O
otjm
Guest
According to the Gallup poll, the decline in attendance at Mass started in about 1957-1958 which was well before Vatican 2.
- Status
U
Unitas
Guest
Your little comparison would work if Rome (Catholicism) and Medina/Mecca (Islam) were morally equivalent, which they are not.
S
Sure
Guest
This doesn’t make any sense…31.4% raised as Catholics and 2.6% converted…so what about the other 66%? They were neither raised as Catholics nor converted?
D
DustinsDad
Guest
R
Rolltide
Guest
Correct. These are not the percentages of Catholics, but the percentages of all people living in America. 31.4% of AMERICANS were raised Catholic, 2.6% of AMERICANS converted to Catholicism, and 10% of AMERICANS are former Catholics.
By the way, 2.6% of Americans means that, in raw numbers, the Catholic Church has managed to convert about 7.8 million Americans.
D
DustinsDad
Guest
And Satan is smart, he will use the Muslims to get Christians in this country to further secularize, to further trade the truth of Christ for the new false god of religiously indifferent (i.e. agnostic/athiestic) democracy.
You demonstrate how successful His strategy is. And the faithful should pray and fast and prepare to “hunker down” - it’s gonna get worse before it gets better.
Click below to listen to an MP3 of a great talk that describes the present situation and the meaning behind the Social Reign of Christ the King:
The Kingship of Christ or the Kingship of Satan
Peace in Christ,
DustinsDad
C
Chancellare
Guest
It is not clear what you mean by “loyalty to the Catholic Church, not the USA”.
For example, are we going to bomb Iraq in the name of Catholicism? Or stop illegal immigration for the sake of promoting Catholicism? Or aborting more fetuses to correct the population of non-Catholics in USA? Or are we going to stop paying IRS and divert our taxes to Vatican?
Failing to define the exact issue, any question in this direction can only lead to the ridiculous.
If ever there is one substantive issue, this was answered already 2000 years ago when Christ said “Render unto Caesar…”
With the exception of the above, this question fails in any sensibility test.
B
Brennan_Doherty
Guest
The 1957-58 decline did not continue. It dropped, then upticked in 1960, then held steady from '61 to '65. Then the downard trend, which “just happened” to start in 1965 (I wonder what happened then?) continued unabated until 1975 and really even beyond that 'til 1997 with some fluctuations.
Maybe the changes to the Holy Week liturgy didn’t help in the 50’s (I know Evelyn Waugh detested them).
Here is the graph (see the second graph down):
cara.georgetown.edu/AttendPR.pdf
J
JRKH
Guest
If I were to say that my first commitment is to God, would you also say that that is un-American?
Just what is an “American Attitude”
And who said it wouldn’t remain with the USA.
The Catholic Church helps to guide it’s memebers just as any other denomination does. Can you tell me that the RCC is the only church/denomination/faith group that is politically active? Of course not.
The RCC preaches morality. It encourages it’s members of act and even vote a certain way. But once a person is in the voting booth, they are on their own to vote their conscience. - And that my friend is the American way.
Peace
James
B
Brother_John
Guest
Which is what I’ve been saying for years. Vatican II could well have been a pre-emptive strike to prevent mass defections from the Church.
Countless outside influences were already at work to undermine faith and the Church.
Smarter people than you or I took on the challenge of leading the Church through turbulent times.
S
Steadfast
Guest
A lot of good discussion here:
I hate to be the guy who farts in church (pardon the expression), but I wonder how much of the Catholic diaspora have left over the recent priestly scandals?
I don’t think it’s anything like a majority, I am sure that the largest portion of those who have left have done so due to “market forces” (Brilliant post, btw, DustinsDad), but if only a small fraction of the actual percentage is because of this it can certainly be said to have contributed to the decline.
I hate to be the guy who farts in church (pardon the expression), but I wonder how much of the Catholic diaspora have left over the recent priestly scandals?
