Behavior of average Evangelical vs. Catholic

[VociMike]

The more interesting question for my Roman church brothers is: Why are Roman Catholics as a whole less passionate about their faith than Evangelicals are?

The problem is that this question attempts to compare apples and oranges. The proper question would be “Why are Roman Catholics as a whole less passionate about their faith than Protestants are?”

Do you see the difference?

 

[deb1]

When I tell the catholics I know that I am working very hard on raising my children to be abstinent till marriage or dont allow them to watch MTV or that I want my daughter to marry a Godly man and be a stay at home mom(she will still be going to college:thumbsup: ), you should see the looks I get They are not on the same page. Just goes to show how easy it is to get caught up in worldly beliefs. Does the CC teach you not to get caught up in what the world has to offer and then define what that stuff is? My minister talks about it almost every week.

Again this is subjective on my part. Im sure that is not the case everywhere.

Peace

As far as abstinence, my sister-who attends a Lutheran church, informed me that she has told her 13 year old daughter that she can have sex when she is ready. Um…how do I respond to that and still keep friendly relations with my sister?

I really detest MTV also. I have told my sons that they cannot have it on in our house. Not only is it bad morally but the commentaries on the channel make fun of good behavior and glorify bad, selfish behavior.

 

[JohnnyReb]

I think that the problem with the question is that the op does not define which behavior he considers to be indicative of Christian behavior.

Some protestants don’t curse or drink alcohol. For them this is the epitome of good Christian behavior and anyone else who does differently is a bad Christian.

Personally, I see nothing wrong with moderate drinking or an accidental swear word. I don’t curse because it makes the speaker seem idiotic and of low education, not because I think that an occasional swear word is a sin.

According to some, I would be a bad Christian just based on my light alcohol consumption.

Personally, I think that Christian behavior involves treating other humans with respect and trying to help your fellow man. At the present time, I can’t work in a food bank, but I do give what I can to local charities and I try and help those in need.

Before the Op can get an answer to his question he has to create a list describing which behaviors are Christian and which are not.

I like your thinking. I can tell you what you are saying is true. To be a good protestant (and I speak as a protestant) all you have to do is attend church weekly, don’t drink, smoke or swear, or engage in the three unforgivable Ds…drinking, dancing, divorce, and you are “saved”.

Being Christian is so much more than that. Its more than what not to do…it is also about what you do, the good that you do for you fellow humans.

 

[ALLFORHIM]

As far as abstinence, my sister-who attends a Lutheran church, informed me that she has told her 13 year old daughter that she can have sex when she is ready. Um…how do I respond to that and still keep friendly relations with my sister?

I just have it blocked. I use to watch my neighbors girls and they are allowed to watch MTV and they would try and sneak it at my house so I just blocked it. They were actually mad at me. I told them they could do without for an hour. My daughter and her friends were talking about something on MTV and my daughter told them I dont allow her to watch it and she really doesnt care. I thought that was pretty bold for a 12 year old to say to her friends.

It is not just a catholic/protestant/evangelical problem–it is in every household all over the place no matter religion or denom.

 

[carol_marie]

People are people… there are good & bad examples in both groups.

I think the gallup poll that JesusforMadrid quoted is flawed. HOW did they poll people? Many many people consider themselves Catholic but don’t attend mass so of course their faith isn’t important to them. It’s different w/ Protestant Chuches - someone is only “Assemblies of God” while they are attending that church… if they quit going to switch to something else, they don’t identify with that group anymore.

In my personal experience, Catholics are MUCH more concerned with social justice and taking care of the needy, and feeding the poor. I didn’t hear much of that as an Evangelical. So if the measure of a “good Christian” is
Matthew 25:37, 38 - feeding, clothing, visiting the imprisoned etc. - Catholics win hands down.

 

[Morning_Star15]

I think it’s hard to judge how “Christian” or “Christ-like” somebody is. People here have mentioned that Evangelicals are more visibly Christ-like in church, etc. Yes, that’s something I’ve noticed as well, but how do you know that all the hugging and kissing isn’t just for show and that they’re different people the rest of the week? I’m not saying that’s the case and I don’t mean to offend anyone, but you can’t judge whether someone is “Christ-like” or not by how they behave in church. Evangelical church services tend to be more lively than Catholic ones, so we Catholics have less opportunity to show our “Christ-likeness” during Mass, but that doesn’t mean that we aren’t being Christian in our hearts. There’s the quiet, prayerful, meditative side to Christianity that’s very important as well. Take a look at the Gospels and take note of how many times they mention Jesus praying, or about to go pray, or start a sentence with “After Jesus had finished praying…”. I hate to say it, but I’ve met people who can pray and sing very loudly and can passionately talk about how important their faith is to them, and quote the Bible, etc., but when put in a situation where someone needs their help, their “Christ-like” behaviour vanishes.

