How do ex-Catholics vote?

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Something that I just thought of and realized doesn't get mentioned much despite tons of talk about how Catholics vote.

By most surveys a slim majority of ex-Catholics are converts to other denominations of Christianity (like about 53%), with the rest mostly being "none" and a small amount to non-Christian religions. The ones that are still Christian are majority evangelical (though not overwhelmingly) but doubtfully as Republican as white evangelicals since many are Hispanic, and they're probably more likely to be progressive evangelicals. And of course the "nones"/non-Christians would be overwhelmingly Democratic, like 75%. The ones still Christian are probably about 2/3 Republican. So overall that'd equal around 55-60% D. Any other thoughts?

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Likewise I really doubt that many Catholic to Mainline Christians are country club Republicans like the stereotype might suggest.

Catholic-to-mainline converts? Who converts to mainline Protestant denominations these days?  

(Other than perhaps some more liberal-minded Catholics, I think that mainline Protestants converting to Catholicism is more of a thing. For example, many of the Episcopalians who value the Catholic aspects of traditional Anglican doctrine and practice would be among that group, just as many of the Episcopalians who value the Protestant aspects of traditional Anglican doctrine and practice convert to Evangelical and/or non-Evangelical traditional and confessional Protestant groups. And both of these groups within the Episcopal Church are often politically and socially conservative. Hence, why so many of them are leaving the denomination. ).

Uh, look at the chart above. Catholic->Mainline is about twice as common as Mainline->Catholic.

In fact, Mainliners don't have too much of a problem getting converts. It's just that their retention sucks.


http://www.pewforum.org/2015/05/12/chapter-2-religious-switching-and-intermarriage

A more recent survey from 2015. Mainliners lose 1.7 members for every convert they gain. Catholics lose 6.5.

And looking at the tabs above, a greater percentage of mainliners are converts more than any Christian category, as it's over 41%, with evangelicals just under 40% converts as Catholics at less than 10% converts.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Let's take a look at your hypothesis using the above chart.

Ex-Catholic Nones and Others would be very Democratic. Likewise I really doubt that many Catholic to Mainline Christians are country club Republicans like the stereotype might suggest.

Stereotypes that aren't too relevant today. In Minnesota the only stereotype associated with being born Catholic or mainline Protestant (which usually means Lutheran) is what your last name sounds like. No one even expects there to be class differences. Mainliners in general as country club Republicans is also at least three decades out of date, look at how mainline Protestants vote in New England (the Republican lean of white mainliners nationally still is mostly

That leaves Evangelicals.

The way pollsters and the media describe Evangelical almost defaults them to conservatives except for a few emergent types. I'm not so sure how progressive white ex-Catholic Evangelicals really are. I mean I know your anecdotal side, of things, but I have counter anecdotal evidence: the ex-Catholics in my church (including my father) are conservative with the zeal of an ex convert. Are there any decent polls of ex-Catholics?

Lastly, how do Hispanic evangelical vote? I have some vague recollection that they are more GOP than most Hispanics but still lean D.

I think most Catholic->Evangelical converts are more the suburban/exurban megachurch type than some stereotypical religious right zealot, but still Republican. And accurate summary of Hispanics.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

There obviously isn't an "ex-Catholic" community either, since as noted they form a huge spectrum in terms of politics and current religious beliefs.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

My mistake Goldwater. The guy who made the graph noticed his mistake and made an updated graph with more religions.



Pink is Mormon, Green is Jewish.

This graph could be read to imply that mainlines and Catholics are facing more similar problems than either would like to acknowledge.

Not really. The mainlines are at least getting a non-neglible of converts in.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

My mistake Goldwater. The guy who made the graph noticed his mistake and made an updated graph with more religions.



Pink is Mormon, Green is Jewish.

This graph could be read to imply that mainlines and Catholics are facing more similar problems than either would like to acknowledge.

Not really. The mainlines are at least getting a non-neglible of converts in.

     They do lose a lot of ground relative to Evangelicals despite both groups starting off with similar numbers.

But they also gain a lot of converts from evangelicals too, so it almost cancels out. Meanwhile compare the Catholic->Evangelical vs. Evangelical->Catholic numbers, or even the Catholic->Mainline vs. Mainline->Catholic numbers, which kind of shatters the premise in PR's post.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

My mistake Goldwater. The guy who made the graph noticed his mistake and made an updated graph with more religions.



