Yes, but years ago there weren’t that many Evangelicals living where Catholics did. All that came as something of a surprise when Carter got elected in the 70s. Of course a lot has changed since then — people moved around more, Evangelicals became a more prominent part of American life — but basically, where I live, Catholics came to mirror the views of the largely mainstream non-Evangelical Protestants they lived among. So opinions like the writer’s aren’t a Catholic so much as an American, or if you like, a “Blue state” thing.
Yes.
There’s a fluff story floating around that goes through the 50 states naming the top four religious traditions. Pretty much any state where mainstream Protestants and Catholics are over-represented (compared with national averages) leans Democrat to varying degrees.
Like it or not, America’s Progressive tradition is an outgrowth of Protestant Christian spiritual ‘Great Awakenings’. Catholicism, by definition, doesn’t leave much room for a spiritually-based change in social outlook.
I listen to Catholic radio quite a bit and the other day it was Patrick Madrid, I believe, who said that probably during the 70’s most of the American Catholic leadership were Democrats. It would not surprise me, though, if many today were also. And the Catholic Church has also embraced the world much more than evangelicals have, although with evangelicals that’s changing for the worse now, too. Catholicism rejects Genesis as history and believes in evolution, and instead of the Bible as moral guide it has believed in looking at things to determine right and wrong. So if a Hollywood movie carries antichristian messages and values throughout it but manages to have a worldly good defeats evil message, the Catholic church will approve of it. You are also hard-pressed to find spiritual counseling because one’s problems are thought to be psychological in nature, and the spiritual is only thought of as a last resort, if that. Catholics are also not a tiny minority in America but the largest denomination and in a great many places the largest by numbers when Christians are considered according to Catholics, mainline Protestants, and evangelicals.