A Pew Research Center study found that in most countries more adults leave the Catholic Church than enter the Catholic Church, but Catholics still make up the majority of the population in many of the countries analyzed.
Research released on April 23 found that Christianity has experienced the greatest loss of followers due to religious change, when people identify with a different religion from their childhood in adulthood, compared to other religious groups around the world.
US data in the report, “Catholicism has lost people to religious change in many countries, while Protestantism has increased in some,” The center’s 2023-24 U.S. comes from religious landscape study (RLS). International data comes from surveys conducted by Pew in spring 2024.
The percentage of adults in each country surveyed who reported that they were raised Catholic. | Credit: Photo courtesy of Pew Research Center
Global data in which 24 countries were analyzed Pew’s international survey Conducted via telephone or face-to-face interviews. Pew has conducted more than 800,000 interviews in more than 110 countries. The margin of sampling error is based on research from different countries.
Impact of religious change on Catholicism
Religious change has affected Catholicism and Protestantism, the two largest Christian subgroups, in different ways. In almost all countries surveyed, Catholicism lost more people than it gained, while Protestantism saw a net gain from religious change.
Despite losses from religious conversion, Catholics still make up the majority of the population in eight of the 24 countries surveyed by Pew, including Poland (92%), the Philippines (80%), Italy (69%), Mexico (67%), Peru (67%), Hungary (63%), Colombia (60%), and Argentina (58%).
In 12 of the 24 countries surveyed, the majority of the population was Catholic and many adults remain affiliated with the faith today. For example, 96% of Polish adults were Catholic. Of the group, 92% were still affiliated with the religion, with 4% reporting that they had left Catholicism.
Hungary also suffered a slight loss, with 57% of the population identifying as lifelong Catholics and only 2% reporting that they had left the church.
But overall, in 21 countries more people left Catholicism than joined it. The report states that those who leave Catholicism tend to join Protestantism or break away from the religion altogether.
Unaffiliation was found to be particularly common in parts of Europe and Latin America, including Chile, where 19% of former Catholic adults identify as atheists, agnostics, or “nobody”.
In comparison, in Kenya, Brazil, Ghana, Nigeria and the Philippines, former Catholics are more likely to join Protestantism than to become religious “non-believers”, the report said.
Other adults have left the church, with former Catholics making up 10% or more of the total population in 15 countries.
In Italy, 22% of adults said they were raised Catholic but no longer identify as such, and an additional 1% were not raised Catholic but attended the church. The country’s Catholic population experienced a net loss of 21% due to religious conversion.
In the United States, 30% of adults surveyed reported that they were raised Catholic and only 17% remained Catholic. An additional 2% who were not Catholic reported that they attended church, bringing the total to 19% of American adults who are Catholic.
Influence on other religions
Similar to Catholics, former Protestants also make up a large portion of the population in many countries. In nine of the 24 countries analyzed, this group was found to constitute 10% or more of the population.
In many countries more people have joined Protestantism than left it, with the switch to the religion in almost as many places as there have been net losses. The report states that adults who leave the Protestant faith become religiously unaffiliated.
Most of the countries where Protestantism has had a net gain are in Latin America, including Brazil where 15% have joined Protestantism and 6% have left. Most Brazilians who reported switching to Protestantism were former Catholics.
