QUANTO INTERESSA A RELIGIÃO CATÓLICA AOS JOVENS? UM ESTUDO A PARTIR DO CASO PORTUGUÊS

Looking at the generation of grandparents, one could say that an authentic Portuguese was one who sought to identify his or her life with the truths of faith, which acted as an objective referent that gave meaning to their behaviors and attitudes. But the generation of young people is no longer so, and not because they are not authentic, but because the contexts in which they live, the families they have, the school that forms gthem, the questions they ask now are very different from their grandparents. That said, this study, using a quantitative and qualitative methodology, based on primary and secondary data, aims to analyze how young people live their religious dimension. Through the 2014 European Social Survey, it was concluded that, in Portuguese society, four out of ten young people do not have any link or relationship with the Catholic religion, a factor that shows a tendency towards the demise of the socio-cultural identity of the Catholic matrix in Portugal. The religious expression of young Catholics shows that their Christian identity is not based on an assiduous experience of their principles and values but is essentially the result of a cultural and family heritage that is not anchored in regular religious practices.