Religious Diversity and its Challenges for Secularism in Mexico

Abstract

Over the past three decades, Mexico has witnessed the end to the Catholic Church’s virtual monopoly of religious and moved increasingly towards religious diversity. This transformation leads us to the following questions: What challenges does the rise of religious diversity represent for the secularism model in Mexico? The first section of this article describes the current model of secularism in Mexico as the context for church-state relations. The emphasis here is on new areas of confrontation and tension between different political and religious actors who vie to redefine the state’s role in the public sphere. Religious diversity is an important part of cultural pluralism in Mexico. To chart the new religious map, we analyze recent data on religious belonging from Mexico’s Population and Housing Census (2010) and identify the main actors and trends within this transformation. Religious groups have different positions on the relationship between religion and the public sphere. To analyze them, we draw on the Mexican National Survey on Religious Beliefs and Practices conducted by the Religious Research Network of Mexico (RIFREM) in 2016 (Hernández et al. 2016). Based on all available information, we reflect on the issues and challenges of religious transformation and the resulting need to redefine secularism.

Keywords

Religious diversity. Pluralism.Secularism. Religion and public sphere. Mexico