Then we should be like Mexico; which is HEAVILY Catholic.
“Then we should be like Mexico; which is HEAVILY Catholic.”
Actually the Catholic Church was technically illegal in Mexico for decades. As the Wall Street Journal noted:
In 1979, for example, when Pope John Paul II made his first pilgrimage to Mexico, priests were still legally banned from wearing clerical collars in public, owning property, or voting. Incredibly, government officials claimed that the Pope violated Mexican law by wearing his habit. (But in a gesture that exemplifies the complex relationship between the Mexican church and state, then-President Jose Lopez Portillo himself offered to pay the 50 pesos fine.) http://online.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703740704575095704065365166
The persecution in Mexico was so severe that in 1935 there were 17 states in Mexico that did not have a single licensed priest legally allowed to minister to the people.
There are millions of Mexicans who call themselves “Catholics” because that’s what their parents and grandparents said, but they are not even baptized and have never been catechized. I’m not kidding. I know this because I seen it on this side of the border with Mexican immigrants (legal and not) who are adults and have never been baptized.