Catholic by Inheritance: A Challenge and Opportunity

A 2015 the Pew Research Center report uncovered a striking fact: Nine percent of Americans say that they are Catholics, but that Catholicism is not their religion.

Two out of 10 respondents told the Pew pollsters that they are Catholics in the sense that they “claim the faith as their current religion.” Another one out of 10 “were raised in the faith and have now fallen away.” But the third group, the 9 percent that Pew calls “ cultural Catholics,” are more of a puzzle. They do not claim Catholicism as their religion since they are Protestants, atheists, agnostics, or have no religious affiliation. Yet they also regard themselves as indelibly Catholic by culture, ancestry, ethnicity, or family tradition; in other words, the family tree. If Catholicism is a religion, then why do so many Americans call themselves Catholics and yet do not have a Catholic religious identity?

These individuals say they are Catholic “because of their Catholic background,” which mostly means that they were raised in Catholicism as children. They feel they have inherited a Catholic identity, but have made a conscious choice not to embrace or practice Catholicism as their religion.

When asked what it means to be a Catholic, some people say that it is “a matter of religion,” others that it is a matter of “ancestry or culture.” Religion and religious identity are seen as distinct from the cultural identity. It is not simply an assemblage of beliefs and practices, but the fact that one has chosen to believe and practice, that marks something as religious to Americans. One basic assumption that Americans make about religion, then, is that it is something they actively choose, not something that they simply inherit from parents and family.

All parishes have Catholics by inheritance either attending, associated with the parish, or who have left.  What are you doing to keep them engaged or to become re-engaged? This is both a challenge and an opportunity that deserves our attention.