The number of people who have left the Catholic church is huge.
The U.S. Religious Landscape Survey by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life has put hard numbers on the anecdotal evidence: One out of every 10 Americans is an ex-Catholic. If they were a separate denomination, they would be the third-largest denomination in the United States, after Catholics and Baptists. One of three people who were raised Catholic no longer identifies as Catholic.
Pew’s data shows that those leaving the church are not homogenous. They can be divided into two major groups: those who become unaffiliated and those who become Protestant. Almost half of those leaving the church become unaffiliated and almost half become Protestant.
Good 'un, MP.
ReplyDeleteRecovering Romans: the Episcopal Church Welcomes You!
Sadly:
ReplyDeleteIf you believed liberals, most Catholics who leave the church would be joining mainline churches, like the Episcopal church. In fact, almost two-thirds of former Catholics who join a Protestant church join an evangelical church.
almost two-thirds of former Catholics who join a Protestant church join an evangelical church.
ReplyDeleteA third of all pissed off Roman Catholics sounds fine to me.
Wouldn't be surprised if the portion of "pissed off Roman Catholics" who join Evangelical churches are conservatives from here in the U.S., Canada, etc... There are plenty of Catholic parishes here with a definite slant towards social justice / concern for the poor (yeah, no justice for our LGBT brothers & sisters, but that's another story).
ReplyDeleteSocial / political conservatives purely hate that sort of thing, and Evangelical churches happily cater to their sort of shallow theology and personal meanness.
That's an interesting hypothesis, David. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteThe RC church in the US is doing relatively well. Here in Quebec, the ex-Catholics outnumber the Catholics.
ReplyDelete(unfortunately, the Anglican Church is too English to attract many of them)
Jim P, the saving grace for the US RCs are the Latino wetbacks!
ReplyDelete