Advertisement

Towards a Catholic North America?

Chapter
First Online:

Abstract

Religion and religiosity are important identity markers, and changes in a country’s religious composition may affect its culture, value orientations and policies. In recent decades the Protestants in both the U.S. and Canada have lost their absolute population majority. We investigate the future of the religious composition in both the US and Canada jointly to the 2060s taking into consideration changes due to demography, the level and composition of migration, fertility differentials and intergenerational religious transmissions. We use a multi-dimensional cohort-component model to project from the early 2000s the populations of Canada and the U.S. separately according to various scenarios. The joint focus on both the U.S. and Canada allows one to better understand the commonalities and differences between these two nations which are tightly knit in terms of geography, politics, economics and culture. The results of the projections are sensitive to two main determinants: secularization and migration in terms of level and composition. Fertility also plays a role particularly in combination with migration patterns. At present, Catholics increase their proportion through immigration as the share of Catholics among migrants to the U.S. is larger than other religions and their fertility is higher than the U.S. resident population. The contrary is happening in Canada, and fertility differentials benefit Protestants and migration lowers the Catholic share. The projections reveal that North America should not become Catholic by mid-century but close to, with an increasing importance of minorities in the religious landscape.

Keywords

Religious composition Transmission of religion Migration Fertility Secularization Multistate projections U.S. and Canada 
This is a preview of subscription content, log in to check access.

Notes

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Laurent Martel and Patrice Dion for useful comments, Marcin Stonawski for his generous assistance with the data as well as participants in the VID colloquium on April 21st, 2011 (Vienna, Austria) where preliminary results were presented for wise suggestions.

References

  1. Bélanger, A., & Caron Malenfant, É. (2005). Population projections of visible minority groups, Canada, provinces and regions: 2001–2017 (Statistics Canada Cat. 91-541-XIE). Ottawa: Statistics Canada.Google Scholar
  2. Bélanger, A., & Gilbert, S. (2003). The fertility of immigrant women and their Canadian-born daughters. Report on the demographic situation in Canada, 2002, Statistics Canada (Cat. 91–209). Ottawa: Statistics Canada.Google Scholar
  3. Caron Malenfant, É., & Bélanger, A. (2006). The fertility of visible minority women in Canada. Report on the demographic situation in Canada, 2003 and 2004 (Statistics Canada Cat. 91–209). Ottawa: Statistics Canada.Google Scholar
  4. Caron Malenfant, É., Lebel, A., & Martel, L. (2010). Projections of the diversity of the Canadian population (Statistics Canada Cat. 91-551-XWE). Ottawa: Statistics Canada.Google Scholar
  5. Castells, M. (2004). The power of identity. The information age: Economy, society and culture (Vol. II). Chichester: John Wiley and Sons Ltd.Google Scholar
  6. Crockett, A., & Voas, D. (2006). Generations of decline: Religious change in twentieth-century Britain. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 45, 567–584.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  7. Glaeser, E. L., & Sacerdote, B. I. (2008). Education and religion. Journal of Human Capital, 2(2), 188–215.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  8. Goujon, A., Skirbekk, V., Fliegenschnee, K., & Strzelecki, P. (2007a). New times, old beliefs: Projecting the future size of religions in Austria. Vienna yearbook of population research 5, 237-270.Google Scholar
  9. Goujon, A., Skirbekk, V., & Fliegenschnee, K. (2007b). New times, old beliefs: Investigating the future of religions in Austria and Switzerland. Work session on demographic projections, proceedings, Bucharest, 10–12 Oct 2007. Eurostat methodologies and working papers (pp. 355–370).Google Scholar
  10. Grabill, W. H., & Cho, L.-J. (1965). Methodology for the measurement of current fertility from population data on young children. Demography, 2, 50–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  11. Groot, W., & Maassen van den Brink, H. (2007). The health effects of education. Economics of Education Review, 26(2), 186–200.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  12. Guibernau, M. (2007). The identity of nations. Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
  13. Hoge, D. R. (1981). Converts, dropouts, and returnees. New York: The Pilgrim Press.Google Scholar
  14. Hollmann, F. W., Mulder, T. J., & Kallan, J. E. (2000). Methodology and assumptions for the population projections of the United States: 1999 to 2100 (Population division working paper no. 38). Washington, DC: Population Projections Branch, Population Division, U.S. Census Bureau.Google Scholar
  15. Hummer, R. A., Ellison, C. G., Rogers, R. G., Moulton, B. E., & Romero, R. R. (2004). Religious involvement and adult mortality in the United States: Review and perspective. Southern Medical Journal, 97(12), 1223–1230.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  16. Iannaccone, L. R. (1992). Religious practice: A human capital approach. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 29, 297–314.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  17. Inglehart, R., & Baker, W. E. (2000). Modernization, cultural change, and the persistence of traditional values. American Sociological Review, 65(1), 19–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  18. Jasso, G., & Rosenzweig, M. R. (2006). Characteristics of immigrants to the United States: 1820–2003. In R. Ueda (Ed.), Companion to American immigration (pp. 328–358). Malden: Blackwell Publishing.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  19. Jones, E. F., & Westoff, C. F. (1979). The end of Catholic fertility. Demography, 16(2), 209–218.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  20. Krotki, K., & Lapierre, E. (1968). La fécondité au Canada selon la religion, l’origine ethnique, et L’état matrimonial. Population, 23, 815–834.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  21. Kung, H.-C., Hoyert, D. L., Xu, J., & Murphy, S. L. (2008). Deaths: Final data for 2005. National vital statistics reports, Vol. 56, No. 10. Hyattsville: National Center for Health Statistics.Google Scholar
  22. Lehrer, E. (1996). Religion as a determinant of fertility. Journal of Population Economics, 9(2), 173–196.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  23. Lehrer, E. (2004). Religion as a determinant of economic and demographic behavior in the United States. Population and Development Review, 30(4), 707–726.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  24. Lerch, M., Oris, M., Wanner, P., Forney, Y., & Dutreuilh, C. (2010). Religious affiliation and mortality in Switzerland, 1991–2004. Population (English edition), 65(2), 217–250.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  25. McQuillan, K. (2004). When does religion influence fertility? Population and Development Review, 30(1), 25–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  26. Sander, W. (1992). Catholicism and the economics of fertility. Population Studies, 46(3), 477–489.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  27. Skirbekk, V., Goujon, A., & Kaufmann, E. (2010). Secularism, fundamentalism, or Catholicism? The religious composition of the United States to 2043. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 49(2), 293–310.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  28. Statistics Canada. (1993). Religion, the daily, statistics Canada’s official release bulletin (Statistics Canada Cat. 96-304E). Ottawa: Statistics Canada.Google Scholar
  29. Statistics Canada. (2003). Religions in Canada, 2001 Census: Analysis series (Statistics Canada Cat. 96F0030). Ottawa: Statistics Canada.Google Scholar
  30. Statistics Canada. (2010). Population projections for Canada, provinces and territories, 2009 to 2036 (Statistics Canada Cat. 91–52). Ottawa: Statistics Canada.Google Scholar
  31. U.S. Department of Homeland Security. (2009). Yearbook of immigration statistics, 2006. Washington, DC: GPO.Google Scholar

Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital (IIASA, VID/ŐAW, WU), International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)LaxenburgAustria
  2. 2.Vienna Institute of Demography/Austrian Academy of SciencesViennaAustria
  3. 3.Demography DivisionStatistics CanadaOttawaCanada

Personalised recommendations

Cite chapter

Buy options