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Item Restricted The effects of the intensity of religious practices and beliefs on economic growth among catholic countries(2010-03) Aguilar, Janice H.; Carandang, Nina Herschelica I.; Desierto, DesireeThere have been several empirical researches on the effects of Religion on the Economy. This paper investigates the effects of the intensity of Religious practices and beliefs on Economic Growth of Catholic countries. It further investigates the effects of religious diversity on economic growth as well as on the intensity of religiosity among Catholic countries. Catholic countries are defined to be those in which the Catholic religion has the highest percentage in terms of denomination. We derived a cross-country data set from the panel data set of Barro and McCleary which they used in their empirical research, "Religion and Economic Growth". The data set includes survey questions on Catholic religious beliefs and practices. Using the data on Herfindahl index, we derived the Pluralism index as one minus Herfindahl index as suggested by Barro and McCleary (2003). We conclude that, the intensity of religious practices and beliefs among Catholic countries have a positive effect on economic growth. This verified that the findings of Barro and McCleary still hold for Catholic countries as we defined. We also found out that the diversity of religion has a negative impact on economic growth of Catholic countries and that the economic theory for religious market as described by Iannaccone (1991) does not explain the intensity of Catholic beliefs and practices.