History of the Catholic Church in Mexico

The history of the Catholic Church in Mexico dates from the period of the Spanish conquest (1519–21) and has continued as an institution in Mexico into the twenty-first century. Catholicism is one of many major legacies from the Spanish colonial era, the others include Spanish as the nation's language, the Civil Code and Spanish colonial architecture. The Catholic Church was a privileged institution until the mid nineteenth century. It was the sole permissible church in the colonial era and into the early Mexican Republic, following independence in 1821. Following independence, it involved itself directly in politics, including in matters that did not specifically involve the Church.^[1]

In the mid-nineteenth century the liberal Reform brought major changes in church-state relations. Mexican liberals in power challenged the Catholic Church's role, particularly in reaction to its involvement in politics.^[2] The Reform curtailed the Church's role in education, property ownership, and control of birth, marriage, and death records, with specific anticlerical laws. Many of these were incorporated into the Constitution of 1857, restricting the Church's corporate ownership of property and other limitations. Although there were some liberal clerics who advocated reform, such as José María Luis Mora, the Church came to be seen as conservative and anti-revolutionary.^[2] During the bloody War of the Reform, the Church was an ally of conservative forces that attempted to oust the liberal government. They also were associated with the conservatives' attempt to regain power during the French Intervention, when Maximilian of Habsburg was invited to become emperor of Mexico. The empire fell and conservatives were discredited, along with the Catholic Church. However, during the long presidency of Porfirio Díaz (1876–1911) the liberal general pursued a policy of conciliation with the Catholic Church; though he kept the anticlerical articles of the liberal constitution in force, he in practice allowed greater freedom of action for the Catholic Church.^[3] With Díaz's ouster in 1911 and the decade-long conflict of the Mexican Revolution, the victorious Constitutionalist faction led by Venustiano Carranza wrote the new Constitution of 1917 that strengthened the anticlerical measures in the liberal Constitution of 1857.

With the presidency of Northern, anticlerical, revolutionary general Plutarco Elías Calles (1924–28), the State's enforcement of the anticlerical articles of Constitution of 1917 provoked a major crisis with violence in a number of regions of Mexico. The Cristero Rebellion (1926–29) was resolved, with the aid of diplomacy of the U.S. Ambassador to Mexico, ending the violence, but the anticlerical articles of the constitution remained. President Manuel Avila Camacho (1940–1946) came to office declaring "I am a [Catholic] believer," (soy creyente) and Church-State relations improved though without constitutional changes.

A major change came in 1992, with the presidency of Carlos Salinas de Gortari (1988–1994). In a sweeping program of reform to "modernize Mexico" that he outlined in his 1988 inaugural address, his government pushed through revisions in the Mexican Constitution, explicitly including a new legal framework that restored the Catholic Church's juridical personality.^{[4][5][6][7][8]} The majority of Mexicans in the twenty-first century identify themselves as being Catholic, but the growth of other religious groups such as Protestant evangelicals, Mormons, as well as secularism is consistent with trends elsewhere in Latin America. The 1992 federal Act on Religious Associations and Public Worship (Ley de Asociaciones Religiosas y Culto Público), known in English as the Religious Associations Act or (RAA), has affected all religious groups in Mexico.^[9]