Ex-Catholics being counted as Catholics

[Nixbits]

As an aside, I wonder what would be the reaction if a worldwide atheist organisation (if there were such a thing) declared that the number of atheists is 7.3 billion, without clearly stating how they reach this figure. The organisation would explain, if pressed to do so, that all persons in the first few years of life are incapable of understanding the concept of a god. This initial period of lack of belief leaves a permanent pattern in the mind. Hence, ‘once an atheist, always an atheist’. And there s no way to undo this permanent underlying atheism.

I suspect that such an attitude would not meet with universal acceptance amongst those that profess a religious faith.

More seriously, I completely agree with Mike from NJ. I was perplexed to learn that, according to the teaching of the Catholic Church, I’m still a Catholic and always will be because I was baptised as a baby. This happened because my mother was a Catholic and my father a protestant (CofE) and they were only allowed to marry in a Catholic church if they agreed to raise their children as Catholics. I recently discovered that my mother was raised Catholic for the same reason - her father was Catholic but her mother was protestant (CofE). This rule on marriage was a shrewd way to increase the numbers.

Because of the ‘once a Catholic, always a Catholic’ approach, there must be large numbers of atheist Catholics, Muslim Catholics and pagan Catholics, amongst others. When I mentioned this on a previous thread last year, it seemed to ruffle a few feathers and the entire thread was unceremoniously deleted. Perhaps I unwittingly breached forum rules, or else I scratched a nerve that a moderator found too painful. I will probably never know.

 

[Reuben_J]

This rule on marriage was a shrewd way to increase the numbers.

Because of the ‘once a Catholic, always a Catholic’ approach, there must be large numbers of atheist Catholics, Muslim Catholics and pagan Catholics, amongst others. When I mentioned this on a previous thread last year, it seemed to ruffle a few feathers and the entire thread was unceremoniously deleted. Perhaps I unwittingly breached forum rules, or else I scratched a nerve that a moderator found too painful. I will probably never know.

I am quite perplexed to see the bedeviled with number here.

My feathers would absolutely not ruffled and search me what is too painful about it?

The condition for Catholic to enter a mixed marriage is just a condition of Catholic marriage - one of which is to bring up the children in the faith. That is part of the marriage vows on which the priest would solemnize your marriage. If a Catholic does not want a Catholic marriage, then go for civil marriage. Thats not the end of everything. But if you still want to be Catholic, then obey Catholic belief, thats all.

The bedeviling with numbers, such as an insinuation to attempt to misrepresent or inflate the figure, is all atheists imagination based on their way of thought, bigger, more, being better.

To the Catholics, that issue does not arise. Some may try to argue it like that, but true Catholics would probably tend to minimize it. Christians will find great revival when they realize there is threat to their religion, when they find that their number is dwindling and when many of them leave the faith. The great explosion of Christianity was during early Christianity, when there was persecution.

But even if not, Catholics are under no illusion of their number. Baptism record is Church method to gauge their population. Such figure, at best would only give you a general trend. Real number would be seen at mass or people attending church. Every parish knows how big, roughly is its congregation.

The trend of Catholic population can only be studied through statistic in a time span over a period of time. Is the Baptism increased, slowing down or decrease?

But this is a good thread. At least one can see how the argument develops. .

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

Farbeit from me to “bedevil with numbers” as highlighted by Reuben, nor to accuse anyone else of doing.

I merely wonder in passing if incidentally as a spin-off, the notion of “OCAC” is found to be a convenient way for some Archbishops of projecting that they can politically mobilise so many millions of “Papal troops”. Is this in the spirit of David when he arranged a census and against the spirit accepted by Gideon when he was guided to only have a small force of 300 for a crucial operation?

The real reason behind OCAC is very simple. In the light of the wider definition of “Extra ecclesiam nulla salus” i.e the Christian churches that have stemmed from the one Church, and as has been pointed out, it is about defining the absence of need for rebaptism. Both before and after Constantine many people left the Catholic faith in practice, and with various implications. Many factions advocated convoluted rules imposing rebaptism. Inevitably the validity of baptism got more and more called into question.

