"Previous studies have examined the causal link between Protestantism and democratization, primarily in shaping a nation-states cultural ethos and its tendency to affect the outcome of democratic politics. Historically, Protestantism has also been linked to generating a political culture that promotes individualism, tolerance, the pluralism of ideas, and civic associationalism. Recent empirical evidence also shows how Protestant countries are more likely to be democratic compared to largely Islamic and Catholic states. Drawing from established cultural theories, the author empirically tests the argument whether or not transitional states with larger Protestant populations are more likely to strengthen their democracies. Findings indicate that transitional states that have higher Protestant populations are more likely to have higher levels of voice and accountability, political stability, citizenship empowerment, and civil society pluralism. The author contends that transitional states with higher Protestant populations are more likely to consolidate their democracies."
Protestantism is a form of Christianity that emphasizes justification of sinners through faith alone, the teaching that salvation comes by unmerited divine grace, the priesthood of all believers, and the Bible as the sole infallible source of authority for Christian faith and practice. The five solae summarize the basic theological beliefs of mainstream Protestantism.
"For what is specific in the Catholic religion is immortalization and not justification, in the Protestant sense. Rather is this latter ethical. It is from Kant, in spite of what orthodox Protestants may think of him, that Protestantism derived its penultimate conclusions — namely, that religion rests upon morality, and not morality upon religion, as in Catholicism."
Protestantism"Together with Ludger Woessmann, professor of economics at Munich, he started by looking at data from 19th-century Prussia, the society that Weber was born into. The region was split into 450 counties, around two thirds of them predominantly Protestant and the other third Catholic. "Religiosity was more pervasive at that time than it is today," he says, "and it seems that religion was the main driver behind education differences. Protestants were more likely to be encouraged to go to school. And this higher level of education translated into jobs in manufacturing and services rather than agriculture. Accordingly, they earned higher incomes than their Catholic neighbours."
Protestantism"Latin America is still overwhelmingly Catholic. That being said, there has indeed been a very dramatic increase in religious pluralism over the past 20 years. Specifically, there has been a very rapid rise in Protestant conversions to the extent that some countries in Latin America, such as Brazil, Guatemala, Chile and Honduras, have very large Protestant minorities. Looking at the chart you can see Guatemala has about a third – well, close to a third – El Salvador, 25 percent. Belize is a British colony so it’s not surprising it’s 27 percent Protestant; Honduras is 22 percent. Notice – we’ll talk about his later – Mexico is only 6 percent Protestant. And the figures are more symbolic than actually correct, but they give you a sense. In the case of Central America, much of this conversion took place during the 1970s and 1980s during the era of the civil wars. I don’t want to put too fine a point on this or overstate it, but Protestant conversion was to some extent during this period a reaction to the violence and upheaval of the era."
Protestantism"On the one hand, Protestantism attempted to recapture the ore of the Christian commitment by an appeal to the individual’s capacity in the Spirit to read the Scriptures, yet it did not provide the ascesis the praxis to develop noetic perception, so that the person could enter appropriately into the liturgical context within which the Scriptures could be opened for understanding. The individual outside of this context was drawn in different directions by different spirits leading to the diversity of contemporary Protestantism. On the other hand, Roman Catholicism attempted to secure a unity through discursive reasoning and papal authority. Discursive reasoning turned out not to be the support but the enemy of Tradition. Once disconnected from the ascetic life of true theology and noetic understanding, it brought into question all particular content that declared itself as canonical. As a consequence, Roman Catholic moral theology, as well as Roman Catholic bioethics, both brought traditional content into question and broke into a diversity of moral understandings as a discursive reason showed itself unable to establish one particular canonical moral understanding."
Protestantism"Until quite recently, most of the writing on Protestant Christianity in Southeast Asia was from a missiological perspective. While some of this writing is sensitive to the question of how people in Southeast Asia adapted Protestant Christian practice to their local worlds, it was not until the 1980s that a significant number of scholars began to focus attention on how Christian practice in Southeast Asia was shaped by both Christian doctrines and indigenous cultures. Recent work has included studies of the emergence of a Protestant-derived religious movement in nineteenth-century Java; of the linkages between late nineteenth-century Protestant missionary work among the Karo Batak in Sumatra and the expansion of Dutch colonial rule; of the political and economic aspects."
Protestantism"The outcome of the Reformation was the victory, not of Luthers perception of grace in all its purity and costliness, but of the vigilant religious instinct of man for the place where grace is to be obtained at the cheapest price."
Protestantism