{"id":1047,"date":"2013-11-26T07:57:00","date_gmt":"2013-11-26T07:57:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2013\/11\/new-poll-faithful-catholics-an-endangered-species.html"},"modified":"2013-11-26T07:57:00","modified_gmt":"2013-11-26T07:57:00","slug":"new-poll-faithful-catholics-an-endangered-species","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2013\/11\/new-poll-faithful-catholics-an-endangered-species.html","title":{"rendered":"New Poll: \u2018Faithful Catholics\u2019 an Endangered Species"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>
Pope Francis is full of surprises. This month he launched a survey of Catholic opinion in order to inform a special synod on the family scheduled to meet in Rome next October. Not surprisingly, it\u2019s caught many national conferences of bishops on the hop. Under John Paul II and Benedict XIV they\u2019d got used to a Vatican which looked inwards rather that outwards for authority. A favourite text was\u00a0Lumen Gentium<\/em>\u2019s passage which insists that the magisterium of the Pontiff requires \u201creligious submission\u00a0of mind and will.\u201d A survey of ordinary Catholics sits oddly with this stance. What can it mean?<\/span><\/div>\n
Catholic opinion is divided on the answer. Conservatives say the survey\u2019s designed to do no more than expose how the church\u2019s irreformable teaching on family and sex needs to be strengthened. It will aid in the re-confessionalisation of the faithful, helping gather strayed sheep back to the fold. Reformists say the opposite. They welcome the initiative as a sign that Francis really cares about what ordinary Catholics think, and that Vatican II\u2019s claim that the Church is \u201cthe whole people of God\u201d is at last being made good.<\/span><\/div>\n
A closer look at the\u00a0questionnaire<\/a>\u00a0supports the conservative view over the reformist one, for it\u2019s not a survey in any sense that a social scientist would recognize. The 38 questions are larded with theological jargon, and will leave many of the faithful scratching their heads and Googling the Catholic Encyclopedia. Take question 1a, for example:<\/span><\/div>\n
Read the rest here<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pope Francis is full of surprises. This month he launched a survey of Catholic opinion in order to inform a special synod on the family scheduled to meet in Rome next October. Not surprisingly, it\u2019s caught many national conferences of bishops on the hop. Under John Paul II and Benedict XIV they\u2019d got used to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nNew Poll: \u2018Faithful Catholics\u2019 an Endangered Species<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Pope Francis is full of surprises. 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