Very legitimately the OP raised the thread from the personal and emotional angle. How do we assert ourselves as individuals in the universe and before the God of our understanding, in sincerity, when we have got qualms about the people who have got entangled up in spiritual matters along our path?

Let’s face it power-wielders of all kinds are doing the same every day of our lives, especially politicians and commerce. It is encumbent on us to get them all out of our hair and ensure they don’t have a hold on us, not just the religious ones.

In other words just not care what they think. What is important is the doors the invisible God leaves open (which we maybe didn’t explore much in the first place), not what doors people with baggage might be clanging on about. Many people advocate our studying Holy Scriptures besides the Roman Catholics, and always the whole lot is needed, not only the fragments “deemed” to grind certain people’s axes.

God meant to meet us somehow in a way that would unfold as it went, whether the people that did it were single-minded or not. This is the way to go for those of us who are “happy” to carry on being called Catholics just as much as those of us who want to have distance from the badge.

Hanging around the excellent CAF and just unfolding our newspaper, it’s easy to get an overdose of grandstanding and megaphoning propagandists, moralisers etc. It’s just as hard work for us all whatever our position on the religion scale.

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

In some ethnic sub-cultures over the centuries, “remaining Catholic” additionally and incidentally signalled social stability, e.g in Ireland, one wasn’t losing one’s solidarity with the oppressed - itself a very good value to maintain.

 

[Padres1969]

I am quite perplexed to see the bedeviled with number here.

My feathers would absolutely not ruffled and search me what is too painful about it?

The condition for Catholic to enter a mixed marriage is just a condition of Catholic marriage - one of which is to bring up the children in the faith. That is part of the marriage vows on which the priest would solemnize your marriage. If a Catholic does not want a Catholic marriage, then go for civil marriage. Thats not the end of everything. But if you still want to be Catholic, then obey Catholic belief, thats all.

The bedeviling with numbers, such as an insinuation to attempt to misrepresent or inflate the figure, is all atheists imagination based on their way of thought, bigger, more, being better.

To the Catholics, that issue does not arise. Some may try to argue it like that, but true Catholics would probably tend to minimize it. Christians will find great revival when they realize there is threat to their religion, when they find that their number is dwindling and when many of them leave the faith. The great explosion of Christianity was during early Christianity, when there was persecution.

But even if not, Catholics are under no illusion of their number. Baptism record is Church method to gauge their population. Such figure, at best would only give you a general trend. Real number would be seen at mass or people attending church. Every parish knows how big, roughly is its congregation.

The trend of Catholic population can only be studied through statistic in a time span over a period of time. Is the Baptism increased, slowing down or decrease?

But this is a good thread. At least one can see how the argument develops. .

It will be interesting how Catholic numbers are impacted then in the next 30-50 years in the west. So far the Catholic Church hasn’t seen quite the drop off in adherents as Mainline Protestantism, but then a part of that may be the delayed effect counting only baptisms since it takes a generation or more to see any trends develop that are happening currently.

 

[pepipop]

In some ethnic sub-cultures over the centuries, “remaining Catholic” additionally and incidentally signalled social stability, e.g in Ireland, one wasn’t losing one’s solidarity with the oppressed - itself a very good value to maintain.

That could be said of any religion in the world and not necessarily in relation to oppression, but to dominate also. E.G. Remaining Protestant in the North of Ireland, the UK, in parts of the USA, Canada, etc… and many countries in Europe.

No doubt, this trait will occur similarly with Islam, Buddhism, etc… just a cultural fact of life.

 

[pepipop]

It will be interesting how Catholic numbers are impacted then in the next 30-50 years in the west. So far the Catholic Church hasn’t seen quite the drop off in adherents as Mainline Protestantism, but then a part of that may be the delayed effect counting only baptisms since it takes a generation or more to see any trends develop that are happening currently.

