Has synodal report accurately captured the state of US Catholicism?
At face value, a new report on the state of American Catholics makes for grim reading, pointing to growing division and unhappiness. According to the report by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), Catholics in the US are divided over everything from the liturgy to gay rights. Part of the Pope’s Synod of Synodality, the report warned that Catholics have brought divisions from the political arena into the Church in America, an increasingly diverse community centred increasingly in the south and west.
In many ways, this hardly comes as a shock. Even before the Supreme Court ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson, the Pew Research Center found deep divisions among American Catholics towards abortion, in addition to considerable division within the country at large. After Dobbs, Pewfound 51 per cent of Catholics disapproved of the decision by the Supreme Court. Pew also found that just 39 per cent of American Catholics believe abortion should be illegal in some or all cases, against 60 per cent who feel abortion should be legal.
There has almost seemed to be a battle for the heart of American Catholicism of late, especially after Pope Francis recently passed over Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone and Archbishop José Horacio Gómez for Bishop Robert McElroy. That brought to national attention the division over whether Catholic politicians who support abortion access should still receive Communion. According to the report, polarisation has also impacted the church hierarchy, with divisions among senior clergy becoming “a source of grave scandal”.
McElroy has not only questioned identifying abortion as a “preeminent” priority – instead of giving more prominence to poverty, immigration, or climate change – but has denounced the campaign to exclude Catholic politicians who support abortion access from Communion. By contrast, Cordileone barred US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi from receiving Communion because of her support for abortion access. While McElroy signed a statement expressing support for LGBT youth, Cordileone has spoken out about same-sex marriage, and Gómez has fiercely attacked “woke” culture.
In common with reports from other Western countries, there was also an emphasis on inclusion, notably for LGBT people, with the report emphasising that “The hope for a welcoming Church expressed itself clearly with the desire to accompany with authenticity LGBTQ+ persons and their families”. The abuse scandal has also undermined trust in the Church, the report found. However, the synodal process has been somewhat undermined by a very low participation rate. In the United States, the rate has been around 1-2 per cent.
This is not unique to the US, of course. In England and Wales, for instance, the participation rate for the synodal process among all baptised Catholics has been under 1 per cent and under 10 per cent for those attending Mass. There has also been criticism that liberal groups have been disproportionately represented in many Western countries, at a time when most Catholics had been oblivious to the synodal process. Questions have even been raised about the tone of questions amid an increasingly leftwards turn by the Synodal Path in Germany, and calls for upending Catholic tradition in Ireland.
It also seems that national reports often reflect countrywide societal norms. Again, according to the Pew Research Center, the general cultural division within Europe is also mirrored among the Continent’s Catholics. Unsurprisingly perhaps, the President of the Polish Episcopal Conference publicly rebuked the Synodal Path in Germany. According to Poland’s own synodal report, Catholics there do not want doctrinal changes.
At face value then the USCCB report indicates a tremendous lack of unity among American Catholics, one evidenced also in data on the Latin Mass and attitudes towards abortion both pre- and post-Dobbs. Still, with a participation rate of less than 1.5 per cent, how accurately has the report captured the mood among America’s Catholics? While the report makes for uncomfortable reading for those who hope for a more cohesive Catholic Church in the US, given the low participation rate and potentially leading tone, one should perhaps take its findings with more than a pinch of salt.
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