It sounds like more Hispanics are finally coming around to the Protestant roots of the US.
I would hope that the Hispanics are coming around to knowing Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior rather than being a Protestant or Catholic....
The "American tradition" has been Catholicism since the 1840s. It hasn't been protestantism for 160 years, even since there were massive wave of immigration from Ireland. In sheer membership, The Catholic church far outranks the second largest organized Christian church in the U.S.A (60 million for the Catholic Church vs. 15 million for the Southern Baptist Convention) Indeed, the ONLY part of the U.S. where the "historic cultural tradition" is protestantism, is parts of the deep south (and I say "parts" because states like Louisiana and Texas are exceptions to that rule).
IMO, the reason more Hispanics are becoming Protestant is they were Catholics In Name Only to begin. They may have been baptized Catholic, but they never observed their Catholic faith.
I think the roots of the US are Roman Catholic.
1492 Catholic Christopher Columbus discovered America.
· Catholicism arrived in what is now the United States during the earliest days of the European colonization of the Americas. As early as 1492 and onward, the Spanish Catholic missionaries followed closely on the heels of Columbus.
New York State
The original name of Lake George was given to the Lake by the French Jesuit priest, Issac Joques, in 1646. The lake was named the Lac du Saint Sacrement, meaning "The Lake of the Blessed Sacrament."
Also, In 1626, the first authenticated white man to see Niagara Falls was Father Joseph de la Roche-Dallion. Father Roche-Dallion preached to the Neutral Indians at various villages.
1500’s Florida
St. Augustine, Florida: First Religious service in what is now the United States: a Catholic Mass.
16th century Mississippi River and Louisianna
· 1519 - Alvarez de Pindea discovers mouth of the Mississippi · 1541 - Hernando de Soto discovers the Mississippi River · 1543 - July 18 -De Soto expedition survivors - under the command of Luis de Moscoso - become the first group of white men to travel down the Mississippi River to the Gulf of Mexico. 17th century · 1673 - Jacques Marquette and Louis Joliet reach the Mississippi River - and later verify that it flows into the Gulf of Mexico rather than the Pacific Ocean. · 1682 - Robert Cavalier, Sieur de la Salle, erects a cross at the mouth of the Mississippi River after descending the river from the Great Lakes and claims the territory for Louis XIV of France, for whom Louisiana is named. · 1699 - March -Pierre Le Moyne Iberville becomes the first European to find the Mississippi River from the open sea.
California
Father Junipero Serra discovered and named everything in California 1767
The Franciscans of Mexico were asked to take over missions in Baja California. These remote facilities became Father Serra's responsibility. 1769
Spain began settlement of Alta California with the Sacred Expedition which Serra accompanied. The first destination was San Diego. It was on Presidio Hill where Serra planted the cross and dedicated the first mission in Alta California. At this same time, the first fortified settlement was founded. Serra himself established nine missions, with a total of twenty-one missions eventually being established along the El Camino Real, from San Diego to Sonoma, a distance of 700 miles.