Precisely, baptism numbers are the only ‘real’ way of presenting accurate trends.

Numbers of attendees at individual parishes are also taken annually. Our parish increased by 200 this year.

 

[Padres1969]

Precisely, baptism numbers are the only ‘real’ way of presenting accurate trends.

Not really. My point was that they’re inaccurate at the present time and the RCC won’t be aware of any change for 30-60 years after it happens. The RCC could be in the same situation in the west as Mainline Protestantism, or worse, today, and wouldn’t necessarily know about it or publicly acknowledge it for decades. I mean as it is RCC numbers in the US would be roughly where most of Mainline Protestantism is, if not for the immigrant numbers bolstering losses. Throw in the delayed reaction counting only baptisms does and the RCC in the west…

Mind you my concern comes from my own life experience. As I’ve got a family and friend groups full of people who the RCC is still counting as part of it’s membership from the last two generations, who are not actually Catholic anymore (and in some cases not even Christian anymore). If I’d have to estimate I’d say about 1/3rd are still “cultural Catholics”, and less than 10% are actually still active Catholics.

 

[pepipop]

Not really. My point was that they’re inaccurate at the present time and the RCC won’t be aware of any change for 30-60 years after it happens. The RCC could be in the same situation in the west as Mainline Protestantism, or worse, today, and wouldn’t necessarily know about it or publicly acknowledge it for decades. I mean as it is RCC numbers in the US would be roughly where most of Mainline Protestantism is, if not for the immigrant numbers bolstering losses. Throw in the delayed reaction counting only baptisms does and the RCC in the west…

Mind you my concern comes from my own life experience. As I’ve got a family and friend groups full of people who the RCC is still counting as part of it’s membership from the last two generations, who are not actually Catholic anymore (and in some cases not even Christian anymore). If I’d have to estimate I’d say about 1/3rd are still “cultural Catholics”, and less than 10% are actually still active Catholics.

If your friends haven’t been Catholics for two generations, why was the latter generation baptised Catholic,if the older generation had left the church? Obviously,cultural reasons plays a part and is no doubt a large reason for any religion in the world surviving and flourishing - family values carried through with children marrying in their respective religions, etc… however if people truly leave any faith, further generations would not be baptised, as the former generation would have left.

An estimate can be put forward about anything.

It is impossible to measure ‘current practicing Catholics’, especially as there is over 1.2 billion Catholics, worldwide.

There is no manageable way to count those that leave, then return, and/ or ask for last rights on their deathbed, want a Catholic burial, etc. Possibly, if people didn’t move around, and everyone remained in their original parishes it would be easy enough - but that does not happen anymore.

Number crunching for individual protestant denominations is much, more manageable, as the 800 million protestants worldwide, is further divided across ~ 30,000 denominations.

Needless to say, some denominations, for example, Lutherian has approximately 75 million members worldwide, which is still relatively more manageable than 1.2 billion.

It would seem no one Protestant denomination has numbers greater than ~ 75 million.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_Protestant_churches

Other Protestant denominations will number around 1-2 million, and others much, much less, hence numbers can be maintained very easily in such denominations.

 

[Peter_J]

True. At the same time no one has stepped up to disagree with Father Grondin to say he is incorrect as to how the Yearbook tallies the number of Catholics, so at the very least I’m going to assume he is correct until shown otherwise.

I might have mis-spoken a bit: I said “it’s a little weird for me to be on a thread that’s partially about said priest, especially since I’ve never met him and know almost nothing about him”, but it would certainly also be weird for me if there were a thread on this forum about my own parish priest.

But I also have to say that this ^^ comment makes me very curious about the parish(es) that you used to go to. In my experience, if people disagree with something the priest says, they generally don’t tell him but just start going to a different parish. (If even that: I don’t think it’s at all unusual for someone to quietly listen to things they disagree with week after week and not change parish.) But I digress.

