What countries are considered Catholic

[Hokomai]

Maybe I can clarify myself too. I’m not opposed to religion, but I am opposed to the abuse that can arise where the government sponsors one religion over another and bases secular law on religious law. Such as the imposition of Sharia law which is imposed in so many of the Arab/Muslim countries to the deteriment of human rights, especially rights for women.

I don’t want to see Canon law become the law of a country either because that can lead to abuse and discrimination based on other differences. Secular law and religious law can be in sync – I think the abolition of the death penalty in this country is one such law that Catholics oppose and many secularists do too. But in that case, no rights are being violated, but affirmed. No one is being singled out for harm. That’s the distinction.

Roe is bad law in a secular sense (but I won’t babble on about Roe). In that case, the problem with Roe is in it’s fashioning and that comports with those who are against abortion. There are legit and legal reasons to overturn Roe that can be found in secular law and conforms to religious laws.

I am not Muslim bashing – but in today’s world it’s the Muslim countries that have erased the line between religious and secular law – or are actively attempting to do so. If it’s fear, it’s a fear of what Sharia law brings.

Some countries such as Morocco (in the major cities) acccept a woman’s head uncovered. But Morocco is a tribal country so when you go outside of the cities, you must dress much more modestly. I’m okay with that. I can respect some customs.

But then you have headcoverings which, in other countries, lead to veiling, which leads to complete body covering. Now, the Saudis are trying, or have imposed, a law that women, who cannot drive at all, should cover their eyes when outside. The Taliban did not let women out of the house, without male family escort, and had another head covering, equally obstructive. They did not educate girls. How non-discriminatory is that? This is what happens when there is no difference between the secular and the religious – in this case Sharia law.

Religion plays a role in the secular and I would not interfere with that. I, as a Catholic, should know how to dress and behave. I would not change people’s dress here and say, for example, Orthodox Jewish women should not cover their heads nor would I suggest that Orthodox Jews must open for business on a Saturday, because we should have a uniform day of rest, and cut their ear locks because no one else has ear lock. Those religious practices harm no one. They are choice. When it becomes the secular law too, that’s when I see a problem.

Israel is another example – a good one. They are a Jewish state but have managed to keep the secular and the religious separate to a large degree. The Orthodoxy (those who accept Israel as part of the prophecy), would like to impose more religious law. Thus far Israel has resisted from crossing the line from a Jewish state to a religious state.

I completely agree.

 

[Leegal]

I wanted to add that religion does have a role in government, but it should not BE the government.

One example here was the Church’s and the mayor’s office in NYC and how they worked in concert with each other to clean up Times Square, thorough legislation and active engagement with the Catholic Church, and make it safe for families to go there. Now the businesses are family oriented, or regular businesses such as restaurants and cosmetics – not porn and prostitution and crime.

For as long as I remembered it was hard to go there, even to see a regular film and there are regular theaters because it was so dangerous. It also borders the theater district. People could not go and not be accosted. Families could not go because every other store was a sex shop, porn shop, shops selling drug paraphrenalia and fake I.D.'s to young people who roamed the streets in packs. And the area was filled with prostitutes. It had been like this since I was a child.

 

[Leegal]

I think some of the stats are not accurate. Is Belgium included?

Belgium is 75.54% Catholic as of 2005 – the year of the report.

 

[severus68]

Belgium is 75.54% Catholic as of 2005 – the year of the report.

I would have thought the percentage would be higher.

BTW I agree with your reasoning on the issue of a state religion. Well said.

 

[ConstantineTG]

You are right. “people I know” is not a valid statistic. I live in the Philippines and I would say that over 95% of the people I know are Catholic!

Well, good for you then. You’re in the right crowd. A lot of the people I know have become Evangelicals, Pentecostals, or neo-Arians including INC. Most people my age and younger (30s and below) are allured by the Evangelical movements and usually recruitment is through peer peer pressure. I’m actually quite surprised by how many suddenly turn up Protestant. And I’m sure some of them were Catholics not too long ago.

Also in the rural areas, that is where the missions of the Evangelicals and Pentecostals are in full swing. I think there’s some sort of Protestant community in every street corner, literally. Granted that they are small communities of maybe a dozen or two who get together in someone’s driveway, its still alarming to me that I see a lot of them.

