Which religion is grabbing the most Catholics?

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I found it tough but I chose the Mainline Liberalism. I know People get hooked by other religions in America, but what about the other countries that are Strong in the Catholic faith? Are they losing catholics to other religions? I think liberalism really changed the American Society. People think that freedom of anything means they can do anything without any reprocussions. AH, won’t they find out!!!
 
The question was , I believe , which religion is grabbing the most Catholics?

For Catholics under 40 years of age…I’d say Evangelical Types, especially the ones with Rock Bands.

From my limited experience the “Catholics” who leave were not real Caatholics. By that I mean the extent of their Catechismal Education stopped aat grade 3 or 4. They were Baptised, have a smattering of Caatechism for Confirmation - and that’s it.

These adults were operating with a 3rd grade knowledge of Catholocism. Going to Mass was not enough!

I GET HOOKED ON CATHOLOCISM…WEEKLY!
 
Mike C:
one reason I believe is, that most young Catholics know nothing about their faith. Example are these forums, and others. people ask ridiculous questions. “Are eggs meat?”. “Can we eat chicken of Friday’s in Lent?”, What does INRI on a crucifix mean?" These are basic questions you should have known from the age of 6.
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Are eggs meat? Okay, that’s not really a faith issue. That’s just plain stupidity! How can people be so ignorant? If they think eggs are meat, what do they think the chicken is? Well, not meat, of course! I mean… that’s logical, right?? :banghead:
 
I didn’t vote because my feeling is that it is the non-denominationals, and I’m not sure where they would fit it.

I went to a non-denomination service with my brother and sister-in-law once (my sister-in-law’s brother is a member) just out of curiosity, and there was tons of Catholic-bashing, even down to having pamphlets in their lobby. I told my sister-in-law’s brother that it is fine if they want to break away from the Catholic Church but that I didn’t think part of a Christian religion should be bashing any other religion, let alone another Christian religion. It was really a disgrace.

I don’t know if other non-denoms are like that, but this one surely was.

I just don’t understand how people can think they can just go out and start their own church. Don’t they realize that only God can do that?
 
Hi Karl and thank you for this forum! I’m so thankful for it!

By all means, in my opinion, I think the thing that is grabbing the most folks away -is the Evangelical Fundamentalist “non-denom” view “all I need is me, Jesus and the Bible”-----and as “Montanaman” so poignantly and accurately explained in his posting “Went Undercover Part II”----his experience in this huge church service with screen monitors, rock bands, Starbucks, …all this “feel good”–hip–coffee–rock music----“cool” Christianity. THIS is drawing young people away from the TRUE CHURCH, because it is totally secularist in view. It does nothing more than appeal to our sick culture in drawing folks in in this disguise. It is not teaching the truth, proper doctrine, etc…Question is—how do Catholics deal with this? Do we need to “appeal to the masses to reach people”? I think so, to some extent…

LOVED the fact that at the “Anaheim Catholic Family Conference” we had it all. Proper doctrine being taught to both adults and children and teens. Speakers were awesome, There was music that appealed to the kids and teens that was “cool” --yet solid Biblical Catholic teaching at the same time, i.e., Purity rosaries given out to the teens --coinciding with the talk that morning–all white with one red heart in the middle. This is sooooo awesome to me!!! My teen will never forget this day and has put his white “Purity rosary” around his lamp on his bedside table. This thrills me to no end!!!There CAN be “cool” stuff along with the solid Catholic doctrine AND beauty and art, displaying pictures of Saints, etc. Our Blessed Mother, also in class, right after a rock band concert. This is cool beyond belief for a parent to see!

I look forward to so much more of this in the years to come!!!

Praise the Lord~~
 
I was a Jehovah’s Witness for years before I became a born again Christian and before we would go out “in service” (knocking on your door) we would hope that we would find some Catholics that we could talk to. Catholics were by far the easiest “targets” because they generally did not know their bible and often times they didn’t even know WHY they believed what they believed. This is a sad truth. Most Jehovah’s Witnesses were former Catholics, although I don’t think they are grabbing the most. That title I’d give to the Evangelical Christians. Have you been to one of their services? They are most entertaining & those churches work very hard to “meet the needs of the people” in a pop-psychobabble sort of way.
 
I didn’t vote because my feeling is that it is the non-denominationals, and I’m not sure where they would fit it.
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Audrey, the non-denoms are considered a part of Evangelical Protestantism. They are strictly Sola Scriptura(Bible-only) based Churches with typically no organization beyond the local congregation, and range in scale from large “mega-churches” to back yard mom and pop operations.

