Latin American Catholicism Declining

Those who don't live there tend to stereotype Latin America as universally Roman Catholic. Once true, new evidence suggests it is less true than formerly, in some nations much less. See a Washington Post article reporting recent Pew Research Center findings for 18 countries and one territory - Puerto Rico.

Pew finds that in El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras and Uruguay, the percent identifying as Catholic is 50% or fewer. Fewer than two out of three people in the following countries are Catholic: Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico.

I wouldn't have guessed Catholicism had ebbed so far. A quote shows the telling pattern:

Overall, 84% of Latin American adults report that they were raised Catholic, 15 percentage points more than currently identify as Catholic.