I don’t think it’s anything like a majority, I am sure that the largest portion of those who have left have done so due to “market forces” (Brilliant post, btw, DustinsDad), but if only a small fraction of the actual percentage is because of this it can certainly be said to have contributed to the decline.
C
catherineajt
Guest
I’ll admit that the lawsuits and the scandals were a mitigating factor in my family’s conversion to Orthodoxy…only to find out that the OCA has its own problems as far as that goes, and between that and other issues it wasn’t worth being out of communion with our families and with Rome. So we came back to the Catholic Church.
A
ASimpleSinner
Guest
Earth.
A
ASimpleSinner
Guest
9 out of 10 times I have found that the folks who claim to be leaving over the scandals (which affected >2% of priests! ) aren’t leaving JUST because of that… A lot of times I even feel that the scandal is just the expedient “flashpoint” that isn’t often the real or main issue.
Anecdotally, one woman I know who went Episcopalian had been decrying the Catholic Church’s teaching on artificial birth control and the ban on women’s ordination for years. There is no possible way to justify going to the Episcopalians (or any other mainline church that is older than a few years!) if really your only motivation is to escape scandal… NEWSFLASH: Everyone has it! Every body of clergy out there suffers at least 2% “scandal factor”. Going Episcopal for her could only have been about finding a community that agrees with her. Otherwise she will be back at square one when she finds out about some scandal or another there.
H
HOPEFUL_IN_UK
Guest
I agree with what you’ve said. I’ve noticed that in people, myself. Now, the actual victims would be different. If some of them have ceased to be Catholic, I wouldn’t be able to blame them, really.
As for the OP… I don’t know if there’s anything that we can DO about it except continue on course and try to not be discouraged. I think the numbers of people ceasing to call themselves Catholic are likely to increase at a faster and faster rate. I also think, “They’ll be back.” The Church will still be there for them when they realize they want the Truth.
A
ASimpleSinner
Guest
I mostly agree with you. The only thing I would change is I do think there is a small but effective action we can take. Making greater efforts to really have Catholic education and encouraging our priests to use their ten min of sermon time to cover a basic of the faith once a week could have a tremendous effect if even 15% of Catholic parishes nationwide (not already doing so) did so.
The number of people who fall through the cracks and don’t really understand or can’t explain the faith are “ripe for the pickens” when it comes to either just dropping out of practicing any faith, or being talked into joinging an Evangelical community which takes advantage of the Catholic being mostly ignorant about a lot of their Catholic faith, but in fact actually have enough basic formation (believe in God, knows Bible is God’s word, believes in Jesus) to be “sold” by folks who come with teachings that sound cogent and ask tough questions that these poorly formed Catholics can’t answer, and then assume that all Catholics don’t have the answers!
Everytime some hapless co-worker wants to harp on me for being “all Catholic” (and I don’t talk much about it at work, they only know I take Sunday mornings off for church)… Well everytime they say something pedantic like “Yea I was raised all Catholic in a real Catholic family, and I don’t believe in any of that %#%#!!”…
I ask: “You were raised ‘real catholic’ eh?”
Them: “Yea.”
ME: “Can you name the sacraments of initiation? The three levels of holy orders?”
NO, none of them ever can. And it never occurs to them that going to Mass every sunday may still have left them not knowing much about their faith.
B
Brother_John
Guest
Just remember, we are created in God’s image and likeness
S
Sure
Guest
If you were in math class and said the decline began in 1966 or 67, you would get the answer wrong. The correct answer would be 1958.
There was a gradual decline from 1958-1966, a sharper decline from 1966-1971, and then a return to another gradual decline from 1972-1984 or so. You could blame the 1966-1971 on Vatican II or you could blame it on massive social upheaval (think '68 Democratic convention, woodstock, free love, marijuana, etc.) - there was juuuuust a bit of rebelliousness going on with the millions of baby boomers ages 16-30.
B
Brother_John
Guest
:tiphat:
A
ASimpleSinner
Guest
That would explain a few things!Just remember, we are created in God’s image and likeness
- Status