They appeal a great deal to American culture as they allow a great deal of personal freedom in how to worship and also in how they believe. And because of this they are attracting many former Catholics who were typically never properly catechized.

Aside from maybe the local church pastor they have no magisterium to correct erroneous intepretations of scripture. When there is a theological dispute, the dissenting person or group usually splinters off to start their own Church, or shops around for another congregation which agrees with their scriptural interpretaion. Its really a never ending cycle, as history since Martin Luther attests to.
 
If all non-Catholic religions are at some point fundamentally based on a lie (except the Jews) I would be forced to conclude that lies, not religons steal **all ** Catholics.

Conversion back to the Catholic Church is a process of knowing and sharing the truth with love, by both actions and words.
 
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1962Missal:
Around here, the non-denom’s aren’t making much of an impact, but the Southern Baptists are gaining converts all the time. My impression is that most Catholic converts to S-B go because they want Sunday worship to be a classroom. I’ve literally seen them sitting in the pews with Bible, notebook, and pencil. When you ask them why they left the Church, the universal answer is, “I wasn’t being fed.”

Question: Are Southern Baptists Evangelical or Fundamentalist?

Justin
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This is very belated, but I am a former Southern Baptist and also a former Bible Church Dispensationalist. Not only did we have pen and Bible in hand, but the preacher often provided fill-in-the-blank outlines. Considering that most parishes do not have didactic or catechetical preaching, not do they provide adult formation on Sundays, I think the fact that ex-Catholics were looking to be fed is partially our fault. So how about having catechetical or didactic sermons with handouts? It might do wonders and even reverse the trend in parishes that try it!

Just a thought…
 
Sometimes I am embarrassed about being Catholic. Most of my friends are Protestant. They know more about the Bible then the Catholics I know. They seem to talk more about Godly things, pray more & quote Scripture more than my Catholic friends do. They all have had spouses that were Catholic & they did not defend their faith, none are Catholic now. My friends say I am not like most Catholics. Catholics don’t seem to know the Lord & have that personal relationship like you do. Meaning me. Why do ya’ll thank this is? What are we doing wrong. What do they have that we are missing?http://forums.catholic-questions.org/images/icons/icon9.gif
 
Why Karl, listening to Catholic news radio the other day I thought
I heard that the Mormans were the fastest growing, I think that
might be in Europe, or other countries, I was at work. But they
sure do seem to be knocking at the door more than usual. I see
those commercials too alot for the free book of Mormon.
 
We need to get priests in the pulpit saying “this is what Catholics believe and why…” So how do we go about getting this?

AMEN!!!
 
My fondest apologetical experience was with a group of JWs who came to my home to do some proselytising. I listened to their Arian spiel; then I read to them the Nicene Creed from a St. Joseph Missal I had handy (do keep one handy!). I told them that the Creed was written before the Church decided which books belonged in the Bible, and that Catholic bishops were responsible for both. They were not amused since I was not willing to debate them on exegesis, e.g., their specious translation of John 1 (“the Word was *a * God”). But they were caught off guard as I was deconstructing their tacit criterion of sola scriptura.
 
I tried to come back to the Church (as I was raised Catholic, left for 20 years, but wanted to return) and failed. I take full responsibility for the decision that I just don’t belong anymore, for a number of reasons.

So for now, I will just be a Deist. I really like the family emphasis of the Latter-Day-Saints, but just can’t buy the Joseph Smith story. But the Catholic Church no longer seems to be the welcoming place it was for a time when I grew up.
 
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Sometimes I am embarrassed about being Catholic. Most of my friends are Protestant. They know more about the Bible then the Catholics I know. They seem to talk more about Godly things, pray more & quote Scripture more than my Catholic friends do. They all have had spouses that were Catholic & they did not defend their faith, none are Catholic now. My friends say I am not like most Catholics. Catholics don’t seem to know the Lord & have that personal relationship like you do. Meaning me. Why do ya’ll thank this is? What are we doing wrong. What do they have that we are missing?http://forums.catholic-questions.org/images/icons/icon9.gif
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I think you need to find some new Catholic friends. :twocents:

If you have any doubt that there is a new spirit of evangelism and apology in the Catholic Church, just go on-line to Catholic Answers. If your friends have stereotypical views about “backwards” and “uneducated” Catholics, maybe you should direct them to the CA website too?

