There are 6.5 ex-Catholics in the US for every Catholic convert

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

No other religious group has such a high ratio:

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/10/10/7-facts-about-american-catholics

Thoughts?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Thoughts?

There've been scandals.

[Kingpoleon]

There've been scandals.

That’s the understatement of the millennium.

[Devout Centrist]

There are no ex-Catholics, red. Once a member, always a member.

[RI]

At least one, if not two, entire generations of US Catholics gave up on even attempting catechesis. And, of course, the sex abuse scandals have been disastrous.

On a lesser note, Catholicism is a very rationalist and philosophical faith by Christian standards, which is not something which is as appreciated in the United States these days. It's not surprising that the biggest gainers among Christians have been highly emotion-based groups like Pentecostals. There is a real, albeit shallow, power to their approach.

[PSOL]

How have Protestant, specifically Baptist and Evangelical, groups been able to not attract such scrutiny to their sexual scandals and issues with outdated rites in the modern era?

[Donerail]

How have Protestant, specifically Baptist and Evangelical, groups been able to not attract such scrutiny to their sexual scandals and issues with outdated rites in the modern era?

The Southern Baptist Convention has had its own scandals. As for why there hasn't been as much scrutiny, there's a combination of factors. One is that they're just more geographically concentrated in the South — a lot of national journalists live in cities where the Catholic Church is a real and meaningful presence, while far fewer in cities where evangelical groups (at least white evangelicals) are the dominant denomination. These churches are also much more autonomous — a scandal in one local non-denominational church doesn't say anything about another non-denominational church, while a scandal in the Catholic hierarchy impugns the entire apparatus.

What do you mean by "outdated rites"? I don't particularly associate Baptists with any particular rites...

[afleitch]

The same Religious Landscape showed that only 44% of millennial Catholics are white with 44% latino and 49% are first or second generation immigrants, are marginally pro-choice and 80% supportive of homosexuality and 72% in favour of equal marriage (and this was in 2014, a lifetime ago.)

They are also increasing net contributors to the 'Nones'.

While I don't buy RI's 'rationalist and philosophical' argument in full, even if partially accurate if the Church doesn't reflect the needs of diverse young and child rearing Catholics, there's no where else for them to go but out the door completely.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

There are no ex-Catholics, red. Once a member, always a member.

Not according to people who identify as such who have no reason to recognize any dogma of the church or any of its authority.

[H. Ross Peron]

This reflects the contrast in the intelligentsia's narratives of religious trends and actual demographic changes in religious affiliation. For example, Buddhism and other Eastern religions were considered the future of religion from the 1960s onwards due to their increasing influence among Western intellectuals but in numbers, actual Western converts to Buddhism or Hinduism was far exceeded by Asian converts to Christianity in the past half century. Same with Catholicism which seems to be picking off an unusually high number of intellectuals from Protestant (evangelical or mainline) or agnostic backgrounds but far exceeded in absolute numbers by working-class converts to Evangelicalism-especially if one counts the Global South.

[PSOL]

So exactly what religious faiths are being caught on to working class adherents in the United States then?

[DC Al Fine]

So exactly what religious faiths are being caught on to working class adherents in the United States then?

Pentecostalism and non-denominational Evangelicalism mostly.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

So exactly what religious faiths are being caught on to working class adherents in the United States then?

A lot of the so-called "nones" aren't the urban secular progressives we normally assume but working-class people who are running low on social capital and social trust in general, in their spiritual lives not least of all. Upstate New York and Upper New England are lousy with with disengaged blue-collar Obama-Trump-Biden types who checked out from their local Congregationalist or Methodist parish after it started being driven by the pronouns-in-bio set, or their local Catholic diocese after it started being driven by very-online canon lawyers who wore Brooks Brothers suits for their high school yearbook photos.

[PSOL]

So exactly what religious faiths are being caught on to working class adherents in the United States then?

Pentecostalism and non-denominational Evangelicalism mostly.

I assumed that these denominations have been decreasing or at least stagnating in adherence from the regular working class since the 2000s. If they’re still growing with the working class, then that would mean the more wealthier adherents are dropping the faith then for something else, no?

