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MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines has continued to lead the total number of Catholic baptisms in the world, according to the Vatican’s statistical yearbook.
Quoting the Apostolic Nunciature in Manila, the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines news agency reported that the Philippines had 1.6 million newly baptized Catholics in 2020, according to the Vatican’s Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae (Statistical Yearbook of the Church).
Next to the Philippines is Mexico, which recorded 1.53 million baptisms, and Brazil with 1.12 million.
In 2019, the Philippines also topped the list of Catholic baptisms around the world.
READ: PH remains Asia’s Catholic bulwark
“I am glad to share that the Philippines has the highest number of baptisms in 2020 compared to other places in the world,” Apostolic Nuncio to the Philippines Archbishop Charles Brown said over Radio Veritas on Monday.
Brown also said the statistics is “a living testament of faith in the 500 years of Catholicism in the country.”
The first baptism in the country occurred on April 14, 1521, after some 800 natives, including Cebu’s chieftain, Rajah Humabon, and his wife, Hara Humamay, were baptized that day.
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