Perhaps it’s your job to try to clear up some of your protestant friends’ misconceptions about Catholics. Maybe Jesus is calling you to defend His Church. Don’t despair as your post seems to suggest. Pray about it and take action, for God’s sake.

Just some thoughts.

-Peace
 
Concerning Latin America:

I don’t know if they beat out JWs or Evangelicals, but during the 70s, 80s, and 90s, the Mormons had hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans join the LDS church.

Mormons claim it is in fulfillment of prophecy that these “literal descendants of Israel” would “blossom like a rose”.
(So much for DNA)
 
Hi my name is Anthony and I’m a recent revert to the Catholic church from evangelical protestantism. I actually left the church at 17 and joined the Baha’i faith. After 6 years in that religion I joined my wife’s United Methodist church. It was a nice church and the fellowship was great. IT was much better than Catholic churches which have a tendency to be rather unwelcoming and cold. After 18 years there we joined a Baptist church. It is very evangelical and a bit anti Catholic. This particular congregation is about 70% former Catholic. That wasn’t such a bad thing. I found myself constantly defending the and explaining what the church teaches. Several of the sermons there actually got me reading on the computer about the ancient church. You see, I started to research on how the catholicchurch got so off course and I found out other wise. Well there might be lots more I can say about my faith journey (testimony), but that is it for now. Oh and I started to say all this just as a way of saying I think evangelical churches are taking most catholics away. My 2 brothers are evangelicals now and one sister is a Jehovah’s Witness. My other two sisters are still Catholic but really don’t know the faith as well as they should. One I think is even a bit agnostic. Oh well
Code: 
         your brother in the Lord
           Anthony
 
excuse me, I had to answer the door, two Jehovah’s witnesses, haven’t had that in a while since I am usually gone by this time. Two older ladies, only speak Spanish and I don’t feel up to engaging in discussion in that language yet. Went to get them cool water bottles, heard them exclaiming over retablo of OL Guadalupe in my front hall, complete with large wall rosary, flowers, candle the whole 9 yards, they got a good view of the large crucifix by the front door (a wedding present) with blessed palms as well. They probably couldn’t wait to get out of such a den of iniquity. I didn’t have the heart to warn them that this entire development is an over 55 community for Winter Texans, most of whom aren’t down here yet and don’t speak Spanish anyhow. Maybe they are regretting they missed the chance to save me from damnation, I know Catholics are their most valued converts.
 
i’de say the small non-denominational, baptist, and Church of Christ churches are a big draw in rural oklahoma. I live about 20 miles from the nearest big town closest to Oklahoma City. There are many small churches out here that either baptist, Church of Christ or a non-denominational spinoffs based on Cambellites. I have family members belonging to a non-denomational church but closely aligned with Church of Christ in doctrine but recently split over the frquency of communion. What bothers me is many of these have subtle but deep seated anti-catholic views. The non-denomination churches I am speaking even went as far as initiating a campaign to persuade as many people as possible to boycott “The Passion of the Christ” as being too catholic. Oklahoma has very high divorce rate, and some of these Churches I have knowledge are churches with more than 50%+ of their members are divorced. I can only assume some these must include former catholics.
 
I will base my answer on where I grew up and have seen many catholics left the Church, i.e., in the Philippines.

I think one of the main reasons why they left the Church is the lack of knowledge of the faith. Many of these fundamentalist preachers attack the way we worship and practice the faith (veneration of icons, prayers for intercession of Saints, love for Mama Mary, etc.). Many Catholics in the Philippines don’t even bother reading the Bible, much less reading the history of the Church. These stuff is often viewed as something reserved only for those who want to go to seminary or convent and not for lay people. We’re very thankful, though, that in the recent years there has been a tremendous increase in Catholic Charismatic movements. This actually where I started reading the Bible when I became a member of one group of Charismatic Movements called Elim Catholic Charismatic Renewal Movement. They borrowed a bit of Protestant way of praise and worship songs, but they are faithful to the Catholic Church. I would say most of these Charismatic groups borrowed what is good in Protestantism and rejected the bad. Some kind of separating the wheat from the chaff. We focus our “mission” on the Eucharist. This is, I would say, the life of all these Charismatic Movements in the Philippines. These movements have been sent to preach the Catholic faith to almost every country in the world. I don’t even doubt that these is the work of the Holy Spirit to counteract the spread of Protestant lies and biases against the Catholic Church.

Pio
 
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