Religion
According to the IBGE census: 74% are Roman Catholics (about 130 million); 15.4% are Protestants (about 28 million); 7.4% consider themselves agnostics, atheists or without a religion (about 12 million); 1.3% are followers of Spiritism (about 2.2 million); 0.3% are followers of African traditional religions such as Candomblé and Umbanda; 1.7% are members of other religions. Some of these are Jehovah's Witnesses (1,100,000), Latter-day Saints (200,000), Buddhism (215,000), Judaism (86,000), and Islam (27,000) and some practice a mixture of different religions, such as Catholicism, Candomblé, and indigenous American religions.
Brazil has the largest Roman Catholic population in the world.
Followers of Protestantism are rising in number. Until 1970, the majority of Brazilian Protestants were adherents of "traditional churches", mostly Lutherans, Presbyterians and Baptists. Since then, numbers of Pentecostal and Neopentecostal adherents have increased significantly.
Islam in Brazil was first practiced by African slaves. Today, the Muslim population in Brazil is made up mostly of Arab immigrants. The US Department of State claims there is a recent trend of increased conversions to Islam among non-Arab citizens.
The largest population of Buddhists in Latin America lives in Brazil. This is mostly because Brazil has the largest Japanese population outside Japan.
About 8% of Brazilians declared themselves to be non-religious (with 2% declaring themselves atheists) and 58% of Catholics considered themselves "not very practicing" or "not at all practicing".
According to IBGE 2000 Census, the following are the largest religious denominations in Brazil, with those with more than a half million members only shown.
Rank | Group | Members | Other information |
---|---|---|---|
1 | Roman Catholic Church | 135 million |
|
2 | Non-religious | 12.5 million |
|
3 | Assemblies of God (Assembléias de Deus) |
8.4 million |
|
4 | Baptist | 3.1 million |
|
5 | Christian Congregation of Brazil | 2.4 million | |
6 | Spiritist | 2.2 million |
|
7 | Universal Church of the Kingdom of God (Igreja Universal do Reino de Deus) |
2.1 million |
|
8 | Foursquare Gospel Church | 1.3 million |
|
9 | Adventists | 1.2 million |
|
10 | Jehovah's Witnesses | 1.1 million | |
11 | Lutherans | 1 million |
|
12 | Calvinists | 981,000 |
|
13 | God is Love Pentecostal Church | 774,000 |
|
14 | Afro-Brazilian | 525,000 |
|
15 | Brazilian Catholics | 500,000 | |
– | Others and no religion declared | 3.5 million |
Read more about this topic: Brazilian Society
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—Malcolm X (19251965)