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Interesting survey on young adult American Catholics and their faith, much better than the infamous Gallup poll ("Blacken the oval next to the one sentence that describes the theology of the Eucharist").

Some of the conclusions:

- Contrary to the view that denominational boundries are vanishing, of Catholis under 40, suprising stability in the Church. 90% of those raised Catholic still call themselves Catholic. 75% of non-Latino and 80% of Latino say they cannot imagine being anything else than Catholic.

-- Orthodoxy strong. 80 - 90% express belief in Christ's divinity, the sacraments, the real presence, etc.

-- With little differnce between regular church goers, ethnicity, parish involvement or between theological conservatives and progressives, young Catholics are displeased with the role of the laity and women in the church.

-- Both the theologicaly traditional and the progressive believe Catholics have a duty to oppose racism and close the gap between rich and poor.

-- Another area of near unamimity was a displeasure with their experiences in religious education (excpet for retreats, which got high marks). Nevertheless, they wanted their children to have Catholic RE.

--40% of non-Latino and 70% of Latino young Catholic never heard of Vatican Council II. Of those that did, only half of them had ever read or discussed anything about it. [That one even knocked my socks off, this is a totally postconciliar generation].

-- Of married couples, half of non-Latino and 25% of Latino-Latina marriages were to non-Catholics.

-- More than half pray daily.

-- Both conservatives and progressives fel strongly in favor of civil rights for homosexuals.

-- The authors note however, except for a core group of 10%, today's young adult Catholics are clearly the children of 'communal or Catholics' but not communal or cultural Catholics themselves. Their experince of Catholicism as a tight-knit culture is sparse and their knowledge of the language and symbolism of Catholicism is limited.

Very interesting. I think it is encouraging from a humanistic point of view. I believe that it falls to those of us under 30 to learn from our "elders" the culture we have somewhat lost.

Dmitri

"of Catholis under 40, suprising stability in the Church. 90% of those raised Catholic still call themselves Catholic. 75% of non-Latino and 80% of Latino say they cannot imagine being anything else than Catholic."

This is not surprising at all, but it is somewhat deceiving. In Greece, for example, 99% would respond that they are Orthodox and can't imagine being anything else -- but only 5% are going to liturgy on Sunday. I wouldn't characterize this as stability - but as clear identification with the traditions in which one is raised -- and that includes a good helping of ethnicity (among Italians and Irish as well as Greeks).

"-- With little differnce between regular church goers, ethnicity, parish involvement or between theological conservatives and progressives, young Catholics are displeased with the role of the laity and women in the church."

But this, again, is misleading. It's very true that both of these groups are displeased with the status quo -- but where they want to see that status quo go is rather quite different, so the picture of consensus painted by this quote is misleading.

I'm sorry. I did realize while first typing this summary I was not being clear. The survey reported that a great consensus wanted to see expanded formal roles for women and laity.

On the stability issue, it was in contrast to Protesants in our same society and the issue of do young catholics believe all denominations are the same. The report thought that in a religiously pluralistic society, a 90% retention rate was significant compared to other bodies.

K.

[ 01-10-2002: Message edited by: Kurt ]

Dear Kurt;

Do you know of any online links to the information you provided about this survey?

Thank you very much.

Stefan

Dear Kurt,

This is interesting and valuable information. Good to know that the younger generation finds value in the Faith and holds to it! We so often hear about the failure of the Churches to reach and hold youth. Certainly there is much more to be done to better share the beliefs and customs; but it is important to reflect that someone somewhere is doing something right!

Thanks for sharing it with us.

Steve

It was reported recently in Commonweal. I think they publish only minor selection on line.

K.

I find the fact that half of the young Catholics "pray daily" to be very encouraging. With all the social pressure not to pray and to do other things (watch TV, work, date, etc) its nice to see that daily prayer is still occurring.

What was discouraging to me is that most had a displeasure in religious education. One would think that the reason for having a religious education is to reinforce the values that the parents have and to provide additional training and education in the Catholic faith. If the Catholic Schools aren't providing a doctrinally sound religious education, then what be the use of sending your kid there?

Erik