Sorry about my rambling, but what I’m trying to get across is that only God Himself really knows how important our Faith is to us, and how much like Him we are. We can ask Him to reveal the truth about ourselves to us, but I just don’t think this is something that can be visibly ascertained on a general level.

God bless,

Karolina

 

[carol_marie]

Sorry about my rambling, but what I’m trying to get across is that **only God Himself really knows how important our Faith is to us, and how much like Him we are. **We can ask Him to reveal the truth about ourselves to us, but I just don’t think this is something that can be visibly ascertained on a general level.

God bless,

Karolina

Well said.

 

[scylla]

Polls usually are stupid as they reflect opinion. Who cares what people think as what we think does not determine truth.

This is useful to see what peoples opinions are but as a reflection of truth of what it correct is pretty much a waste of time. You might as well ask if you like hamburgers with cheese or without, it has the same revelence to truth about Christianity, and if it is better to be an Evangelical or a Catholic.
I know it sounds intolerant as these days everyone feels like their opinion matters, but if you are truly seeking God you opinion is worth nothing, what matters is what does God want you to do?

So both the average Evangelical and Catholic are probably both bad as they both are just average. This means they are lukewarm, and need to change. They need to be a devout, extreme follower of God. They need to go for the narrow gate not for what the majority wants to do.

I have never met an honest Evangelical Pastor after speaking to about 30 in the last year or so, but that doesn’t mean that there are no honest Evangelical Pastors this is just my experience. Of course, I know plenty of crummy Catholics.
Who cares?
What matters is truth.
Heck I know very commited Mormon, so what?

So I would say neither is truly living a Christian life as that demands obedience to God. Now to look like we are living Christian lives we can see that most of us look like we are. We cannot know what is in others hearts but we can ask and find out and it is pretty enlightening if you speak with enough Catholics and Evangelicals with direct questions.
Most will get angry, evasive and many will dodge and not truly want to speak about sin ruth, and there is very few and far between those who will examine their faith and their obedience.

I make it a hobby to visit non-catholic churches and speak to people so maybe that makes me pessimistic though I am optimistic generally about truth and God’s ability to preserve it. I am pretty aware of how we mess it all up though by putting ourselves first.

In Christ
Scylla

 

[30miller]

The answer to this question is fairly clear based on recent Gallup polls.

First, which christian groups are most passionate about their faith? According to a recent Gallup poll, those in the United States who answer “my faith is very important to me” as a share of total church members are roughly like this:

70-80% Southern Baptists, Assembly of God
50-70% Methodists, Presbyterians
30-40% Roman Catholics
20-30% Episcopalians

I am leaving out a few other denominations. Not surprisingly, the Southern Baptist and Assembly of God denominations are also the fastest growing denominations in American (including a large share of Ex Catholics). These are also Evangelical denominations (i.e. a high view of scripture and a low church style). However, there are Evangelicals in the other denominations as well, just not in as high proportions.

Second, define “Christ like” behaviour. Those who are most likely to be against abortion, homosexual marriage, pre marital sex and other “moral values” issues are, according to Gallup, those same denominations. There is a very high correlation between, for example, opposition to abortion and importance of faith. I suspect that if you could compare the 30% of Roman Catholics who say that their faith is very important to the 80% of Assemblies of God who say the same, there would be little difference in their moral attitudes.

However, when we compare Roman Catholics with Evangelicals, we are comparing basically all self-defined Roman Catholics, who proportionally are less “practicing” than Evangelicals. Hence, less “Christ like” attitudes statistically for Roman Catholics.

The exception, from a Roman Catholic point of view, would be on the issue of birth control, which RCs still have statistically higher opposition that the general public and, obviously, than every Protestant group.

If any statistics nerds are interested, I should be glad to post some of these Gallup polls. They come from the Premium Service, so I cannot link them. I have also consulted directly with George Gallup, a fine Evangelical Episcopalian man (yes, there are some). He agrees with the above conclusions.

Another interesting fact is that Evangelicals on the whole give more of their personal finances to church and other non profit causes than do Roman Catholics.