 

[Peter_J]

P.S. I’ll respond to more of your post, Mike, as time permits; but for the moment I think I had better stress something which I don’t think has been said yet: Although we do draw a distinction, in principle, between ex-Catholic and “never-been-Catholic”, such a distinction is hardly ever made for ordinary everyday intents and purposes.

there must be large numbers of atheist Catholics, Muslim Catholics and pagan Catholics, amongst others.

Hi Nixbits. Don’t believe things just because they are posted on catholic.com. There are atheist ex-Catholics and there are Catholic ex-atheists. (And so on for the others.)

 

[Padres1969]

If your friends haven’t been Catholics for two generations, why was the latter generation baptised Catholic,if the older generation had left the church? Obviously,cultural reasons plays a part and is no doubt a large reason for any religion in the world surviving and flourishing - family values carried through with children marrying in their respective religions, etc… however if people truly leave any faith, further generations would not be baptised, as the former generation would have left.

An estimate can be put forward about anything.

It is impossible to measure ‘current practicing Catholics’, especially as there is over 1.2 billion Catholics, worldwide.

There is no manageable way to count those that leave, then return, and/ or ask for last rights on their deathbed, want a Catholic burial, etc. Possibly, if people didn’t move around, and everyone remained in their original parishes it would be easy enough - but that does not happen anymore.

**Number crunching for individual protestant denominations is much, more manageable, as the 800 million protestants worldwide, is further divided across ~ 30,000 denominations. **

Needless to say, some denominations, for example, Lutherian has approximately 75 million members worldwide, which is still relatively more manageable than 1.2 billion.

It would seem no one Protestant denomination has numbers greater than ~ 75 million.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_Protestant_churches

Other Protestant denominations will number around 1-2 million, and others much, much less, hence numbers can be maintained very easily in such denominations.

Ok that’s an argument I can possibly accept as a reason the RCC chooses to use the baptism numbers beyond theological reasons. Except that is assuming the job couldn’t be broken up locally by diocese which presumably would have much more manageable numbers.

As for why generations would continue to baptize succeeding generations despite not really being Catholic in my experience it’s been a cultural thing more than anything. The “Greatest Generation” baptized their children, “Baby Boomers”, out of a combo of faith, shame and cultural expectation imparted from the preceding generation. The following Generation, Baby Boomers, who baptized the Millennial generation did so almost exclusively out of cultural expectation. And the Millennials who grew up listed Catholic but not really raised Catholic no longer even feel that cultural expectation, as in many cases they weren’t even really Catholic to begin with, and most of them are not baptizing their children Catholic, or often at all.

 

[commenter]

Ok that’s an argument I can possibly accept as a reason the RCC chooses to use the baptism numbers beyond theological reasons. Except that is assuming the job couldn’t be broken up locally by diocese which presumably would have much more manageable numbers.

You’re trying to fit Catholics into a Protestant paradigm, of course it is not a great fit.

• Diocesan figures themselves are approximations. People change parishes, move to other cities without registering in any parish, they belong to 2 parishes or dioceses simultaneously, they go away to college or the Service, they are involved in both Latin and Eastern Catholic Churches, ethnic and territorial parishes, and so on.
• Protestant figures invariably focus on number of individuals, Catholic parishes count number of families. Translating “families” into “individuals” is a loose approximation.
• I have a friend who leaves the Catholic Church, on average, once a year. But only on some things. YOU try measuring her.
• GK Chesterton was clearly Catholic long before his formal entrance.
• Being “in the Faith” is one thing, being “in the Church” is another thing.

They only bother to gather raw figures because it gives a rough sense of describing a region; that rural Georgia is a different kind of pastoral challenge than Rhode Island. Chicago likely has a greater concentration of Catholic institutions, per 100,000 Catholics, than Los Angeles.