Pink is Mormon, Green is Jewish.

This graph could be read to imply that mainlines and Catholics are facing more similar problems than either would like to acknowledge.

Not really. The mainlines are at least getting a non-neglible of converts in.

Similar retention problems, not necessarily similar problems attracting converts.

That graph though should show just how inane the idea that Catholics have super high retention rates on paper even if not all of them still act as Catholic is though. In fact it shows that Catholic retention isn't even better than average. That's why I saw that premise as so ridiculous, and the data backs me up.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

My mistake Goldwater. The guy who made the graph noticed his mistake and made an updated graph with more religions.



Pink is Mormon, Green is Jewish.

This graph could be read to imply that mainlines and Catholics are facing more similar problems than either would like to acknowledge.

Not really. The mainlines are at least getting a non-neglible of converts in.

Similar retention problems, not necessarily similar problems attracting converts.

That graph though should show just how inane the idea that Catholics have super high retention rates on paper even if not all of them still act as Catholic is though. In fact it shows that Catholic retention isn't even better than average. That's why I saw that premise as so ridiculous, and the data backs me up.

I wasn't disagreeing. There's, starting very recently and probably too recently to do much good, been an increasing awareness within Catholicism that cultural Catholicism among white Americans can't be relied on any more and has been a bit of a paper tiger for a couple of generations now.

Then why don't Atlas posters in general realize that?

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

How does one become an ex-Catholic.  One has to be excommunicated by the Church.  For example, if you stop going to mass, and say you don't believe in that stuff anyway, but haven't actually been excommunicated, doesn't the Catholic church still consider you a Catholic?

The Church does, yeah, but Pew doesn't.

I also recall reading that the list of excommunicable offenses includes open expression of opposition to fundamental church teaching, which would be done by anyone who is openly now a non-Christian or converts to a different denomination. The formal excommunication process obviously isn't done on almost everyone who falls into this category, but it's not really done at all anymore (excommunication was obviously designed for kings in the Middle Ages, not people in the modern day.) So essentially yes, stating that you're a non-Christian or a non-Catholic Christian does equal a de facto excommunication. My church's lead pastor for example unless he recanted and returned wouldn't be allowed to take part in any Catholic sacraments or receive a Catholic funeral. This is of course virtually never an issue because someone who has renounced the church isn't going to care.

Posters who don't realize it (including me) tend to live in places where this collapse is less advanced. We've been over this.

Hmmm, so Minneapolis is closer to the rule than the exception?

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

How does one become an ex-Catholic.  One has to be excommunicated by the Church.  For example, if you stop going to mass, and say you don't believe in that stuff anyway, but haven't actually been excommunicated, doesn't the Catholic church still consider you a Catholic?

The Church does, yeah, but Pew doesn't.

I also recall reading that the list of excommunicable offenses includes open expression of opposition to fundamental church teaching, which would be done by anyone who is openly now a non-Christian or converts to a different denomination. The formal excommunication process obviously isn't done on almost everyone who falls into this category, but it's not really done at all anymore (excommunication was obviously designed for kings in the Middle Ages, not people in the modern day.) So essentially yes, stating that you're a non-Christian or a non-Catholic Christian does equal a de facto excommunication. My church's lead pastor for example unless he recanted and returned wouldn't be allowed to take part in any Catholic sacraments or receive a Catholic funeral. This is of course virtually never an issue because someone who has renounced the church isn't going to care.

The reason the Church still considers these people Catholic for statistical purposes is simply because it's hard to keep track and count of these things.

But they can't keep track of them anyway. These people obviously aren't going to register with a new parish if they move or inform the church of address changes.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Hmmm, so Minneapolis is closer to the rule than the exception?

As far as I know, these days yes, but don't mistake this for me conceding that that's a good thing.
[/quote]

And you know who's fault that is primarily? The Vatican, above everyone else.

I consider it a good thing meanwhile simply because it results in an expansion of personal freedom and not having this places an unfair burden on certain people due to factors outside of their control. No person, regardless of their ethnic background, should EVER be locked into a religious or cultural tradition they are uncomfortable with, under any circumstances whatsoever.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

How does one become an ex-Catholic.  One has to be excommunicated by the Church.  For example, if you stop going to mass, and say you don't believe in that stuff anyway, but haven't actually been excommunicated, doesn't the Catholic church still consider you a Catholic?