So the answer, at least from a US national perspective, is clear: Evangelicals are more Christ like on “family moral issue”, because statistically speaking, they are more passionate or practicing in their faith.

The more interesting question for my Roman church brothers is: Why are Roman Catholics as a whole less passionate about their faith than Evangelicals are?

For me, if the RC church doesn’t change lives, all your fine apologetics is rather useless, ¿no?

Madrid,
Help me out with this statistics thing: If I take the 30-40% “good” Catholics and tomorrow leave the Church of Rome (a la the origin of all the other groups you mention) , then the statistic on my new subgroup of Christians (which can be added to the 30,000+ protestant subgroups of christianity already extant) would be 100% and would be most likely more “Christ like” than Evangelicals - right? (to use your words and following the methodology of your’s and Gallup’s analysis) . That is how statistics work, isn’t it? 100% beats 70-80%. Now what exactly did I win by schisming the Church even further to win this statistical game - as I surely did win now, didn’t I?
Madrid, watch Marcus Grodi at 8:00 Mondays on EWTN and cross the Tiber yourself. And bring a boatload of the 70-80% along with you - for many of them certainly are the good people that the many posters above me have attested to.

 

[Della]

I didn’t mean to offend anyone here. I have just been to a lot of evangelical churches and they seem to outwardly live more christian lives then catholics. They don’t swear as much, they generally seem to be nicer to eachother, on average they seem to spend more time reading the bible and praying. they also seem more chaste sexually.

A couple of things I don’t think you have considered: Most Evangelical churches are smaller than Catholic ones and everyone knows everybody’s business, which has a tendency to keep people in line. And, there is a lot of pressure to appear holy in Evangelical churches. Catholics don’t judge one another by artificial standards set up by men. In fact, we don’t judge others’ behavior by what we think they ought to do or not do–we let people be people, not mannikins who must behave a certain way in order to be accepted. Nor do we shun people if they decide they no longer want to be one of us, which is all too common among Evangelicals, sad to say.

sometimes I think that in a lot of Catholic lives there is a huge disconnect with what happens at Mass and what goes on in their lives.

it is hard to be a catholic evangelist when all the catholics people know live un christian lives outside of mass.

Oh, there’s disconnect with Evangelical people, too. They just don’t have the freedom to let anyone know about it. And why should anyone live their lives to please another’s sense of decorum? There are worse things than swearing and drinking too much. There’s holding down/abusing one’s wife and children by throwing Bible verses at them. There’s cheating when no one sees. There’s believing the ends justify the means, from which a lot of real wickedness has sprung. And so on…

People have to be free to choose for themselves if they will follow Christ or not. In the Catholic Church no one tries to make you into what they think you ought to be, but let’s you live your life as you think best. We let people fail, but we also help them when they fall–something I have very rarely seen amongst Evangelicals.

 

[ALLFORHIM]

A couple of things I don’t think you have considered: Most Evangelical churches are smaller than Catholic ones and everyone knows everybody’s business, which has a tendency to keep people in line. And, there is a lot of pressure to appear holy in Evangelical churches. Catholics don’t judge one another by artificial standards set up by men. In fact, we don’t judge others’ behavior by what we think they ought to do or not do–we let people be people, not mannikins who must behave a certain way in order to be accepted. Nor do we shun people if they decide they no longer want to be one of us, which is all too common among Evangelicals, sad to say.

Oh, there’s disconnect with Evangelical people, too. They just don’t have the freedom to let anyone know about it. And why should anyone live their lives to please another’s sense of decorum? There are worse things than swearing and drinking too much. There’s holding down/abusing one’s wife and children by throwing Bible verses at them. There’s cheating when no one sees. There’s believing the ends justify the means, from which a lot of real wickedness has sprung. And so on…

People have to be free to choose for themselves if they will follow Christ or not. In the Catholic Church no one tries to make you into what they think you ought to be, but let’s you live your life as you think best. We let people fail, but we also help them when they fall–something I have very rarely seen amongst Evangelicals.

Hi,

Im sure there is truth to what you say. Im just glad my church is nothing like what you are saying about evangelicals I truly have found a church full of people who are genuine. AMEN!! I do feel blessed after hearing so many negative things about other churches spoken of on this forum. I wonder if my church is rare. I hope not.

 

[Jennifer123]

So the answer, at least from a US national perspective, is clear: Evangelicals are more Christ like on “family moral issue”, because statistically speaking, they are more passionate or practicing in their faith.

The more interesting question for my Roman church brothers is: Why are Roman Catholics as a whole less passionate about their faith than Evangelicals are?

