Catholic Support for LGBTQ People (Mostly) Continues to Grow

The Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) released its “2025 American Values Atlas,” revealing where Americans stand on LGBTQ protections and equality, with mostly positive news about Catholics’ opinions.

The report was conducted between February and December of 2025 and surveyed 22,000 Americans across all 50 states. The overall findings show that a majority of Americans support same-sex marriage, equal protections, and access to business services regardless of sexuality or identity.

The survey gathered opinions based on both religious and political affiliations and found that one in ten Americans identify as LGBTQ, with 20% of younger Americans (ages 18–29) identifying as such.

“I think one thing that comes from these reports year after year is that there is no monolithic position on LGBTQ rights,” Melissa Deckman, PRRI’s Chief Executive Officer said. “And in fact, we find among most Americans of faith there’s broad support for nondiscrimination protections and marriage equality.”

Deckman credits Pope Francis’ warmer welcome to LGBTQ individuals in the Catholic Church, as well as early indications that Pope Leo will follow suit. This, paired with greater visibility of LGBTQ individuals in public life, has made support for the community feel more personal.

“We’ve seen an increase in support for rights for LGBTQ Americans — to same-sex marriage, in part because many Americans, including Catholics, have family members or friends who are LGBTQ, and that has led to a growing level of support for rights for LGBTQ Americans writ large, Catholics included,” she said.

In regard to most LGBTQ issues, Catholics overall tend to be more supportive of the LGBTQ community than white evangelical Protestants, who register as the least supportive religious group toward LGBTQ individuals in the survey.

Notably, there is a slight variance along ethnic/racial lines within the Catholic subset, with Hispanic Catholics marginally more supportive of LGBTQ equality than white Catholics — a difference researchers attribute in part to Hispanic communities’ familiarity with marginalization.

Friction emerges, however, between general support and specific policy when it comes to transgender Americans. On the broad question, support remains strong: Jewish Americans and non-Christian denominations show at least 80% support for equality for transgender Americans, while Catholic subsets register only slightly lower — 75% of Hispanic Catholics and 73% of white Catholics support equal protections. But those numbers shift when the questions become more specific.

On legislation requiring transgender individuals to use bathrooms associated with their sex at birth, 62% of white Catholics express support — a drop of more than ten points from their generalized support for transgender equality.

Deckman puts it plainly: “I think in some ways the devil is always in the details. When you ask about the specific policy concerning transgender Americans, there tends to be less support for those rights, and so the bathroom bills are a great example.”

In terms of the number of LGBTQ+ people identifying with faith groups, the trend for Catholics follows the trend for other faith groups. The report states:

“. . . LGBTQ Americans are half as likely as all Americans to identify with a white Christian group (18% vs. 40%), including white evangelical Protestant (4% vs. 14%), white mainline/non-evangelical Protestant (7% vs. 12%), and white Catholic (6% vs. 12%). LGBTQ Americans are also less likely than all Americans to identify as Christians of color (19% vs. 25%), though this gap is considerably smaller than the one among white Christians.”

The report also shows that factors beyond religious affiliation play a role in decisiveness from geography to political party.

A striking find in this report was that young Republicans (ages 18-29) in America saw a decrease in support of nondiscrimination protections. In 2015 support among this group was 74% and dropped to 50% when the survey was conducted last year. Deckman believes that the reason for this drastic drop is that while many think of younger Americans as being more liberal, or in the case of those identifying as Republican as more moderately focused, it could be that these individuals remaining in the party are more conservative-minded and adhere to the beliefs of the party’s base.

Geography was also an indicator of individual opinions. Deep red states like Mississippi and Arkansas fell below a majority in supporting nondiscrimination protections whereas Mid-Atlantic and Northeast states like Maryland, Massachusetts and the District of Columbia were overwhelmingly in support. 

—Matthew Gorczyka, New Ways Ministry, April 6, 2026