arranging other community initiatives to aid the indegent. (To tinychat indir get more details, see Chapter 6.)

They are on the list of key findings in excess of 30,000 face-to-face interviews carried out across 18 nations and Puerto Rico because of the Pew Research Center between October 2013 and February 2014. The study encompasses almost all Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking nations and regions extending from Mexico through Central America to your tip that is southern of America. Due to fieldwork constraints and sensitivities linked to polling about faith, Cuba could never be included; it will be the only country that is spanish-speaking Latin America which was maybe not polled.

The study of Latin America is a component of a more substantial work, the Pew-Templeton worldwide Religious Futures project, which analyzes religious modification and its effect on communities all over the world. The international Religious Futures project is funded because of The Pew Charitable Trusts while the John Templeton Foundation.

The remaining with this Overview describes the main findings in increased detail and offers context that is additional you start with some evaluations with Hispanics staying in the usa.

Evaluations with U.S. Hispanics

Lots of the major habits revealed by this study mirror trends discovered among U.S. Hispanics, based on a 2013 Pew Research poll. The U.S. Hispanic populace (now about 54.1 million individuals) is bigger than the full total population in most but two Latin American nations – Brazil (195 million) and Mexico (113 million).

Almost 25 % of Hispanic grownups in the us were raised Catholic but have actually since kept the faith (24%), while simply 2% of U.S. Hispanics have changed into Catholicism after being raised an additional spiritual tradition or without any affiliation – a web drop of 22 portion points. The scale with this exodus is roughly on par with a few Latin US nations which also have seen high decreases within the share of grownups whom identify as Catholic, including Nicaragua (minus 25 percentage points), Uruguay (minus 22 points), Brazil (minus 20) and El Salvador (minus 19).

Like their counterparts in Latin America, numerous U.S. Hispanics have remaining Catholicism for Protestant churches. Protestants now take into account about one-in-five Hispanics in america (22%), approximately exactly like in Latin America (19%). In addition, a number that is substantial of in america (18%) describe their faith as atheist, agnostic or nothing in specific. That is significantly more than double the portion of Latin adults that are american8%) who will be consistently unaffiliated.

Spiritual Affiliations of Latin Us Americans and U.S. Hispanics

Although Catholicism’s historically principal place has weakened in present decades (see reputation for spiritual Change), it remains the bulk religion across most of Latin America. Catholics constitute a majority that is overwhelming more than two-thirds) of this adult populace in nine regarding the countries surveyed, ranging from 89per cent in Paraguay to 70per cent in Panama. these greatly Catholic countries, but, Protestants now really are a minority that is significant constituting almost 10% of this populace in each nation.

Catholics constitute between one-half and approximately two-thirds associated with populace in five associated with accepted places surveyed: Chile, Costa Rica, Brazil, the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico. Similarly, 55% of U.S. Hispanics are Catholic.

In three central countries that are american El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua – about 50 % of this populace is Catholic, while roughly four-in-ten adults describe on their own as Protestant.

Uruguay is the country that is only where in fact the percentage of grownups whom state they’ve been religiously unaffiliated (37%) competitors the share who identify as Catholic (42%). In addition, 15% of Uruguayans identify as Protestant. (See Religion in Uruguay.)