The Church does, yeah, but Pew doesn't.

I also recall reading that the list of excommunicable offenses includes open expression of opposition to fundamental church teaching, which would be done by anyone who is openly now a non-Christian or converts to a different denomination. The formal excommunication process obviously isn't done on almost everyone who falls into this category, but it's not really done at all anymore (excommunication was obviously designed for kings in the Middle Ages, not people in the modern day.) So essentially yes, stating that you're a non-Christian or a non-Catholic Christian does equal a de facto excommunication. My church's lead pastor for example unless he recanted and returned wouldn't be allowed to take part in any Catholic sacraments or receive a Catholic funeral. This is of course virtually never an issue because someone who has renounced the church isn't going to care.

The reason the Church still considers these people Catholic for statistical purposes is simply because it's hard to keep track and count of these things.

But they can't keep track of them anyway. These people obviously aren't going to register with a new parish if they move or inform the church of address changes.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Hmmm, so Minneapolis is closer to the rule than the exception?

As far as I know, these days yes, but don't mistake this for me conceding that that's a good thing.

And you know who's fault that is primarily? The Vatican, above everyone else.

Well, it's very easy and convenient to say that, isn't it?

I originally wrote more here--including clarifying that I certainly don't think the Vatican is completely blameless--but it was beside the point. Regardless, you don't wish the Church well and appear to be doing quite well for yourself spiritually speaking in the world-as-it-is so your perception of where to place blame is probably just as biased as a geriatric devout Catholic's, merely in the opposite direction.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Yes, we all know your thoughts on this by now.
[/quote]

I mean your first bit is probably true, but I am curious who besides the Vatican is mostly to blame. And I actually am a little surprised that you say it's not a good thing, seeing as how you have said before the easy fluidity of religion in the US is a good thing, and there's no way anyone but an extreme reactionary could support a de facto lack of freedom of religion.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

How does one become an ex-Catholic.  One has to be excommunicated by the Church.  For example, if you stop going to mass, and say you don't believe in that stuff anyway, but haven't actually been excommunicated, doesn't the Catholic church still consider you a Catholic?

The Church does, yeah, but Pew doesn't.

I also recall reading that the list of excommunicable offenses includes open expression of opposition to fundamental church teaching, which would be done by anyone who is openly now a non-Christian or converts to a different denomination. The formal excommunication process obviously isn't done on almost everyone who falls into this category, but it's not really done at all anymore (excommunication was obviously designed for kings in the Middle Ages, not people in the modern day.) So essentially yes, stating that you're a non-Christian or a non-Catholic Christian does equal a de facto excommunication. My church's lead pastor for example unless he recanted and returned wouldn't be allowed to take part in any Catholic sacraments or receive a Catholic funeral. This is of course virtually never an issue because someone who has renounced the church isn't going to care.

The reason the Church still considers these people Catholic for statistical purposes is simply because it's hard to keep track and count of these things.

But they can't keep track of them anyway. These people obviously aren't going to register with a new parish if they move or inform the church of address changes.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Hmmm, so Minneapolis is closer to the rule than the exception?

As far as I know, these days yes, but don't mistake this for me conceding that that's a good thing.

And you know who's fault that is primarily? The Vatican, above everyone else.

Well, it's very easy and convenient to say that, isn't it?

I originally wrote more here--including clarifying that I certainly don't think the Vatican is completely blameless--but it was beside the point. Regardless, you don't wish the Church well and appear to be doing quite well for yourself spiritually speaking in the world-as-it-is so your perception of where to place blame is probably just as biased as a geriatric devout Catholic's, merely in the opposite direction.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Yes, we all know your thoughts on this by now.

I mean your first bit is probably true, but I am curious who besides the Vatican is mostly to blame.