There’s a great deal about Baptist figures I don’t understand; why and how they count # of Salvations at crusades, why they count unbaptized children for some purposes, but not other reasons, and other issues. But why should Baptists gather figures to meet my Catholic expectations? They wouldn’t expect to have to defend their statistics to someone else. I figure, it’s their data, they know how to use it.

(Again, there’s an extreme interest among Protestants in how the Catholic Church defines things; not referring to CAF, but in general).

 

[pepipop]

Ok that’s an argument I can possibly accept as a reason the RCC chooses to use the baptism numbers beyond theological reasons. Except that is assuming the job couldn’t be broken up locally by diocese which presumably would have much more manageable numbers.

As for why generations would continue to baptize succeeding generations despite not really being Catholic in my experience it’s been a cultural thing more than anything. The “Greatest Generation” baptized their children, “Baby Boomers”, out of a combo of faith, shame and cultural expectation imparted from the preceding generation. The following Generation, Baby Boomers, who baptized the Millennial generation did so almost exclusively out of cultural expectation. And the Millennials who grew up listed Catholic but not really raised Catholic no longer even feel that cultural expectation, as in many cases they weren’t even really Catholic to begin with, and most of them are not baptizing their children Catholic, or often at all.

Which can be said for every religion on earth. Muslims continue the tradition of bringing their children up as Muslims, Protestants baptise their kids within their denominations, hindu’s, buddhists, etc… so that statement can be applied to all numbers recorded for all religions. Not all Protestants will be practicing their faith either but may have married in it to appease families and baptised their children in their faith - it is NOT specific to Catholics.

It cannot be broken up per diocese, as most people, particularly in the Western world, lives elsewhere, whether it be for college, marriage, job opportunity reasons, etc.

It’s just not feasible. I left my original parish decades ago, and have not ‘registered’ with a parish since but have attended mass each Sunday since then, in numerous countries whilst working overseas and for the past decade in Ireland.

Also, the number of lapsed Catholics that would actually admit to ‘themselves’ that they had completely ‘left’ the faith may not be too high, as evidenced by the continued baptisms.

If anyone is completely against their faith and wants nothing whatsoever to do with it, they do not carry on being associated with that religion, be it for cultural or any other reason, and definitely do not baptise their children into their ‘ex-faith’.

It is assumed that ex-Muslims, Protestants, etc… would not baptise or register their children within their ex-faiths either.

So baptism is the only practical way to register numbers, in the CC, as each parish has to keep a record of all baptisms, which are then collated centrally.

 

[TCEL]

Forgive me for being late to the punch, or for any repetition, but I thought something similar occurs in Judaism, except Jewishness is determined by matrimony (the mother) instead of Baptism? Hence, atheist Jews. Jewish atheism is an odd concept for me, but I think there are some parallels between Judaism and Catholicism here.

 

[SyroMalankara]

Forgive me for being late to the punch, or for any repetition, but I thought something similar occurs in Judaism, except Jewishness is determined by matrimony (the mother) instead of Baptism? Hence, atheist Jews. Jewish atheism is an odd concept for me, but I think there are some parallels between Judaism and Catholicism here.

Very good. Theologically, through baptism, the Church becomes the baptized person’s mother. Hence Catholic. Tribe is determined by Father, so if ones Father is Latin Catholic the children are Latins, if dad is Syriac Catholic the kids are Syriac, if Ukrainian etc… exactly as Judaism

 

[Peter_J]

• GK Chesterton was clearly Catholic long before his formal entrance.

In some people’s eyes, but not according to the typical usage of Catholic on this forum (i.e. “Catholic” = ICWR).

 

[Thorolfr]

Very good. Theologically, through baptism, the Church becomes the baptized person’s mother. Hence Catholic. Tribe is determined by Father, so if ones Father is Latin Catholic the children are Latins, if dad is Syriac Catholic the kids are Syriac, if Ukrainian etc… exactly as Judaism

And if someone is baptized Anglican or baptized Lutheran, etc. and then converts to Catholicism, what does that mean? Who is their mother in that case and what tribe do they belong to?

