Apr 4, 2025 12:00 pm By Jules Gomes
Global survey finds shocking hemorrhage of adults who were raised Christians leaving the Church
Most people around the world raised as Christians are abandoning their religion, but nearly all adults who were raised Muslim remain within Islam, according to a Pew Research Survey of 36 countries published on March 26.
Most conversions to Islam are occurring in America – and sadly, most of the new converts (13%) say they were raised as Christians. The United States has the highest or entrance rate into Islam of any of the countries studied, with one-fifth of Muslim Americans saying they were raised in other faiths or none.
Latino Catholics, in particular, are converting to Islam in significant numbers, corresponding surveys over the last two decades have found.
About 9% of converts to Islam are Latino, a 2020 survey confirmed — up from 5% in 2017. Many are of either Mexican or Puerto Rican descent, but conversion to Islam is also a phenomenon across Latin America, the report stated.
Conversion to Islam: Sociological or Theological?
The new phenomenon of single-parent homes in Latino Catholic families could be a factor drawing Latinas to Islam; in 2023, almost a third of Hispanic families were led by a single mother, according to U.S. Census data. By contrast, American Muslims are less likely to be divorced.
However, most Islamic converts (about 50% of them women who have chosen to wear head coverings, as The Tablet reported last year) cited theological rather than sociological reasons for their conversion. About 95% of respondents in the Latino Muslim Survey said monotheism led to their conversion, and 94% claimed it was a desire for a direct connection to the Creator.
A major factor in the conversion rate is the proselytizing (dawah) efforts Islamic evangelistic organizations like IslamInSpanish Centro Islámico in Houston, Texas, make, actively reaching out to Latino Catholics. In November 2021, Latino Muslims celebrated the grand opening of what they claim is the only Spanish-language mosque in the U.S.
“IslamInSpanish is a pioneer,” remarked Dr. Craig Considine, a practicing Catholic and senior lecturer in Islamic Studies at Rice University, noting how Islam’s directives on daily prayer and bans on alcohol, gambling and pork are a draw for disillusioned Catholics. “It’s food for the soul, food for the brain.”
Catholics Fail to Evangelize Muslims
Considine also stressed that Islam is drawing converts by building community: “It’s multi-ethnic. It’s multinational. It’s multi-racial,” he said. “It’s the quintessential American story of community building. The Irish and Italians did it. And now they’re doing it not through Christianity but through Islam.”
Robert Spencer, who has written 29 books on Islam and the Middle East, told The Stream the Catholic Church is failing evangelize Muslims, though Muslims are proselyting Catholics:
“Many Hispanic Catholics are turning to Islam, and the Catholic Church is doing absolutely nothing to counter this growing trend,” he said. “This is because the Vatican II documents have given rise to a great deal of confusion over whether Muslims should be evangelized at all, or are part of the ‘plan of salvation.’ Pope Francis has added to this confusion by conducting numerous outreach meetings with Muslim leaders and concluding the highly misleading Document on Human Fraternity.
“And so while Muslim groups make concerted efforts to convert Catholics, the Church hierarchy persists in fondly assuming that Muslims are their partners in faith.”
The American Muslim Association of North America, based in North Miami, says heavily Hispanic South Florida in particular is home to a rising number of Latino Muslims.
“What most Latinos who have embraced Islam find most amazing is their cultural affinity to the Muslim culture,” said Wilfredo Ruiz, a Puerto Rican-born Muslim who converted a decade ago and is a lawyer for the South Florida chapter of the Council of American-Islamic Relations. “It’s like rediscovering your past. That area of our past has been hidden from us.
“Our language is nurtured by more than 4,000 words that come from Arabic. Every word in Spanish that starts with ‘al,’ for example, like alcalde, alcantarilla, almohada” comes from Arabic.
Prosperous Nations Hit by Christian Recession
According to the Pew report, the only other country experiencing a high “accession” rate to Islam is Kenya, with 11% of Kenyan Muslims saying they were raised in another religion or with no religion.
On a global level, the survey revealed that Spain, a traditionally Catholic country, suffered the largest net losses for Catholics from “religious switching” (in proportion to the size of its population) of any country surveyed.
About 36% of Spanish adults have left Christianity, while just 3% of Spanish adults have entered Christianity.
The survey also revealed that the Church has sustained net losses of 20 percentage points or more of the total adult populations in Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands, Germany, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Australia, Chile, the United States, and Italy due to “switching.”
Most who have left the Church no longer identify with any religion, saying they are now atheist, agnostic or have no religion in particular. This trend is especially strong in many high-income countries.
The highest retention rates for Christianity are in the Philippines, Hungary, and Nigeria, where nearly all adults who were raised Christian are still Christian today, the pollsters found.
Despite the fact that Singapore is a high-income country, a larger share of adults joined rather than left Christianity. While 12% of Singaporean adults say they were raised Christian, 18% currently identify as Christians — a net gain of 6% of all Singaporean adults.
In Asia, the lowest retention rate among Christians was found in South Korea. About half of Koreans raised Christian still identify as Christian (51%), while the other half (49%) are no longer Christian.
Dr. Jules Gomes, (BA, BD, MTh, PhD), has a doctorate in biblical studies from the University of Cambridge. Currently a Vatican-accredited journalist based in Rome, he is the author of five books and several academic articles. Gomes lectured at Catholic and Protestant seminaries and universities and was canon theologian and artistic director at Liverpool Cathedral. This article has been cross-posted with the author’s permission from The Stream.