Lapsed Catholics explain why they leave church

[dawn9476]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/ ... story.html

The most common reasons from people who responded to the survey were the priest acting like a king, too much conservative politics discussed, and too much time was spent on issues such as homosexuality and birth control.

Most of the people who responded were also women with the average age of 53, which means that if you alienate a 53 year old woman from the church, you risk alienating her children and grandchildren.

[QAF_Rocks]

Interesting that skepticism or doubt seems not to be a major factor for people leaving the Catholic church.

[BelieveinScience]

I grew up Catholic. I don't know if it was just my church or not but I rarely went to the actual services and the one time I went they all prayed for the "aborted babies and that would God would love them" I may have started giggling with that one. Then when I was in high school during one of the CCD classes they separated the girls and the boys and told the girls that it was our job to serve the man and put the man first. Umm yeah. They never said much on homosexuality just that it was okay to be gay as long as you don't act on it. And they told everyone that masturbating was a sin and when we got confirmed if we did that we should confess it.

[Coconut Flan]

Most of the people I know who no longer attend mass quit because of being insulted in some way by a priest or the position of the church on divorce and the requirement for a church process before remarriage.

[Wolfie]

My dad's immediate family mostly left when his father died, his mother was trying to figure out how she was going to support her 4 children (from about 8 to 17), and the church said "give us money or else."

[mockingbird]

I grew up Catholic. I'm kind-of pissed at the church right now with the whole birth control thing. I go to a Jesuit college and I was really disappointed when our president sent out a letter/email that basically regurgitated the church's position. Jesuits are supposed to be progressive and our campus does a LOT of work to serve the poor/underserved populations (including a free clinic run by the med students) so I thought this was something we would take a stand against. Or at least not send out letters in support of the church's position and just let it blow over. Um, nope. I haven't been to church in months though I'll probably go to Easter Vigil because I LOVE that mass.

The priests/Jesuits here are all great and my priests back home were great too. I never heard anything discriminatory from them. I was actually good friends with one before he got transferred, and we talked literature and he was over our house a few times. Our priests like Harry Potter and this one time my mom and I went back to the sacristy and our one very introverted priest was singing "Manic Monday" to himself, which was hilarious. I guess what I am trying to say is that they always came across as pretty normal people with their own interests outside of the church - people who didn't let legalism control their entire lives. All the priests we've had at my church and the ones I've met at school have been welcoming. I've always liked the priests and most of the people in my church (the religious education director who started when I was in high school is really legalistic but I think it says something that about half the families pulled their kids out of PSR [public school religion] classes after bad experiences with her - I think the priests are just too nice to fire her). I'm just annoyed with the public image the Church/Vatican is promoting lately.

My really Catholic friend and I spent about an hour complaining about Santorum the last time I saw her, so even people like that are getting upset in my experience.