[Salvation]

Interesting statistics.

[NYer]

Six out of ten active Catholics would only consider attending a Catholic church ...

Which means 40% are still lacking in good catechesis about their faith.

[the invisib1e hand]

It must take a lot willpower to be a loyal Protestant.

[ThanhPhero]

only 16 percent of Protestant churchgoers will only consider attending a church of their present denomination.

Protestants are more apt to see religion as something to feel comfortable with, a social phenomenon and if it doesn't validate them they will just move on to a church where they are more "comfortable."

[Jaded]

Interesting

[annalex]

The interesting question would be, how many Protestants would consider converting to the Catholic Church, and vice versa, if that were the only option in town. As it is, this survey is no news at all, since obviously switching between Protestant demonimations is not exactly a life-altering event in most cases.

As a side remark, we Catholics tend to exaggerrate the importance of “30,000” denominations in Protestantism. My observation is that the majority of them are quite interchangeable for a Protestant. A significant divisions are liturgical vs. low church and calvinist vs. arminian. My intuitive feeling is, most Protestants have high loyalty to either of these four groups, but would switch inside the group rather painlessly.

Another factor is that a Catholic would make a distinction between visiting a Protestant denomination — even as often as weekly — and converting to Protestantism. I remember a conversation we once had with a new neighbor down the street, a couple with grown children. “We are Catholic. But we mostly go to the Calvary chapel. It is kind of nondenominational. We like it”. But when the husband passed on, the funeral was in a Catholic Church; they moved, and a year later I bumped into the widow in a supermarket. “Tell your wife, I returned to the Church”, she said. In other words, the identity remained Catholic all along, — the inclusive, non-credal Calvary chapel environment did not seem to challenge that.

[KosmicKitty]

I left my church recently. I was raised in the Congregational church, but when it become the UCC, things started to change. It took quite awhile but I feel that I didn’t leave the church, it left me.

What did it for me was the sermon on the polar bears dying because of global warming & the weekly prayer where all the military killed in Iraq and all the Iraq civilian killed with a plea for peace.

I have NO problem praying for our brave soldiers who have lost their lives defending our country.

I do have a problem when the prayer is a transparent cover for the clergy’s anti-war stance.

[BibChr]

Protestants tend to deify God, not their denominations. Breaking news?

[free_life]

There are those who have this catholic or protestant religious thing and then there are those who have Christ. I will stay with Christ.

[MEGoody]

A new survey of denominational loyalty reports that churchgoing Catholics are significantly less likely than churchgoing Protestants to change denominations.

Obviously, those Protestant denominations are not doing their job in teaching that Catholics are evil. ;)

[tiki]

I went to a funeral Tuesday, the son wouldn’t allow his Catholic mother to have a Catholic Mass. He stood up and touted his great religion, how he has gone from Fundamentalist to Pentacostal to Evangelical and he still hasn’t found the right place but it was obvious that he didn’t see the stupidity. He might as well have said that he hasn’t found a faith home that believes exactly the way he wants to believe and who cares about the truth.

[raynearhood]

I came into this one a couple of days late. Sorry. Anyhow my response to the article, not the debate that happened the thread progressed:

Is there a link to the full results of this survey?

From the article: Respondents who attend worship services at least once a month were first asked the specific denomination of the church they attend most often. This distinguished “Southern Baptist” from “Free Will Baptist,” for example.

This sort of addressed the concern I have about this survey, and I am interested in the results.

I have a feeling that Presbyterians, Lutherans, Southern Baptists, Reformed Church Goers, Traditional Methodists,and Reformed Baptists are more likely to remain in their denomination than modern evangelicals are.

Of course, one has to take into consideration the differences between PCA v. PCUSA, Traditional Methodists v. UMC, Southern Baptists v. "Purpose Driven" Southern Baptist, Missouri Synod v. Evangelical Lutheran, etc...

Does the survey take into consideration the problems within Catholicism in America, like pro-Abortion Bishops and their followers? or Liberation theology Catholic Churches that teach that Christ came for social justice and salvation from poverty? or the Women "priests" that claim to be Catholic still? How about the regular church goers that want Catholicism to be more socially liberal and stick around trying to change it? I mean, just because a Catholic church is a Catholic church doesn't necessarily mean that it actually adheres to all of the dogmas and doctrines of the Catholic Church, right? Is it the Catholic Church that keeps some of the survey respondants loyal, or is is the liberalization of the particular church they attend mixed with family and traditional loyalties that keep them around?

Anyhow, my point being, it's hard to believe that the survey is as telling as the article makes it out to be. I would guess that the loyalty to traditional, confessional, mostly Reformed Protestant denominations is similar to the loyalty to Traditional Catholicism.

But, who knows? I would like to see the full results, though. Interesting, at the very least.

[mikeus_maximus]

Mormons and Jehovah witnesses feel the same about their organizations. The "majority rule" has never been God's way. See, e.g. Noah, every prophet, Heb. 2, I Pet. 3, etc.

[editor-surveyor]

The “falling away” and “strong dellusion” have been apparent in national politics, so seeing it in the church should come as no surprise.

Good bye tares!