Well, there's the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, for one thing. The Church is facing problems in a lot of countries, and some of them ARE worldwide problems, but the fact that they're not all present in all countries in the same ways means that each individual set of problems can't really be immediately assigned to the top of the hierarchy. There's also a failure of responsiveness to institutional religion in general in contemporary American society itself, for which, as I've said before, there's more than enough blame to go around--institutional religion obviously bears a lot of the responsibility for this (especially in more liberal parts of the country where it comes across as more tone-deaf to people's needs), but so do Madison Avenue, academia, entertainment and news media, et cetera.[/quote]

I think the main point though is that if institutionalized religion and hierarchy weren't so bad behaved in general the rest of this wouldn't have as much of an effect. That's more of a symptom than a cause.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Religious fluidity is generally a good thing but I generally prefer that people flowing into that 'None' category, specifically, retain some kind of affective connection to where they're coming from, however tenuous; twitch upon the thread and all that. The reason I say that Catholicism and mainline Protestantism may be encountering similar problems relative to that category is that both of them have lost the sort of social glue that keeps people who believe in God, ish, but aren't necessarily super-devout or theologically adroit coming to church and identifying with Christianity rather than just sleeping in on Sunday and calling themselves 'spiritual'. In Catholicism's case this is obviously exacerbated by the Church saying things that are too different from people's outside moral and political commitments; in the case of mainline Protestantism, often what is being said isn't different enough.

There are plenty of people who effectively do that and just identify as "Christian" without identifying with any particular denomination though. My girlfriend is one of them. Our current President is another.

And why I can't fault that as the best route is because I can't blame anyone for not wanting to associate in any way with any type of institution that has deeply hurt them, and it's easy to use conservative evangelical churches as an example, but this is undeniably the case with Catholicism just as frequently. And remember that I grew up in North Dakota where the Catholic church is quite literally "all ultra-conservative, all the time" because it has no reason to be anything else, and yet the Twin Cities diocese manages to be even worse if you can imagine it, especially under Neinstedt. Things were so bad the Star Tribune was running stories about people leaving the church specifically because of that stuff. So it's easy to see why I don't know too many people who broke with the church without severing all types of connections.

And I think not having this is advantageous, and actually leads to greater societal interaction. Think of the people who are effectively just Christmas and Easter Christians but don't want to go on those days to the evangelical or Catholic church they were raised in and will actually do some checking out, or will just figure "Oh, I can just go to that pretty progressive sounding church my friend goes to". Christmas and Easter hipster Christians actually are a thing in fact.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Christmas and Easter hipster Christians actually are a thing in fact.

You made some really good points in this post, but the fact that it all builds up to this sentence gives me some real bad vibes. I'm in bummed-out city.

ETA: Actually, I'll attempt to respond more substantively if you tell me what you think of Joe Strummer.

A bit overrated. It's kind of telling that the best songs by The Clash are their mainstream radio singles, and they released an objectively terrible album as well (Cut The Crap.) One of those bands were the bands they influenced were better than them, though I have to give them credit for giving the influence. I actually tend to think of music in terms of its distance of years earlier than or after 1985 and thus think of it in terms of BRS and ARS (Before and After Revolution Summer), but can't deny he was definitely one of the most important BRS musicians.

I also think you missed the point of that sentence.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Christmas and Easter hipster Christians actually are a thing in fact.

You made some really good points in this post, but the fact that it all builds up to this sentence gives me some real bad vibes. I'm in bummed-out city.

ETA: Actually, I'll attempt to respond more substantively if you tell me what you think of Joe Strummer.

A bit overrated. It's kind of telling that the best songs by The Clash are their mainstream radio singles, and they released an objectively terrible album as well (Cut The Crap.) One of those bands were the bands they influenced were better than them, though I have to give them credit for giving the influence. I actually tend to think of music in terms of its distance of years earlier than or after 1985 and thus think of it in terms of BRS and ARS (Before and After Revolution Summer), but can't deny he was definitely one of the most important BRS musicians.

Thanks. I more or less agree with that analysis of the Clash (with the exception of Sandinista!, which I think is more solid overall than it's given credit for). The reference I was making was to a Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros song, though.

That I am not too familiar with.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Very possibly, yeah.

In terms of substantive response to your main point I would simply say that your description of the specifics of the Saint Paul-Minneapolis ecclesiastical province is if anything a case in point of what I was saying. It's within an individual bishop's or archbishop's choice, not the Vatican's, whether his diocese or province will be 'all ultra-conservative, all the time' or not. (It shouldn't be so, because Catholic social teaching on paper doesn't map well onto a secular left-right spectrum, but Catholicism's been susceptible to bad deals with the political right for a long time now and it's definitely something for which one can reasonably criticize the Church and a lot of people in it. Not great!)

