Religion

The breakdown of the population of the Philippines by religion is a matter of considerable significance, since it reflects a cultural as well as a psychological division, resulting from a separation produced both by geography and history. The Spaniards soon made Manila their base, and thereafter only the peoples in the extreme north and south were able to escape their grasp. They converted all the inhabitants of the plains to Catholicism, leaving alone only the animists of the interior and the mountainous regions; while the Muslims for their part fiercely defended their separate identity.

The principal religion of the Philippines is Catholicism, though there are some Protestants (Methodists, Lutherans) as well as the Aglipayans or Iglesia ni Kristo, and Muslims and others.