Posted on 04/04/2005 8:00:34 AM PDT by SmithL
WASHINGTON - Most Americans want the next pope to work for changes in Roman Catholic Church policies to allow priests to marry and women to join the priesthood. And they want more done to combat sexual abuse by priests, an AP-Ipsos poll found.
A solid majority of Americans, and Catholics in the country, are calling for the changes even while saying they widely admire Pope John Paul II, who supported traditional policies against priest marriage and against allowing women into the priesthood.
"He crossed so many boundaries, opened doors to many governments," said Joseph Riess, a Catholic businessman from Vienna, Va. "But I think it's time for changes."
Just over half of Americans, 51 percent, and almost three-fourths of Catholics say John Paul, who died Saturday, will be remembered as one of the greatest popes, according to the poll conducted for The Associated Press by Ipsos-Public Affairs.
The U.S. Catholic church is struggling with a variety of problems, including a dramatically shrinking U.S. priesthood, disagreement over the proper role for lay leaders, and a conservative-liberal divide over sexuality, women's ordination and clergy celibacy.
About two-thirds of those polled said priests should be allowed to marry and almost that many said they want women in the priesthood. A majority of Catholics supported both steps.
More than four in five Americans - and about the same number of Catholics - said they want to see the next pope do more to address the problem of priests sexually abusing children.
The church has been trying to deal with an abuse crisis that bubbled to the surface in January 2002 in the Archdiocese of Boston, then spread throughout the country. Since then, the church has adopted a toughened discipline policy, enacted child protection and victim outreach plans in dioceses, and removed hundreds of accused priests from church work.
Americans were divided when asked from where the next pope should come. Just over a third said he should be from Europe, while a similar number said he should be from a part of the world where Catholicism is growing fastest, like Africa or Latin America. The rest weren't sure.
"I don't think it matters where they're from," said Heather Schramko, a clinical researcher and a Catholic from Perrysburg, Ohio. "But they need to modernize the church."
The AP-Ipsos poll of 1,001 adults was taken Friday to Sunday and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
Some of the interviews were conducted before news broke Saturday about the pope's death, but most people knew he was gravely ill.
So are your relatives Catholic or Protestant?
Yeah, that would be as sweet as Tom DeLay getting the Presidential nomination in 08.... The Hammer @ 1600, Panzerkardinal become Panzerpope at the Vatican, now we just need to find a new Tory in Britian to make the Trimuvirate complete....
We're all catholics, but 1.1 billion people rightfully claim to be Catholic, which includes the Eastern Orthodox.
They are schismatics, and I'm the token heretic. :p
No, it does not!
Are you aware of The Great Schism? Just because there was a divide within the Church that came about the Great Schism, doesn't mean that the Eastern Orthodox Church suddenly lost their claim to their Catholic roots.
I like Mrs. Smith and her piece: "Contraception, Why Not?", but theologically, I object to the above statement specifically: it refuses to let God. The objection should read like this: "The Church prohibits contraception because contraception militates against the blessings of God's creative act." Sometimes God blesses the unjust in spite of their rebellion. More often, God curses the unjust in accord with their rebellion.
Galatians 6:7
Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.
I do too. The problem is, there seems to be no mechanism for doing so, short of de-bishoping the bishop, which I've never heard of.
If you're going to add them together, then it's 1.4 billion. I'll leave it up to you to figure out why you keep hearing over and over that there are 1.1 billion Catholics worldwide.
Well, yes and no. The fact that the Synod of Trullo saw a need to legislate permission for married men to be ordained while still requiring their abstinence when "handling sacred things" indicates that the practice was well established. That the bishop of Rome refused to ratify the change in discipline also indicates that it was deeply engrained. (Rejection of Trullo was a major element in growing divergence between East and West, exacerbated in the 700s by the Iconoclasm controversy.)
One must beware of concluding from efforts to crack down on violators of a law that violations are widespread. At various times and various places between the 300s and the 1000s (you are referring to Gregory VII), married priests, concubinate priests were more or less common and efforts to enforce celibacy varied as well.
Since the attack on clerical celibacy in the Protestant Reformation, a powerful motive to exaggerate the degree of clerical concubinage has existed for Western Enlightenment/Protestant historians, who have dominated the universities in northern Europe for centuries. I do not wish to underestimate the degree to which the ancient expectation that even married priests must abstain was flouted, but the fact that it persisted over the first 1000 years speaks for its having been deeply embedded.
It's not entirely unlike the priest homosexual scandals: if you read the MSM you have the impression that at least half the priests molest little girls when in fact its a small percent molesting boys. I'm _not_ justifying these actions at all, but do notice how people with axes to grind (MSM today; Enlightenment polemicists or Reformation polemicists of the past) tend to exaggerate how widespread is the practice they are criticizing.
Absolutely agree.
I want a pope.
Not another politician.
We have enough d&%@*#&mn politicians already.
LOL...no kidding. I like Cdl. Ratzinger.
JPII may be gone now, but I think the Beard is on borrowed time....
I am aware of the Great Schism which is precisely the reason why Orthodox are not Catholic. They are catholic, like Catholics are orthodox though.
Eeastern Rite Catholics, such as Syrian Catholic Church, are Catholics. Orthodox Chruches, such as Russian Orthodox Church, are not. Two completely different things.
I believe in the Father almighty,...the holy catholic Church... ;-)
OK with me. Throw in Sabine Herold as President of France and Angela Merkel as German Chancellor and you've got a winning hand.
Schismatic?
So they are Catholic!
you might try reading and understanding the links you reference
I grew up post VCII and I know that one..
We believe in one God, the father almighty . . .
And there are 1.4 billion Catholics and Orthodox combined.
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