Madrid

Religious Statistics

Considerable statistical evidence indicates that the number of minority religions in Madrid is increasing. This growth is taking place within a general framework of legal freedom that possesses both a domestic and a European side. Roman Catholicism is the major religion in Madrid, with Islam the second largest faith. A large Jewish community is also found in Madrid, but it was only after the 19th century that Jews were permitted to enter the country. Madrid hosts the largest number of religious confessions, according to government officials. The most recent government census, taken in 2009, indicated that the largest communities of immigrants from predominantly Islamic countries were located in the autonomous communities of Catalonia, Andalucía, Madrid, Valencia, and Murcia. Madrid also hosts a number of foreign missionaries of evangelical Christian, Mormon, Orthodox, Buddhist, and Islamic faiths.

The democratic political system established by the Spanish constitution of 1978 promoted the religious pluralism that currently characterizes Spain in general and the city of Madrid in particular. The legal regulation applicable to Madrid in religion, as in the rest of Spain, protects religious freedom and prohibits discrimination for religious reasons. Consequently, today Madrid civil society is defined by multiculturalism, religious pluralism, and one of the highest European levels of religious freedom. Apart from the Catholic community, which constitutes the great majority of religious adherents, the major religious communities established in Madrid are the Evangelicals, Muslims, Jews, Orthodox Christians, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Jehovah's Witnesses, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, Baha'is, Unification Church, and Church of Scientology.

Religious History

The religious culture of Madrid is based on a variety of influences. The Visigothic kingdom left a sense of a united Christian Hispania that would [Page 728]later be consolidated in the Reconquista period following centuries of Muslim rule. The first settlements of Muslims and Jews occurred in the ninth century, when the city of Madrid was founded. Protestant minorities were settled in Madrid in the first half of the 19th century. However, intolerance against religious minorities in the period 1492 to 1609 defined Madrid until the 19th century as a Catholic city.

The Spanish Constitution of the Second Republic (1931) recognized religious freedom and supported the establishment of several religious minorities in Madrid, but following the Civil War (1936–1939), religious freedom and religious pluralism did not exist under the military dictatorship of General Francisco Franco, until his death in 1975 and the restoration of the monarchy. During the military dictatorship, Roman Catholicism was the only religion with a legal status; other worship services could not be advertised, and only the Roman Catholic Church could own property and exercise rights. This close cooperation was formalized in a Concordat with the Vatican in 1953, which granted the Church an extraordinary set of privileges: mandatory canonical marriages for all Catholics; exemption from government taxation and payment of priests’ salaries and the establishment of a budget for the Church; subsidies for new building construction and the reconstruction of church buildings damaged by the war; censorship of materials the Church considered offensive; the right to establish universities, to operate radio stations, and to publish newspapers and magazines; protection from police intrusion into Church property; mandatory Catholic religious instruction, even in public schools; and exemption of the clergy from military service. Franco secured in return the right to name Roman Catholic bishops in Spain as well as veto power over appointments of clergy down to the parish priest level.

...