| Sumario: | Using data from the 1972-1996 General Social Surveys, no difference greater than sampling variation is found between Protestants and Catholics in the most recent 5-year period (1992-1996) in the proportion holding either a pro-life or a pro-choice position on abortion. Sociological factors underlying this convergene are found to be: a steep decline in church attendance over the period among Catholics, but not Protestants increasing variance from church teaching even among the highly committed, and strong polarisation in opinion by age. A loglinear model fitting contrasting linear trends for Protestants and Catholics in successive 5-year categories of age, cohort and period provides an extremely close fit to the data. However, younger, highly committed Protestants (even liberal Protestants) are growing much more restrictive and while younger, highly committed Catholics are growing much more permissive on abortion. This combination of within-group polarization and between-group convergence provides qualified support for the thesis of religious restructuring advanced by Wuthnow and Hunter, but more detailed analysis reveals complex countercurrents of opinion that defy theoretical systematization. It is argued that the future behavior of the opposing trends - whether they continue, producing a new divergence, or diminish, producing continued equivalence - will adjudicate between theoretical strategies for future research.
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