I do stay in touch with a lot of my friends, former co-workers and acquaintances through Facebook (and Friendster before that). That is how I find out they’re Protestants nowadays.

 

[jerry_joseph]

Glad to see my country India , ranked 6th in the number of catholic priests

nationmaster.com/graph/rel_cat_tot_pri-religion-catholic-total-priests

And also ranked 14’nth in catholic population (19 Million (2011status ). More than the catholic population in Canada . Twice the catholic population of Portugal.

Ranked 8th in the number of catholic parishes.With 8333 parishes (Almost equal to the total parishes in Brazil)

nationmaster.com/graph/rel_cat_par-religion-catholic-parishes.

Although catholics are only 1.5% of the total population of india ( 1.1 Billion which is almost equal to the total Roman catholic population in the world). May God bless our catholic community which is tiny in percentage comparing to country’s population, but bigger in number 19 million and 14nth biggest catholic community in the world.

 

[Night_Crawler]

Sweden.

 

[domandcarols]

Sweden.

Really?!

 

[karaleigh]

America was never Catholic, in that it has always been a minority religion there. America is Christian, mostly Protestant and Anglican.

I’m not sure where to find the history to this, but the Roman Catholic Church help to build the US Dept of Education, and are among the first to build private educational schools through the growth of convents serviced by nuns. The Catholic Church is heavily mentioned in the chronicles of Early American religious reforms. This link to the John Wesley website. There among the commentaries it indicates that the Catholics were a major influence to the establishment of Wesley’s Methodist movement as most of the hymns, prayers, and eulogies are exactly the same as the Catholic Church. As a matter of fact, it so close one would believe the Methodist Church is a branch of the Italian Catholic Order of Rome.

The Catholic Church is a major influence in the USA and in the founding of American religious policies and reforms. .

 

[choliks]

As of this posting, the liturgical reception of the new Archbishop of Manila has begun. The Manila Cathedral is overflowing with thousands and thousands of faithful.

 

[ConstantineTG]

I’m not sure where to find the history to this, but the Roman Catholic Church help to build the US Dept of Education, and are among the first to build private educational schools through the growth of convents serviced by nuns. The Catholic Church is heavily mentioned in the chronicles of Early American religious reforms. This link to the John Wesley website. There among the commentaries it indicates that the Catholics were a major influence to the establishment of Wesley’s Methodist movement as most of the hymns, prayers, and eulogies are exactly the same as the Catholic Church. As a matter of fact, it so close one would believe the Methodist Church is a branch of the Italian Catholic Order of Rome.

The Catholic Church is a major influence in the USA and in the founding of American religious policies and reforms. .

I’m not saying the Catholic Church has no influence or contribution to society. I mean, look at Mother Theresa in a country that has over 1 billion people and only a very small percentage Catholic, or even Christian. I’m saying that Catholicism was never, at any point, been the major faith in the United States. The countries being mentioned here are countries were Catholics comprise of 50% or more of the population.

 

[jerry_joseph]

In india there are approximately 30 million christians are there. It is more than the total population of Australia, Canada and many European Countries.

Main Christian Denominations in India are shown below

Catholic Church 11,800,000 (Roman Catholic-Latin Rite)

Syro-Malabar Church 3,947,396 (Roman Catholic-East Syrian Rite)

Syro-Malankara Church 500,000 (Roman Catholic-West Syrian Rite)

Malankara Jacobite Syrian Orthodox Church 1,000,000 (Oriental Orthodox)

Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church (1,000,000 Oriental Orthodox)

Malabar Independent Syrian Church (10,000 Oriental Orthodox)(

Chaldean Syrian Church 40,000 (Church of the East)

Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church 900,000 (Approx)[140] (Oriental Reformed)

Church of South India 3,800,000 (Protestant)

Church of North India 1,250,000 (Protestant)

Methodist Church in India 648,000 (Protestant)

Baptist 2,392,694 (Protestant)

Lutheran 1,267,786[130] (Protestant)

Indian Brethren 1,000,000 (Protestant)

Presbyterian Church of India 823,456 (Protestant)

