Between 1990 and 2008, the U.S. adult Latino population grew from 8% of the nation’s total to 14%. Along the way, it more than doubled in numbers, from 14.6 million to 30.8 million, making Latinos the nation’s largest minority.

The American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS), conducted by Trinity College of Hartford, CT, has tracked the religious self-identification of U.S. residents for nearly 20 years. A comparison of data from the 1990 and 2008 studies reveals some interesting and unexpected trends among U.S. Latinos.

TRENDS IN RELIGIOUS IDENTIFICATION

The growth of the Latino presence in the United States is the result of both immigration and domestic births. The high number of Latinos born in the U.S., coupled to the large number of immigrants who were born after 1990, has produced some interesting changes in Latino religious identification:

•  The percent of Latinos who identified as Catholic fell from 65.8% in 1990 to 59.5% in 2008. (Even so, the raw number of self-identified Latino Catholics nearly doubled, from 9.6 million to 18.35 million.)

•  In the same time period, the number who identified as Other Christians also fell, from 25.1% to 22.2%; as did those who identified as Other Religions (dropping from 1.9% in 1990 to 1.2% in 2008). This statistical discovery runs against the general assumption of scholars and media figures that non-Catholic Christian traditions are gaining ground among Latinos. That’s not the case: as with other groups of Americans, and the U.S. population as a whole, Latinos are leaving faith communities altogether. Thus,

•  Among Latinos, those who either refused to answer the religion question or who said they don’t know their religious identity increased from 0.8% to 4.5% (from 124,000 persons in 1990 to 1.4 million in 2008). And,

•  The number of Latinos who said they have no religious identification doubled, from 6.4% (932,000) in 1990 to 12.4% (3.8 million) in 2008. (That doubling in percentage required a four-fold increase in raw numbers.) The Latino trend toward no religion is consistent with the steady rise in the number of all Americans who say they have no religious identification (overall, the decline in self-identifying religious Americans dropped 10% between 1990 and 2008).

•  Among Latinos who don’t identify with a religious tradition there was an eight-fold increase in those who say they are atheists and agnostics. Today, U.S. Latino atheists and agnostics outnumber Latino adherents of all non-Christian religions.

•  Among non-Catholic Christians, Jehovah’s Witnesses and Adventists claim the most Latinos.

TRENDS IN PRIMARY-LANGUAGE IDENTIFICATION

Because Latinos are often defined by their common roots in (a) the Spanish language, (b) Latin American nations, and (c) the Roman Catholic faith, a lot can be learned by examining these characteristics. As we have already seen, Roman Catholic identification is steadily declining. But so, too, is Latino commitment to Spanish as a first language.

In general, a Latino’s mastery of English is correlated to a move away from the Catholic Church. As a result, the Catholic Church can claim just 32% of bi-lingual and primarily-English speaking Latinos (compared to 66% of Spanish-only or primarily-Spanish speakers, and 71% of Latinos who primarily speak a language other than Spanish or English).

Also, Latinos who identify with no religious tradition make up 22% of English-primary and bi-lingual Latinos. Generic Christians comprise 19%, and Baptists make up 15% of those Latinos.

In the aggregate, it appears that Americanization – as measured by proficiency in the English language – leads to either secularization or migration to a conservative Christian tradition (notably Adventism and Jehovah’s Witnesses).

IMPACT OF THE GROWING LATINO RELIGIOUS PLURALISM

The increasing diversity of Latino representation in non-Catholic religious bodies is producing changes in the shape of American faith communities and religious practices. Because of Latino migration and settlement patterns, and the drift of ethnic whites toward no religion, Catholicism is declining in the Northeast and growing in sections of the South and Southwest. Those are also the places where Latino “Nones” (those who express no religious identity) are most prevalent.

Interestingly, adherence to Catholicism is strongest where Mexican nationals are dominant and weakest where Puerto Ricans predominate. Also, in the South Atlantic region and in the western portion of the South Central region of the U.S., Latino settlement has helped promote the fast-growing Generic Christian movement: Latinos account for some 10% of Generic Christians in those areas.

CONCLUSION

The ARIS study data suggests that behind the masking effect of large-scale immigration, the U.S. Latino population is steadily moving away from the Catholic Church and into the polar opposite groups, secularism and evangelical Christianity. This drift is correlated to place of birth and proficiency in English, and may point to a hidden plight facing the Catholic Church. Like Mainline Protestantism assailed on both sides – by secularism and evangelicalism – the Catholic Church may be caught in the middle of a uniquely American tug-of-war and polarization of theological perspectives.

To read more of the findings about U.S. Latinos, read the report, “U.S. Latino Religious Identification 1990-2008: Growth, Diversity & Transformation,” available on the U.S. Congregations website, here.

For a more extensive exploration of the trends in U.S. religious practices identified in the ARIS studies, read: A Field Guide to U.S. Congregations: Who’s Going Where and Why, Second edition.