For me, if the RC church doesn’t change lives, all your fine apologetics is rather useless, ¿no?

I have to admit I wondered where all the “zeal” for Christ was when I converted. The Catholics I encountered were not at all like the Evangelicals I somewhat knew as a non-Christian.

I learned over the years that I was wrongly judging people’s hearts based on outward appearance. Catholics didn’t raise their hands in prayer like our Evangelical bretheren, not necessarily because they felt too self-conscious and/or didn’t have enough “Spirit” in them, I found they didn’t raise their hands because they just didn’t need to show everyone else how “Spirit-filled” they were.

Catholics have a different sensibility about them based on our different expressions of worship, devotion and piety. Don’t make the same mistake I made, and make assumptions based on shallow observations based on only limited knowledge.

The stats are interesting. But we must remember that Church attendance as a whole is decreasing. And as far as “family moral values”, from what I’ve experienced, the Catholic Church has it in the bag. It’s not about any one particular family’s expression, as wonderful as that is, it’s about the Truth. Truth with a big “T”. How do you know you have it? I get Focus on the Family’s free newsletter. I was shocked to see a recent piece on “beneficial” and “proper” use of contraception. What good are individual expressions of “family values” if the underlying premise is False? A house divided cannot stand.

 

[Caesar]

I dont think it matters which church has a higher percentage of “passionate” faithful. When it comes to morality, it hardly matters what 30% or 50% or even 99% of society thinks as long as you follow the teachings of Christ in regards to morality.

And I certainly believe it is better to be a faithful Evangalical then a fallen-away Catholic: at leas the Evangelical is sincere.

 

[Morning_Star15]

Well said.

Thank you.

 

[RNRobert]

I think there are both good and bad people in both Catholic and Protestant Churches. But I do not think l have seen Protestants with the level of holiness like Mother Teresa or St Francis of Assisi that the Catholic Church has produced (or the Orthodox Churches, for that matter).

 

[Della]

Hi,

Im sure there is truth to what you say. Im just glad my church is nothing like what you are saying about evangelicals I truly have found a church full of people who are genuine. AMEN!! I do feel blessed after hearing so many negative things about other churches spoken of on this forum. I wonder if my church is rare. I hope not.

And my parish, too. I don’t know everyone in it because it is HUGE! But, of the people I do know, they are good, faithful Christians who love God and serve him in their daily lives.

It just rankles me when someone judges Catholics by standards Catholics are not expected to uphold. Besides, no one should judge one Christian against another. Don’t you agree?

 

[Caesar]

I think there are both good and bad people in both Catholic and Protestant Churches. But I do not think l have seen Protestants with the level of holiness like Mother Teresa or St Francis of Assisi that the Catholic Church has produced (or the Orthodox Churches, for that matter).

Yet St. Fancis and Blessed Teresa are rare and extraordinary.

 

[Philthy]

another stupid poll, what does it matter what I think that does not make it true. the poll question should be: based on your personal experience, observations and prejudice, who are bigger sinners . … .

the only way to answer the question would be a scientific sampling of actual persons self-identified with those religions and either self-reported sin–not likely since confession for Catholics is confidential, and rightly so–or objective members such as criminal conviction rates etc.

nobody here is likely to do such research, so why even start this fruitless, pointless, useless discussion which will shed absolutely no light on anything worth knowing, and will only lead to cross accusations, bitterness, recrimination, and personal tall tales of offenses by other people who have hurt them. total waste of time.

I agree. :yup:

 

[McKevin]

The focus of these two brands of Christianity is in such contrast that their behaviours can’t be held to each other’s standards. For example, it is not a sin to miss church on Sunday at the Christian church I grew up in…but it would be a sin for a Catholic to not attend Mass on Sunday…it’s a sin for most evangelicals to even drink a beer…it’s okay if your Catholic…etc…etc…and then we can say that you can group Catholics into one category because we are The Church of God, but the term “evangelical” can refer to a multiple number of protestant churches. In reality, “evangelical” can also refer to Catholics!!!

 

[santaro75]

I get what you mean but I have my hopes for us Catholics. I see some improvements and I’m very hopeful. We have to pray. Don’t be sobby about it, pray, pray, pray. Please pray. Do you pray the Rosary? Please pray it for our Catholic brothers and sisters that need improvement and God’s grace for perfection.

I do pray the rosary and feel that there are a lot of Catholics that do live a devout life.

I think the changes must come from charismatic leaders. our “fathers” and bishops.