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Religion See other Religion Articles Title: Evangelical trend by Latinos could impact politics - STUDY SAYS GROWING NUMBERS PREFER CHARISMATIC WORSHIP Evangelical trend by Latinos could impact politics - STUDY SAYS GROWING NUMBERS PREFER CHARISMATIC WORSHIP By Kim Vo Mercury News San Jose Mercury News Article Launched:04/26/2007 01:31:48 AM PDT From speaking in tongues to believing in modern-day miracles, a growing number of Latinos prefer a charismatic style of worship that is altering church services across America. Although two-thirds of Hispanics are Roman Catholic in the United States, a small but growing number are converting to evangelical Protestanism. Those shifting allegiances, according to a major new study of the nation's fastest-growing ethnic group, may have political ramifications. Catholics and evangelicals, for example, tend to have different political party affiliations, and Latino evangelicals more passionately oppose hot-button social issues than do Latino Catholics. "Latinos are in the process of transforming this nation's religious landscape," said Roberto Suro, director of the Pew Hispanic Center, which conducted the in-depth look at the breadth and diversity of faith within the Latino community along with the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. The study was based on telephone interviews with 4,016 Latinos from August to October. Key findings from the new study include: About a third of U.S. Catholics are Latino, and more than half of Hispanic Catholics consider themselves charismatics, compared with just an eighth of non-Hispanic Catholics. Charismatic Christianity emphasizes supernatural aspects like prophesy, healing and speaking in tongues. Latinos joining the evangelical movement tend to be Catholic converts who say their conversion was motivated by a desire for a more direct, personal relationship with God, not dissatisfaction with Catholic theology. Latinos prefer worshiping together in an ethnic style congregation that transcends language. Two-thirds of Latinos say their religious beliefs influence their political ones and a majority say churches should get involved in political matters. Latino evangelicals are twice as likely as their Catholic counterparts to identify with the Republican party - 37 percent to 17 percent, respectively. Evangelicals are also more conservative on certain social issues. For instance, 86 percent of evangelical Latinos oppose gay marriage compared with 52 percent of Catholic Latinos. "On hot-button issues like abortion," said Luis Lugo with the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, "they are, if anything, more conservative than white evangelicals." The study's findings didn't surprise many in Silicon Valley, where church leaders have long noticed the changes. At St. Francis of Assisi in East Palo Alto, Father John Coleman said hundreds attend a charismatic prayer service Tuesday evenings in a worship style that veers sharply from the Mass on Sundays. The group is "more inclined to pray aloud, to gesture while they're praying and to interject `Praise the Lord' and `Hallelujah,'" said Coleman, adding that the church supports the additional service. "Anything that gets them praying, we encourage." The Tuesday service, begun about five years ago, underlines the report's assertion that many Latino Catholics have been increasingly incorporating charismatic practices to strengthen their own faith. Melissa Perez's family, however, illustrated another trend: They left Catholicism to join a charismatic church. "They wanted something new, something where they could be more open and free," Perez said of her parents' decision to join San Jose's Jubilee Christian Center when she was about 8 years old. Jubilee's Latino population kept growing and six years ago the church added a Spanish service, which attracts about 800 people weekly, said Melissa Perez, now 26 and a youth pastor at the church. Her parents are the pastors for the Spanish ministry. "We have members who don't even understand Spanish and they come. We have translator radios for them," she said. "The atmosphere, the environment is so free. They can dance around and sing." The communal ethnic experience seems key, said Pastor Willie Nutt of Word of Faith in San Jose, which tried to start a Spanish ministry last year. The predominantly African-American church, which has about 15 percent Latino membership, thought language would be the major appeal for a separate service, he said, but learned "it's more of a cultural thing." "It's a mixture of culture and race and custom," said Nutt, noting the Spanish service stopped after three months. The church is now attempting small home meetings until it has enough momentum to sustain a Spanish service. Pastor Frank Perez credits a practical Christianity for part of his church's growth. Iglesia Sobre la Roca - Church on the Rock - started a little over two years ago with 10 people, including Perez and his wife. It now has 550 members - about 90 percent, he estimates, are former Catholics. "People are taught how to forgive, and the steps to. People are taught how to get along with their family, and the steps to," Perez said. Perez, who has traveled to 27 countries to evangelize and networks with Latino pastors in the South Bay, says he frequently hears social and political opinions intertwined with religious beliefs, though he avoids those topics. "We tend to be on the conservative side," Perez said. Though Latino membership numbers have risen since he was a boy, evangelicals can't take them for granted, Perez said. He's seen people, as they become more assimilated, leave Latino charismatic churches for English ones that offer more programs. "You got to raise the standard, you have to have quality everything," he said. "People like a good restaurant, they want to be served well."
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IMHO the spirit is moving here in our country sweeping up both natives & immigrants, but when the leaders say this above you wonder what they mean. In my experience frequently it means they watch Fox News and say 'kill the muslims'. and I cannot concur.
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