Posted on 03/21/2013 9:59:14 AM PDT by Alex Murphy
The total number of American Catholics depends largely on what you think it takes to be a Catholic, with the numbers dropping as the required level of commitment increases. It takes very little effort to self-identify as a Catholic, so the Pew Research Center’s survey sets the Catholic population high at 75 million. The Catholic Research Forum has more rigorous standards, defining Catholics as people who are baptized into the church and arrange for a Catholic funeral. By this measure, there are approximately 68 million American Catholics. Finally, some demographers count only people who register at a church or regularly attend Mass. The U.S. Religion Census: Religious Congregations & Membership Study, which asked local church leaders to estimate the number of people in their congregations, set the American Catholic population at just 59 million. Weak church attendance accounts for this discrepancy: Only 24 percent of self-reported American Catholics attend Mass weekly. (Another church-generated estimate, the Official Catholic Directory, estimates the national flock at 66.3 million, but critics worry that clerics inflate the numbers for this publication for PR reasons.) What do these numbers mean? There’s a population of approximately 19 million Americans who think they’re Catholic but who are unknown to their local priests.
None of these methods accurately captures the Vatican’s view of the Catholic population. Under church law, baptism makes you a Catholic, and you remain a Catholic until you’re excommunicated or formally repudiate the faith. Since more people unilaterally abandon Catholicism than join it without baptism, the Vatican’s census is typically even higher than the number of self-identified faithful. The official Statistical Yearbook of the Church counts a total of 1.196 billion Catholics worldwide, or 96 million more than Pew does, a difference of about 9 percent.
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
I agree, many of us were hoping for a public display of some sort from the Vatican when they were representing America and especially American Catholics while attending the Pope’s inauguration, rather them receiving communion.
Yesterday I attended weekday Mass which is NOT a requirement for the Catholic Church. The pews in the large church were almost entirely filled. And they were not all filled by old codgers, but many people who are working take their lunch hour at noon in order to attend Mass. What empty pews?Yeaaaaa for daily Mass... ♥ :)
One Catholic, Two Catholics, Three Catholics ...
Four, now non-Catholics show you the door. LOL!
Slate is nonsense.
We have over 100 people at weekday Mass on Wednesdays and Fridays.
Other days — more like 60-70
Still not a bad count!
**The democrat party represents the Catholic voters**
No it doesn’t. It may represent some liberal CINO voters, but the REAL Catholics are not dimocrat voters. How many times have we told you this?
Do you always repeat this dying mantra toward us? I would think someday you would hopefully learn not to post such statements.
You can try to spread something that is untrue if you wish, but the truth is that the democrat party is the party of the members of the Catholic denomination, they support it today, and have throughout their entire history in America, with only a handful of election exceptions.
I don’t think you read my post. CINOs vote dimocrat.....not REAL Catholics?
And what about all the Protestants who voted for Obama — 95 percent in one group?
Yes, real Catholics, members of the Catholic church vote majority democrat.
The majority of Protestants vote republican, and the Protestant vote has always been anti-democrat, hopefully that pleases you.
The black vote was once republican, and now is democrat, as far as we know blacks vote democrat regardless of whether they are Catholic, Protestant, or Muslim, or atheist.
Not a whole lot on this forum that we can accomplish by telling everyone a common fact that everyone knows and that they can have little effect on, the black vote, but we can educate conservatives and pro-lifers, and the many Catholics here on the truth of the Catholic vote, and what Catholic immigration means in regards to saving the lives of the unborn and preserving conservatism in America....if that is our goal.
Except that my posts are completely accurate and correct, they are simple facts.
We can educate conservatives and pro-lifers, and the many Catholics here on the truth of the Catholic vote, and what Catholic immigration means in regards to saving the lives of the unborn and preserving conservatism in America....if that is our goal.
I’m not saying that you are a bigot, but I do question your interests in defeating liberalism and the pro-abortion movement in America.
We can educate conservatives and pro-lifers, and the many Catholics here on the truth of the Catholic vote, and what Catholic immigration means in regards to saving the lives of the unborn and preserving conservatism in America....if that is our goal.
and the pro-abortion movement in America."
Evidently you don’t have anything to say that makes sense, since defending the Catholic vote is defensing the liberal vote, which you seem to have backwards.
It is impossible to refute the facts of what the Catholic vote means for the pro-abortion movement.
If that amuses you, you are free to keep posting cartoons.
At least it saves us struggling to read a post from you.
The Catholic vote is a vote for the left and that is why America’s most prominent Catholics Vice President Biden and ex-speaker Pelosi are representing us at the ceremony of their Pope.
The left is confident of crushing the Protestant Christian presence in American politics because they see that the Catholic voters will eventually take them to total, absolute victory.
Conservatives were hoping that Biden and Pelosi would be used by the Vatican to create a pro-life message to the world’s Catholics but that didn’t happen of course.
ansel12 wrote:
The Catholic vote is a vote for the left and that is why America’s most prominent Catholics Vice President Biden and ex-speaker Pelosi are representing us at the ceremony of their Pope.
The left is confident of crushing the Protestant Christian presence in American politics because they see that the Catholic voters will eventually take them to total, absolute victory.
Conservatives were hoping that Biden and Pelosi would be used by the Vatican to create a pro-life message to the world’s Catholics but that didn’t happen of course.
Conservatives were hoping that Biden and Pelosi would be used by the Vatican to create a pro-life message to the world’s Catholics but that didn’t happen of course.
The mainline guideline here is to "discuss the issues all you want, but do not make it personal."
Making the thread "about" another Freeper is a form of "making it personal."
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.