Church, Withdrawal and Political Engagement in Latin America

In order to explore the relationship among religion, withdrawal and political engagement in Latin America, I test the withdrawal hypothesis, which predicts that time devoted to the church takes time away from politics. I analyze 24 countries surveyed by the 2010 Americas Barometer, in which I study the impact of church attendance, attendance to religious groups, importance of religion, trust in the church, and the Catholic Church presence at the subnational level, employing data from the 2005 Pontifical Yearbook. I find evidence that supports the withdrawal hypothesis among church goers and those who trust in the church, and an increasing presence of the Church also tends to favor withdrawal, whereas political engagement increases among those who attend to church groups.