I simply don't agree that it's for the better that somebody who'd otherwise be a Christmas and Easter Catholic, or Episcopalian, or whatever become a Christmas and Easter hipster Christian instead. This is because there are a ton of really symbolically rich, vibrant, generationally transmitted customs and, frankly, art forms expressed through the holiday services of the liturgical denominations. I don't expect you'll agree with this consideration but I hope you understand why I, as someone deeply interested and invested in art history and history of ideas, consider this relevant. In fact, differing aesthetic sensibilities and philosophies of art (and music!) probably account for a lot of the differences we have on religious issues. In my own assessment of the importance of this I'm far closer to Schleiermacher's definition of religion than Descartes's or Kant's.

If your point was that it's better to be a Christmas and Easter hipster Christian than to never go to any kind of church at all, then no argument there.

I don't see why the phenomenon of nondenominational Christians somehow disproves or detracts from what I'm saying about the Catholic->None and Mainline->None camps.

OK you know there are hipster Christian churches Christmas and Easter traditions too right? And I don't see what makes them less valuable, aside from being newer, especially as they tend to be far more unique (a lot more for one, and then there's things like people literally crowd surfing on Easter or that girl giving a bunch of monologues in the style as if Mary had a Tumblr blog that I've posted about before.) Also the idea that someone needs to stay in something they are really uncomfortable with for the sake of "culture" or even "art" is exactly what why I have such a dim view of cultural religion in the first place.

But my point was mostly that such a person is likely either someone who was a hipster Christian who lapsed but still has a connection to the community or someone exploring things and checking out what they've read about or what they know their friend is going to, basically most of the points about social cohesion are just as valid and relevant. Except that as a self-selected identity people can fit in better. And I fail to see why anyone has a problem with self-selected identities at all.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

But it doesn't have the same social cohesion effect, for the simple reason that it can be dropped like a hot potato the second someone gets uncomfortable.

Ideally both individuals and their social and religious environments should respond receptively and liberally (in the sense of the Aristotelian virtue of liberality) to each other's needs and desires--similar to William James's view that neither Great Man historiography nor historical materialism is correct, because individuals and their environments shape and mold one another in all sorts of complex ways. In contemporary America, neither do.

What problems does this create in the US though? I don't see any.

This is kind of what I mean about an "undue burden". A person raised Catholic and a person raised liberal Protestant, both of whom are gay, should have an equal right to not affiliate with an institution that makes them deeply uncomfortable.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

But it doesn't have the same social cohesion effect, for the simple reason that it can be dropped like a hot potato the second someone gets uncomfortable.

Ideally both individuals and their social and religious environments should respond receptively and liberally (in the sense of the Aristotelian virtue of liberality) to each other's needs and desires--similar to William James's view that neither Great Man historiography nor historical materialism is correct, because individuals and their environments shape and mold one another in all sorts of complex ways. In contemporary America, neither do.

What problems does this create in the US though? I don't see any.

A great many people are very, very lonely. I've talked to a ton of people my age who pine for the stability and sense of purpose of our grandparents' generation, even though we don't want to repeat it wholesale. The fact that there's any widespread demand for something like hipster Christianity indicates an essential 'flattening' of human personality into a few traits and interests that all exist at essentially the same level of salience, which I think is an unacceptable anthropology. (I'm also thinking of somebody like Joe Republic--who actually makes a much better caricature of Modern Liberal Man than Evelyn Waugh's Lieutenant Hooper, because he manages to be both a smug urban liberal and overtly anti-intellectual at the same time--calling me 'pretentious' because I speak in different registers with different posters, as if any departure from the absolute baseline of my personality must be something I'm putting on for show.) As I said, you appear to be doing well for yourself spiritually speaking; you're probably unusually well-equipped, emotionally, for the current American spiritual and cultural environment. But I know a ton of people for whom the same cannot be said. I am someone for whom the same cannot be said.

I don't see how more people simply identifying as "Catholic" instead of "none" or "non-denominational Christian" would help with that.