The Catholic Church: Rejecting Children, Rejecting Progress

It's not much of a surprise that the Catholic Church is seeing a decline in recent years. Church attendance has fallen to less than 30 percent in Italy, where 95 percent describe themselves as Catholic. Here in America, 400,000 left the church in 2008 alone.

The church has been hit hard by child sex abuse scandals, causing many to rethink their affiliation. Many are also having a hard time reconciling their personal convictions with the Church's views on contraception, gender equality, and reproductive rights.

As if those reasons weren't enough to decimate the church's attendance, we have this 'issue' of homosexuality and same-sex marriage.

When it comes to homosexuality, the Catholic Church, unlike many Protestant churches, will not budge. Not only will they not budge, they are also shooting themselves in the foot. They are guaranteeing the decline of new life in the Church by rejecting the very children they need to survive (and, in turn, rejecting the parents, and potential parents, of their own communities).

In Illinois, the Church has decided that, rather than let same-sex couples adopt, they would rather get out of the foster care business altogether.

Since March, state officials have been investigating whether religious agencies that receive public funds to license foster care parents were breaking anti-discrimination laws if they turned away openly gay parents.

In discussions after the civil union bill went into effect in June, representatives for Catholic Charities in Joliet, Springfield, Peoria, Rockford and Belleville told the state that accommodating prospective foster parents in civil unions would violate Catholic Church teaching that defines marriage between a man and a woman.

The Church has since called off efforts to keep in the foster care business by dropping lawsuits against the state, and agreeing to transfer over 1,000 foster care children to other agencies.

The Catholic Church simply refuses to evolve. The number of gay couples who adopted tripled in the last decade. This is a battle the Church will not win.

According to the Adoption Institute, at least 60% of U.S. adoption agencies surveyed accept applications from non-heterosexual parents. Nearly 40% of agencies have knowingly placed children with gay families. About half the agencies surveyed reported a desire for staff training to work with such clients.

"If one agency doesn't serve you and you're gay, then another agency will," said Adam Pertman, executive director of the Adoption Institute. "You don't need 100% agency participation. The bottom line is, if you're gay or lesbian in America and you want to adopt, you can."

About a third of the adoptions by lesbians and gay men were "open," and the birth families' initial reactions regarding sexual orientation were very positive, according to the study.

Contrast these realities with the stunted logic of the Church:

“We believe that children are best served by being in the home of a married couple or a single individual,” [Catholic Conference executive director Robert Gilligan] explained. “That's not a radical notion.”

He added that homes provided by married couples or single, committed individuals “is in the best interest of the child and quite frankly, I think society should recognize that that's in the best interest of the child.”

Talk about throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

While there is no reason to believe that single parents can't, or don't, do the job (so many do it extremely well), it is absurd to posit that two loving parents of the same sex are not as capable as a single parent, especially in an economy where at least one parent must work full time to make ends meet.

Good luck, Catholic Church. While this latest step certainly isn't the nail in the coffin, it isn't doing you any favors.

According to the Public Religion Research Institute:

More than 6-in-10 (62%) Millennials (age 18-29) favor allowing gay and lesbian couples to marry, 69% favor allowing gay and lesbian couples to adopt children, 71% favor civil unions, and 79% favor employment discrimination protections for gay and lesbian people.

Slightly more Catholics (46%) believe the Catholic Church’s position on the issue of gay and lesbian people is too conservative than believe it is about right (43%).

Nearly seven-in-ten (69%) Millennials agree that religious groups are alienating young people by being too judgmental about gay and lesbian issues. Among seniors, only 37% agree that religious groups are alienating young people by being too judgmental and 48% disagree.

Among religious groups, 73% of non-Christian affiliated, 64% of Catholics, 60% of black Protestants, 59% of white mainline Protestants, and 51% of white evangelical Protestants say places of worship contribute either a lot or a little to higher rates of suicide among gay and lesbian youth.

The train has left the station, dudes.  It seems most don't want you on board, anyway.

2011 American Values Survey: America Still Not Cool With Atheists

The Public Religion Research Institute has just released their 2011 American Values Survey.

While there are a lot of interesting findings, the most interesting are the findings related to voters' attitudes about the religious affiliation of potential presidential candidates.

Among the findings:

America digs a religious president
Two-thirds of voters say that it is very important (39%) or somewhat important (28%) for a presidential candidate to have strong religious beliefs. However, nearly 1-in-5 (19%) say they would be less likely to vote for a candidate who had strong religious beliefs if those beliefs were very different from their own.

Suck it, atheists!
Once again, an atheist president seems to be the most universally reviled, with 67% of all voters saying they would be somewhat to very uncomfortable with an atheist in the White House. Unsurprisingly, Republicans were the most uncomfortable (80%), with 70% of Democrats and 56% of Indpendents also feeling uncomfortable with an atheist president. Americans seem to be more threatened by no religion than by religious views that lead some people to fly planes into buildings.