So exactly what religious faiths are being caught on to working class adherents in the United States then?

A lot of the so-called "nones" aren't the urban secular progressives we normally assume but working-class people who are running low on social capital and social trust in general, in their spiritual lives not least of all. Upstate New York and Upper New England are lousy with with disengaged blue-collar Obama-Trump-Biden types who checked out from their local Congregationalist or Methodist parish after it started being driven by the pronouns-in-bio set, or their local Catholic diocese after it started being driven by very-online canon lawyers who wore Brooks Brothers suits for their high school yearbook photos.

Interesting, but what faiths are these people turning to then? The “none” label is an unstable one, and I’m sure something has already started to catch on, right?

[afleitch]

PSOL, from my perspective it seems that Americans are so used to the idea of 'church shopping' and bouncing from faith to faith, and public affiliation that you're struggling with the idea that people might be leaving faith and not looking for another.

[RINO Tom]

At least one, if not two, entire generations of US Catholics gave up on even attempting catechesis. And, of course, the sex abuse scandals have been disastrous.

On a lesser note, Catholicism is a very rationalist and philosophical faith by Christian standards, which is not something which is as appreciated in the United States these days. It's not surprising that the biggest gainers among Christians have been highly emotion-based groups like Pentecostals. There is a real, albeit shallow, power to their approach.

Not sure if you'd want us on your side, given some of your political/religious attitudes I have seen, but as a (relatively liberal) Mainline Protestant, I share this sentiment.

[Tintrlvr]

So exactly what religious faiths are being caught on to working class adherents in the United States then?

Pentecostalism and non-denominational Evangelicalism mostly.

I assumed that these denominations have been decreasing or at least stagnating in adherence from the regular working class since the 2000s. If they’re still growing with the working class, then that would mean the more wealthier adherents are dropping the faith then for something else, no?

So exactly what religious faiths are being caught on to working class adherents in the United States then?

A lot of the so-called "nones" aren't the urban secular progressives we normally assume but working-class people who are running low on social capital and social trust in general, in their spiritual lives not least of all. Upstate New York and Upper New England are lousy with with disengaged blue-collar Obama-Trump-Biden types who checked out from their local Congregationalist or Methodist parish after it started being driven by the pronouns-in-bio set, or their local Catholic diocese after it started being driven by very-online canon lawyers who wore Brooks Brothers suits for their high school yearbook photos.

Interesting, but what faiths are these people turning to then? The “none” label is an unstable one, and I’m sure something has already started to catch on, right?

They aren't. It's pretty normalized in those communities to not attend church or be involved in any particular religious organization. Some (maybe many) of those people probably still have quite active religious beliefs, but those beliefs aren't fitted into a particular denominational slot. A peculiarly American phenomenon is picking and choosing what your religious beliefs on individual issues are, and doing so in a way that doesn't reflect any particular consistency or any denominational alignment. That, and being a strident and convinced Christian with virtually no knowledge of the contents of the Bible or established Christian religious thought at all.

But I'm speaking as an atheist raised in a particularly irreligious Presbyterian household. YMMV.

[RI]

So exactly what religious faiths are being caught on to working class adherents in the United States then?

Pentecostalism is growing rapidly among the Hispanic working class. The white working class is more disaffected altogether.

At least one, if not two, entire generations of US Catholics gave up on even attempting catechesis. And, of course, the sex abuse scandals have been disastrous.

On a lesser note, Catholicism is a very rationalist and philosophical faith by Christian standards, which is not something which is as appreciated in the United States these days. It's not surprising that the biggest gainers among Christians have been highly emotion-based groups like Pentecostals. There is a real, albeit shallow, power to their approach.

Not sure if you'd want us on your side, given some of your political/religious attitudes I have seen, but as a (relatively liberal) Mainline Protestant, I share this sentiment.

Despite my many issues with liberal Mainline Protestantism, all Christians are ultimately on the same side.

[PSOL]

PSOL, from my perspective it seems that Americans are so used to the idea of 'church shopping' and bouncing from faith to faith, and public affiliation that you're struggling with the idea that people might be leaving faith and not looking for another.

