[NYer]

Catholic Ping
Please freepmail me if you want on/off this list

[ottbmare]

I’m supposed to go down on Sunday, with the rest of my RCIA class, to the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, where all the incoming new Catholics from the Washington DC area will take part in a rite that is part of our admission to the Roman Catholic Church. I’m amazed to realize that most of the nave of that huge building will be filled with candidates and catechumens, nearly two thousand of them, just from the local area. Another such ceremony will take place the following weekend because we can’t all fit in a building with a capacity of 2200. And the same thing is taking place at the same time, all over the world. Amazing how many people are joining the Church. Something’s going on.

[Antoninus]

We can do better. Plus, the numbers are less important than how well catechized those 68 million are. We have a long way to go on that front.

[iowamark]

Jack Haberer, editor of the independent Presbyterian Outlook magazine: “Baby boomers who are also Christians, in general, have been drawn more to churches that are more informal, less institutional and more rock 'n' roll-ish,”

Does anyone else see the contradictions here? "Let's attract Christians by becoming more secular!"

[Salvation]

We keep telling people that Catholic membership is up, but they don’t believe us.

Are their stances on life and death or homosexuality issues affecting this?

Hmmmm

[Clemenza]

How much is due to natural increase, versus immigration? Where I see membership increasing (the soutwest and west) it is almost entirely due to immigration. There has been some redistribution of native-born Catholics to the sunbelt, but that has been counterbalanced by church closings in the upper midwest and northeast.

The fastest growing creed in the US, FWIW, is the unchurched/nonreligious.