Not crazy about Muslims (but then again, they're no atheists)
America is slightly more comfortable with a Muslim president than they are with an atheist president, with 64% of all voters feeling uncomfortable with the idea. Republicans are the anomaly here, however, as they feel slightly more uncomfortable (81%) with the idea of a Muslim president, than they do with an atheist president (80%). The majority of Democrats and Independents are uncomfortable with a Muslim president (56% and 58%, respectively). These numbers would likely be higher if most people weren't somewhat used to Obama by now.

In Evangelicals We Trust
In contrast, an Evangelical president is much less threatening, with only 28% of all voters feeling uncomfortable (18% of Republicans, 32% of Democrats, and 31% of Independents). Americans tend to be fearful of the unknown. And while George W. Bush made many uncomfortable, it is a discomfort we are quite familiar with.

The kids are alright?
One trend that is not surprising is that millennials (18-29) seem to be much less bothered by the religious affiliations (or lack of affiliations) that bother older voters...well, except for Mormons.

A little over half (54%) of millennial voters say they would be uncomfortable with a Mormon president, compared to 39% of senior voters (65 and older).  It is unclear if millennials are simply more likely to have seen South Park, or if they are just creeped out by Glenn Beck. I mean, they are weird, right?

56% of millennials say they would feel somewhat uncomfortable with an atheist president (41% would actually feel somewhat comfortable), compared to 77% of senior voters who would feel at least somewhat uncomfortable with an atheist president (this includes the 60% who would feel VERY uncomfortable with an atheist president).

Half of millennials say they would feel at least somewhat uncomfortable with a Muslim president, with nearly as many (47%) saying they would feel somewhat comfortable. Compare that to seniors, of whom 74% would be at least somewhat uncomfortable with a Muslim president.

Progress?

There's much more to dig into, including attitudes on income equality, Obama's performance, and the current GOP candidates-in-running. View the report here (pdf).

The More Money Americans Make, The More Jesus Digs Capitalism

Throughout the history of religion, people have found ways to reconcile views that might be at odds with their religious doctrine.

According to the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus said, "If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me." (Matthew 19:21)

He followed up with, "Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." (Matthew:19:24)

A new Public Religion Research Institute survey reveals some interesting things about American's ability to reconcile their love of Jesus with their love of money.

Overall more Americans believe that Christian values are at odds with capitalism and the free market than believe they are compatible. This pattern also holds among Christians. Among Christians in the U.S., only 38% believe capitalism and the free market are consistent with Christian values while 46% believe the two are at odds. Religiously unaffiliated Americans look similar to the general population and to Christian Americans, with a plurality (40%) saying capitalism is at odds with Christian values, compared to 32% who say they are compatible; 14% say they do not know. There are significant differences by gender, party and income.

Some interesting findings:

• Half (50%) of women believe that capitalism and Christian values are at odds, compared to 37% of men. 
• A majority (53%) of Democrats believe that capitalism and Christian values are at odds, compared to 37% of Republicans.

The most interesting finding, in terms of illustrating our amazing ability to find ways to reconcile religious views with personal views, was the following:

• Nearly half (46%) of Americans with household incomes of $100,000 a year or more believe that capitalism is consistent with Christian values, compared to only 23% of those with household incomes of $30,000 a year or less.

It's understandable that those with very little would agree with Jesus' words in the Gospel of Matthew. It's also understandable that those who are well off would find ways to interpret those words differently, or deem them as irrelevant in a modern society where we have charities and government programs to assist the less fortunate. (Rush Limbaugh seems to know precisely what Jesus would do.) At the end of the day, these surveys say more about human nature than anything else.

A few other findings worth noting:

• Overall most (61%) Americans disagree that most businesses would act ethically on their own without regulation from the government. Less than 4-in-10 (37%) believe that they would. This holds true across political and religious lines, with the lone exception of those who identify with the Tea Party movement (53% agree).

• Nearly 6-in-10 Americans (58%) believe that the federal budget is a moral document that reflects national priorities while 41% disagrees.

• Overall most (61%) Americans disagree that most businesses would act ethically on their own without regulation from the government. 

There is a problem with static documents such as holy books and founding papers in that as the centuries go by, we find ourselves confronting an increasing number of ideas, conundrums, and complexities that the original writers could not have imagined in their wildest dreams. (Those who believe that The Bible is the infallible word of God would certainly disagree.)  We can no more imagine what the Founding Fathers would think about the regulation of agriculture biotechnology than we could imagine what Jesus would think of corporate tax loopholes. And when we attempt to distill the essence of a text for application in our complex modern world, we end up with wildly differing extrapolations. These extrapolations most often are self-serving and at odds with the basic philosophies exhibited in the text. 

While we can certainly look to founding documents and sacred texts for guidance, there comes a point where the text is limited by its place in time, and we start making our own rules to validate our own actions and desires.  Often a shoehorn is involved.

The PRRI media release can be found here (PDF).