These are always unstable categories ripe for something to come if one doesn’t have a strong worldview to back up their current religious identity.

So exactly what religious faiths are being caught on to working class adherents in the United States then?

Pentecostalism is growing rapidly among the Hispanic working class. The white working class is more disaffected altogether.

I totally forgot about the rising Protestant population in Hispanic communities. Say, what exactly leads them to leave the Catholic Church anyway?

[afleitch]

PSOL, from my perspective it seems that Americans are so used to the idea of 'church shopping' and bouncing from faith to faith, and public affiliation that you're struggling with the idea that people might be leaving faith and not looking for another.

These are always unstable categories ripe for something to come if one doesn’t have a strong worldview to back up their current religious identity.

?

[afleitch]

Pew last year found that in 2009, 57% of Hispanics called themselves Catholic down to 47% percent in 2019. The number of Hispanics identifying as Protestant only rose from 23% in 2009 to 24% in 2019

The number describing themselves as belonging to non-Christian religions rose from 1% to 3%

Those describing themselves as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular” increased from 16% to 23%

It's a bit of a misconception (and perhaps some PR) to say that US Hispanic Catholics are become Protestant let alone Pentecostal.

[PSOL]

PSOL, from my perspective it seems that Americans are so used to the idea of 'church shopping' and bouncing from faith to faith, and public affiliation that you're struggling with the idea that people might be leaving faith and not looking for another.

These are always unstable categories ripe for something to come if one doesn’t have a strong worldview to back up their current religious identity.

?

The “nones” in the US are susceptible to religious conversion proven that they are young and willing enough and don’t have tools to resist conversion if they haven’t “made up their mind”

[H. Ross Peron]

So exactly what religious faiths are being caught on to working class adherents in the United States then?

Pentecostalism is growing rapidly among the Hispanic working class. The white working class is more disaffected altogether.

I would add that while most converts to evangelicals were mainline Protestants originally, there seems to have been a fairly large number of working and middle-class conversions from Catholicism to evangelicalism in the postwar era between say 1945 and 1985 that accompanied suburbanization and demographic movement to the more Protestant Sunbelt.

[RI]

Pew last year found that in 2009, 57% of Hispanics called themselves Catholic down to 47% percent in 2019. The number of Hispanics identifying as Protestant only rose from 23% in 2009 to 24% in 2019

The number describing themselves as belonging to non-Christian religions rose from 1% to 3%

Those describing themselves as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular” increased from 16% to 23%

It's a bit of a misconception (and perhaps some PR) to say that US Hispanic Catholics are become Protestant let alone Pentecostal.

Pew's 2019 raw data isn't available yet. In their 2014 dataset, the present religion of Hispanics who were raised Catholic was and no longer Catholic:

42.2% None + Agnostic + Atheist
11.8% Pentecostal
  9.7% Non-Denominational
  8.6% "Christian"
  7.5% Baptist

However, this hides a bit of a class/education divide. Among Hispanic Catholic apostates who had not completed high school (~30% of Hispanics), the breakdown was:

27.0% Pentecostal
18.6% None + Agnostic + Atheist
  9.7% Baptist
  6.2% "Christian"
  3.4% Non-Denominational

So I think, at the very least, there is an argument to be made that working class Hispanics are, conditional on leaving Catholicism, moving to Pentecostalism at least as much as moving to "None". More educated Hispanics are clearly becoming Nones much more than Pentecostals, and this doesn't fully invert along income lines as it does along education lines.

I also found this:

About three-in-ten (29%) Latino Protestants belong to traditional Pentecostal denominations. An additional 38% describe themselves as Pentecostal or charismatic Christians even though they do not belong to a Pentecostal denomination. Among Hispanic Catholics, 52% say they are either charismatic or Pentecostal Catholics.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

I also found this:

About three-in-ten (29%) Latino Protestants belong to traditional Pentecostal denominations. An additional 38% describe themselves as Pentecostal or charismatic Christians even though they do not belong to a Pentecostal denomination. Among Hispanic Catholics, 52% say they are either charismatic or Pentecostal Catholics.

What exactly is a Pentecostal Catholic?