 

[Reuben_J]

It will be interesting how Catholic numbers are impacted then in the next 30-50 years in the west. So far the Catholic Church hasn’t seen quite the drop off in adherents as Mainline Protestantism, but then a part of that may be the delayed effect counting only baptisms since it takes a generation or more to see any trends develop that are happening currently.

In the Western world there is a general drop in practicing religion except for a rise in Islamism due to immigration and higher birth rate.

Catholic numbers are protected in some ways because of the grace of Baptism. While Protestants and atheists dismiss it as purely cultural or some ritual to maintain the numbers, Catholics believe in the supernatural grace of God being poured out in Baptism. We cannot say for sure how it works exactly but the promise of God on the continuity of His Church is plenty. In a practical way, Baptism also affects the mind of Catholics profoundly, for good or bad.

Yes, it is interesting what will happen in the next half century to Catholic population. Right now we can only speculate. There is big rise in Catholicism in Asia and Africa. Seems the wind of the Holy Spirit is blowing to that part of the world. If Europe had brought Christianity to them in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, perhaps in the future, the reverse may happen. God works in mysterious way.

 

[benhur]

This is a follow-up to a question I asked in the Ask An Apologist section this morning.

First I want to thank Fr. Charles Grondin for his answer, which was both thorough and concise. I do have some issues with what this answer means.

The Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae is also referred to as the Statistical Yearbook of the Church. One thing it does is give a total of how many Catholics it believes there are during that year. As most people here on CAF are likely aware the Church believes that once you are baptized that there is an indelible mark on the person’s soul making them forever a Catholic. As Father Grondin noted in his answer the Church takes that stance not only from a metaphysical standpoint but also from a membership standpoint.

The reason why I questioned whether such a stance took hold from a membership standpoint is because how someone who doesn’t necessarily believe or even know that the Church believes this way would interpret statements made about Church membership. I do not possess a copy of the Statistical Yearbook, so I don’t know if when it discusses its membership rolls if it makes clear that it is including those that have left the Catholic faith but have been baptized. I do know that going through various Catholic media reporting on the 2013 Yearbook that so far I have found no article that made that distinction.

For example:
National Catholic Register
Vatican Information Service
AsiaNews.IT

Because these articles are read by non-Catholics as well as Catholics, it is easy to see how membership claims could be read as counting actual members as opposed to members plus those who have since gone on to other churches, faiths, or no faith.

One of the main reasons I posted here in the Non-Catholic Faiths section was to see if other churches do the same thing. As far as I know they don’t.

Regarding Father Grondin’s note about the small number of people who prior to Omnium in mentem had formally defected, I have a few things on that:

1. The average Catholic at the time may not have been aware of the concept that they would be considered Catholics even if they later moved away from Catholicism.
2. Even those that were aware of that concept may have thought that when the Church announced its membership totals that it was using a rubric more in line with what other Churches (and in fact businesses and organizations use) as opposed to the metaphysical one.
3. There were groups such as countmeout.ie which provided assistance to those wishing to know how one formally defects. They asserted that tens of thousands of forms were downloaded prior to Omnium in mentem (which is not an insignificant number in Ireland).
4. Even if the amount of formal defectors is small, I feel it’s important that one should provide accurate information whenever possible. Again, I do NOT have a copy of the Statistical Yearbook so I don’t know if it specifically states how it comes to its numbers. I can only hope that it does. If it does then the fault lies with those members of the media who are passing on such information without stating its counting process.

A note to the mods: I’ve placed this thread in Non-Catholic Religions because it would be of particular interest to those who were formally Catholics. Plus as noted above I wanted to compare and contrast to see if other faith traditions also use a once-a-member-always-a-member method of tallying its members.

Good question. Half my church of 800 are x Catholic.