{"id":262238,"date":"2025-06-16T13:52:32","date_gmt":"2025-06-16T17:52:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/?p=262238"},"modified":"2026-05-01T11:45:53","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T15:45:53","slug":"profile-of-hispanic-catholics-in-the-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/religion\/2025\/06\/16\/profile-of-hispanic-catholics-in-the-us\/","title":{"rendered":"4. Profile of Hispanic Catholics in the U.S."},"content":{"rendered":"\n
How we define Catholics in this chapter<\/summary>\n

This chapter exclusively explores views and experiences among U.S. Catholics (i.e., the 20% of U.S. adults who say they are Catholic when asked about their present religion).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many Americans who are not<\/em> Catholic are still connected to the faith in other ways. Read more about these \u201ccultural Catholics,\u201d former Catholics, and people with other Catholic connections (i.e., those who have  a Catholic parent, spouse or partner, or say \u201cyes\u201d when asked if they ever attend Catholic Mass) in Chapter 7<\/a> and the Overview<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

The share of U.S. Catholic adults who are Hispanic is growing.[12. numoffset=”12″ At the same time, the share of U.S. Hispanics who are Catholic is declining. Refer to \u201cAmong U.S. Latinos, Catholicism Continues to Decline but is Still the Largest Faith<\/a>\u201d for additional details. Still, in the current survey, 40% of Hispanic adults are Catholic \u2013 that is, they say they are Catholic when asked about their present religion. That figure is at least double the share of White, Black and Asian Americans who are Catholic. Additionally, among those who are not Catholics themselves, Hispanics are more likely than White Americans or Americans of other races (including respondents who didn\u2019t answer survey questions about race) to have some Catholic connection (as \u201ccultural Catholics,\u201d former Catholics, or other Catholic-connected people). Refer to this report\u2019s Overview<\/a> for additional details.] Today, 36% of all Catholic adults in the United States are Hispanic,<\/strong> up from 29% in 2007.[13. The estimate that 36% of U.S. Catholics are Hispanic comes from Pew Research Center\u2019s 2023-24 Religious Landscape Study (RLS). In this chapter, we use data from the RLS where possible, because the RLS has a larger sample than the Feb. 3-9, 2025, survey of Catholics. We use data from the 2025 survey to analyze questions that were asked in that survey but not in the RLS.]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hispanic Catholics are a distinctive part of American Catholic religious life in numerous ways. They are more likely than White Catholics to say they participate in a variety of Catholic devotional practices. For example, compared with White Catholics in the U.S., Hispanic Catholics are more likely to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n