St. Thomas Evangelical Church 10,000 (Protestant)

Worldwide Faith Missions 12,000 (Protestant)

Evangelical Church[disambiguation needed ] 250,000 (Protestant)

New Apostolic Church[136] 1,448,209 (Protestant)

India Pentecostal Church of God 600,000 (Protestant)

New Life Fellowship Association[136] 480,000 (Protestant)

Manna Full Gospel Churches[136] 275,000 (Protestant)

Philadelphia Fellowship Church of India[136] 200,000 (Protestant)

Unitarian Union of Northeast India 10,000 (Unitarian)

Jehovah’s Witnesses 33,089[141] (Restorationism)

 

[jerry_joseph]

Three states in india are christian majority.

States with significant percentage of Christians as per 2001 census
State Christian%

Mizoram 90.5%

Nagaland 90.0%

Meghalaya 70.3%

Manipur 34.0%

Goa 26.0 %

Andaman and Nicobar Islands 21.7%

Kerala 19.0 %

Arunachal Pradesh 18.7%

Pondicherry 7.0%

Sikkim 6.6%

Tamil Nadu 6.06%

Jharkhand 4.05%

Assam 3.7%

Tripura 3.2%

Chhattisgarh 2.5%

Orissa 2.4%

Karnataka 2.0%

Andhra Pradesh 1.5%

Maharashtra 1.09%

Christian population in india is officialy 2.5% (27 to 30 Million). But some hindu and other religions groups says that christian population is already crossed 6% in india ie 66 million (more than the total population of France) and Govt of india is hiding the christian population growth for avoiding religious percecution against christians.

 

[ProVobis]

I’m not sure where to find the history to this, but the Roman Catholic Church help to build the US Dept of Education, …

The Roman Catholic Church helped develop all of Western civilization.

But as I go down the list, I see very few English-speaking countries being Catholic from a percentage standpoint, save maybe the Phillipines. Interesting.

 

[liturgyluver]

But as I go down the list, I see very few English-speaking countries being Catholic from a percentage standpoint, save maybe the Phillipines. Interesting.

It is interesting, as you say, but if you add up the actual number of Catholics from the English speaking countries they still represent the second largest group of speakers after the Spanish.

 

[ProVobis]

It is interesting, as you say, but if you add up the actual number of Catholics from the English speaking countries they still represent the second largest group of speakers after the Spanish.

I’m not sure how to take that statistic. The largest Christian denomination in the U.S., where the number of native-English speakers are the highest among countries, are ex-Catholics. That said, I hear many of the Spanish countries are going Protestant (too).

 

[liturgyluver]

I’m not sure how to take that statistic. The largest Christian denomination in the U.S., where the number of native-English speakers are the highest among countries, are ex-Catholics. That said, I hear many of the Spanish countries are going Protestant (too).

Yes, I have heard that too, and in Brazil.

 

[kingal86]

The Roman Catholic Church helped develop all of Western civilization.

But as I go down the list, I see very few English-speaking countries being Catholic from a percentage standpoint, save maybe the Phillipines. Interesting.

I would presume that’s the result of Henry VIII’s English Reformation. Australia, the USA and Canada were originally founded by mostly Protestant British colonists.

 

[Tenofovir]

What is a Catholic country? One with a majority? A plurality? Religion in the constitution or law? I look forward to the day when no country is by law attached to any religion.

I look forward to the day when people can accept others’ beliefs and move on. And not linking religion to law/constitution where religion is part of the culture is something absurd. I know you Americans have it, but the rest of the world sees religion as a deep aspect of the culture of the people making up the country. It is significant. But that does not mean that being religious is compulsory, so in the same way that not every South African plays cricket or rugby, but rugby and cricket are a deep part of the culture here, not every Filipino or Italian need to be Catholic.

 

[Joseklos]

I can guarantee you that El Salvador is not really a catholic country anymore. When I was growing up there, I remember that almost everyone was catholic and now there are baptists, JW’s and Pentecostals and their religions are spreading like crazy! there is even a new Mormon temple that is far more beautiful than most of the cathedrals. Luckily tho, the rural areas and small towns are still catholic but I don’t know how much longer they will remain catholic.