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Brazilian Catholics migrating to other churches

08 Jul 2012 - Preaching the News for Sunday

The Catholic Church in Brazil might take some solace from Saint Paul’s message in this Sunday’s selection from Second Corinthians, where he says he is content with his weaknesses, hardships, and constraints because “when I am weak, then I am strong.” That is due to the fact that fewer than two thirds of Brazilians now identify as Catholics, marking a record decline in the country with the largest Catholic population in the world.Just over 64 percent of the Brazilian population of 191 million identifies itself as Catholic, according to figures from the 2010 census. In the year 2000, when the last census was carried out, Catholics comprised almost 74 percent of the population. The fall since 1970 has been stunning: In that year, almost 92 percent of Brazilians self-identified as Catholic.Meanwhile, the number of Brazilian Christian evangelists has risen rapidly, up nearly a third in the last decade, from 15.4 to 22.2 percent. Demographer Joseph Eustace Diniz Alves, from the National School of Statistical Sciences, said that if the trend continues, the number of evangelicals will surpass that of Catholics in 20 or 30 years. If that happens, "The largest Catholic country in the world will cease to be Catholic," Alves said, adding that evangelical churches are taking over in the suburbs and the new middle class with a "theology of prosperity” which promises an improved economic life to those who join.Father Thierry Linard of the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil said the data reflect an "institutional failure" of the Catholic Church. In his view, the church has been unable to respond as quickly to the migration patterns in the country as have Pentecostal churches. "The Assembly of God has much more penetration in the periphery. Where a community arises, soon a little church comes," he said, adding that in the Catholic Church, the "structure is more onerous." Sources: Articles by Agence France Presse and Denise Menchen and Fabio Brisolla for Folia de S. Paulo

catholics catholic church brazil evangelicals assemblies of god pentecostal churches national school of statistical sciences joseph eustace diniz alves thierry linard

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Bye-bye Brazilian Catholics?

24 Feb 2013 - Preaching the News for Sunday

In this Sunday’s reading from the Book of Genesis, the Lord promises Abram that his descendents will be as numerous as the stars in the sky. One might have said the same of Brazilian Catholics as recently as the 1970s when more than 90 percent of the nation identified with the faith. Today that number has plummeted to 65 percent. Alarmed at the drop, church leaders are trying new strategies to counteract the growing popularity of evangelical churches on the one hand and secularism on the other.Before Pope Benedict XVI announced he would vacate the papacy at the end of the month, he had been expected to visit Rio de Janeiro in July for World Youth Day, a large international gathering aimed at energizing new generations of Catholics. Many Brazilian Catholics were hoping that the trip would bring worldwide focus to the challenges of evangelical growth and secularism.One Brazilian response has been a Charismatic renewal that invigorates many Catholic services with the kind of liveliness that in the past worshipers found only in evangelical churches. Father Marcelo Rossi, a 45-year-old former personal trainer, has sold more than 12 million CDs and has celebrated Mass in a soccer stadium filled with tens of thousands of people.Some Catholic priests now perform “liberation Masses” resembling group exorcisms and welcome congregants who speak in tongues. While such aspects are frowned upon by some Catholics, the Charismatic movement has clearly struck a chord among many worshipers.Evangelical churches, especially Pentecostal ones that share this focus on the charisms or gifts of the Spirit, are growing rapidly and building megachurches. In São Paulo the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, a multinational Pentecostal organization founded in Brazil in 1977, is spending $200 million to build a 10,000-seat replica of Solomon’s Temple.At the same time a growing number of Latin Americans say they have no religious affiliation at all, part of a worldwide trend, said Philip Jenkins, a history professor who teaches at the Institute for Studies of Religion at Baylor University. One sign of this, he said, is the drastic drop in fertility rates, which for the Catholic church means fewer children to be baptized and confirmed, fewer young candidates to become priests and nuns, and diminishing ties to the church for Catholic parents.Brazil’s fertility rate, at about 1.83 children per woman, is among Latin America’s lowest. “If I were a Brazilian cardinal, I would be even more worried about family size and fertility rates, which are a very good augur of secularization, than Pentecostalism,” Jenkins said.Homily hint: The challenges the Catholic Church faces in Brazil, though pronounced, are not unique to that country. The ranks of disaffected Catholics seem to grow daily, for a variety of reasons. Perhaps a parish discussion on how to help stem the tide of defections would be in order. Source: An article by Simon Romero for the New York Times

brazil brazilian catholics philip jenkins universal church of the kingdom of god liberation masses marcelo rossi secularism charismatic renewal evangelicalism pentecostalism

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What do Catholics look like around the world?

Short essays about observed trends in Roman Catholic life - Pastoral trends

What do Catholics look like around the world? One thing is for sure: They don’t look like the crowd in a typical parish in the United States. Catholics in the United States comprise just six percent of all Catholics worldwide—and a very odd group of Catholics at that on any number of measures. What trends best describe Catholics around the world in the 21st century? Three words come to mind: poverty, pluralism, and pentecostal. The bulk of the world’s Catholics now live in great poverty. The greatest proportion of Catholics worldwide is now found in the so-called Global South: Africa, Latin America, Asia. But have we realized that the greatest growth has tended to be in countries that are not majority Catholic, and in countries where Catholics are the majority, they now constitute a significantly smaller majority than in the past? So pluralism is increasing. And pentecostal: In a major recent survey of religion in a number of countries across the Global South, Catholics were very likely to identify as “charismatic” and to resonate with practices and beliefs often termed “pentecostal.” This is all very interesting for those of us in the United States as well. The greatest growth in Catholics today is among impoverished Latino immigrants. And in the United States Catholicism has thrived, some would say, precisely because it had to present itself as a minority religion in a pluralist framework. Finally, the United States is arguably the birthplace of pentecostal Christianity (1906, Los Angeles) as well as the Catholic charismatic movement (1967, Dusquesne University). In addition, Hispanic Catholics, Filipino Catholics, and others supply large portions of the Catholic charismatic movement in the United States. © 2007, Bryan Froehle.

Authors Bryan Froehle

poverty pluralism pentecostal

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