If you’re from an area where a lot of people attend churches that forbid drinking, dancing, and other fun stuff, they will probably see Catholics as wild. (And frankly, if you were Catholic and lived in such an area, the overwhelming disapproval and sobriety would probably make you want to act wild. I don’t drink hardly ever and I’d never drink around an ex-alcoholic; but going through a dry county is like a command to go drink something made of alcohol.)
If you’re from an area where churches are more like a party or a friendly Sunday picnic, they will see Catholics as “cold”. People didn’t used to resent coming into a church where everyone was busy praying with their eyes closed, but now many people take it as an insult. (To be fair, a lot of us don’t know anymore who belongs to the parish because parishes are big, so you also don’t have people catching newbies on their way out of church and helping them out. And that is pretty bad for visitors and newcomers.)
“Only go out of obligation” usually comes from the surprise Catholics feel when somebody asks them why they go to church every Sunday. Most of us, if unprepared, are going to stare at the person like they have two heads, and then say something like, “Because I have to” – because for many of us, it’s like asking somebody why they breathe or eat every day. (And indeed, the 49 early Christian martyrs of the town of Abitene, when asked why they defied the emperor’s order not to meet on Sunday for the Eucharist on pain of death, had nothing more flowery to say than “We cannot live without meeting on Sunday for the Eucharist.”)
Unfortunately, this means we should try to avoid even normal moaning and groaning about getting up and going to Mass, when we’re around non-Catholics or non-practicing Catholics. (Or at least we have to qualify it quickly.) We may take it for granted that we’re glad to go, overall; but other people don’t.
