Customer Reviews

The Catholic Myth

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What is the Catholic conscience? How formed? Answers are provided by the random surveys of the population of English speaking countries in which by priest sociologist Andrew Greeley took part. He calls his 1990 book The Catholic Myth.
The myth is that Catholics are working class bigots. Actually, they are no longer working class, but, Hispanics included, have half again as many college graduates as Protestants, blacks excluded.
The General Social Survey of 1985 and 1987 asked about religious vision and social conscience. Greeley's GRACE scale measured religious vision: Choose your image of God. Is God more a friend to you or more a king? More spouse or master? More lover or judge? More mother or father?
Social conscience was surveyed by asking, How much are you in favor of equal rights for women, minorities, gays? Do you favor or reject the death sentence? Government help for the poor? Civil liberties? Open housing?
Was the GRACE scale related to social conscience? Yes, very strongly even when the influence of gender, age and region was taken out. Only education had more influence on supporting the freedoms stemming from the Bill of Rights.
Corroboration: Those high on GRACE were significantly less likely to vote for Ronald Reagan both times by 8 and 12%).
Catholics Vote Against Leader's Decisions With Their Giving
I will not hide my anger at the [cowardice, corruption and dishonesty] of the hierarchy, priests and scholars of the American Catholic Church.. . . Catholics have not deserted their Church . . . but their loyalty is not due to most of those who occupy the three leadership positions.
The Protestant answers to the survey seem to say the world is a cold and sinful place where man struggles against man. Catholics seem to say the world is a warm community. Happiness is right now not only in the hereafter. To us, the Catholic answers to the survey say, the world is a community of potential friends. All men are in actual truth equal and worthy. God loves all men as a mother loves every child.
The reason we are angry is because we imagine God as a friend, but our leaders are like stern ministers sent by a king to rule us. Legislation without representation in parish, bishop's palace, and Curia is our chief complaint. Yet loyalty is still strong. Only 1% are planning to leave!
The lack of priests and nuns is not due to the vow of celibacy. In Greeley's opinion celibacy is a strength. It confers virtue even holiness making priests credible teachers of morals, a safe friend and counselor. The reason there are so few is their low self esteem. Leaders do so little to support them that job satisfaction is no higher than blue collar workers. Priests have stopped recruiting for the priesthood.
A Comforting Prejudice Slain by Brutal Fact
Catholic leaders command; few obey. Catholics are in favor of equality for gays. On gay marriage 24% say yes compared to 12% of Protestants. As many use artificial contraception as the rest of Americans. They have proportionately more abortions. At exit polls only 1% said abortion was an important voting issue.
One Democrat policy-maker said to Greeley, "Their stand against abortion makes seeking Catholic votes a waste of time." Why are Democrats not influenced by the data? He thinks it is the ancient bigotry of the Harvard elite who so often advise Democrats. I say, When a lovely hypothesis is slain by an ugly fact only those with their noses high in the air cannot smell the odor of decay.
Charles R. Keller
Comments welcome

crkeller@frontiernet.net

Some readers might find this book a bit of a challenge in terms of Greeley's analysis of his years of sociological data, but stick with it... out of the swirling mist of numbers emerges a fascinating study of modern religion in America.

Greeley's sociological sleight-of-hand manages to address (and smash) many myths about the Catholic church. If you think belief is declining in young Catholics... if you believe they are leaving the Church in record numbers... if you think they shed their Catholic consciousness (what Greeley calls their "Catholic imagination") the second they quit Sunday school ... well, you're in for a few surprises.

So buckle up and stick with this book... it's a wild (and inspiring) ride!

This is a truly wonderful book. It IS dense and it is worth every moment spent reading it. You cannot help but find yourself represented somewhere amongst all the respondents surveyed. I have reread it several times over the years and it continues to reassure me and verify my experiences in the Church. I have often been mystified by the presumptions others make about Catholics and Catholicism because the presumptions do not fit my experience at all - and I did not consider my experience or beliefs atypical. The book makes clear the widespread presumptions do not fit with the experiences of entire generations of Catholics in recent history! I would like very much to see a reprint of this book with updated data (or a follow up book). Many of Fr. Greeley's predictions about the Church as it enters the new millenia have no doubt come to pass and I, for one, would like a look at the numbers. It is a great pity Church leaders are not more interested in and responsive to this research. If they were, the Church today would undoubtedly be an even more robust and inclusive home base for Catholics today. This book is also a great treat for fans of the author's novels, which he was inspired to write by some of the findings reported here. This somewhat academic work points up just how deft he is at weaving both harsh and beautiful realities - confirmed by the data, of course - into highly entertaining parables that are themselves unforgettable experiences of grace.

Greeley plays a fascinating combination of roles - both serious sociologist and priest. With his finger on the pulse of society he conducts a well informed, highly civilized dialogue between North American society and his church. The myths he exposes concern the real identity of Catholics - who they really are, how their values are actually changing, how commonly they are a force for higher education, deeper thinking, and a more compassionate social policy. Greeley's trust in lay people as equals of the clergy before God leads him to see the Christian value in women's rising influence. With candid admiration of women he notes, "for those who picture God as present in the world, there is an instinct that God is equally disclosed by women for men and by men for women". (p. 241)

-author of Correcting Jesus

Greeley tried to make a statistical analysis of just about everything you could think of regarding Catholics approachable, and does a disservice in the way he does it. No charts! No graphs! And Greeley repeatedly mentions "statistical significance", which is dangerous, because it's so often misconstrued.

The quips that introduce each chapter are lively and probably meant to keep the reader going. I learned a decent amount of facts about Catholics and the C/church, most of which seem to make sense and most of which I agree with. (Admittedly, much of it did not matter to me one way or the other, but then again, there's something in the book for everyone.)

I wasn't prepared for what Greeley wrote at the end of the book. I just can't go back and read any of his books now, fact or fiction. All in all, many people would find it dry, those who want a rigorous analysis will be disappointed, and most Catholics would either be offended by Greeley or at least surprised by how forward he is in some ways. Not a bad book, but not great either. econ

this book refutes the sterotype that Catholics are working class, uneducated, conservative fundamentalists who blindly pledge allegiance to and follow some old fat guy in Italy. Are there still people out there who believe such stereotypes? I guess i was naive to doubt it.

I thought this book was a little irrelevant considering its date of publication, but there are still many people who accept many myths without the least pause for doubt or consideration. For them I recommend this book, and for anybody who wants to understand Catholic Americans.

This book gets a star for the Index, talking about Catholic social theory. Very good work there.

The rest of the book is garbarge. He continually states bishops ignore his numbers (from talks with some, they do not) and says no one has disproven him. Well, in his mind no one has. I've seen studies directly contradicting him. Interesting.

But my favorite was he proclaims as a fact that all credible research on the early Church says that everyone believed deaconesses to be in Holy Orders. Well, I contacted him looking for ANY source saying this. He has yet to respond because the Council of Nicea, the first Ecumenical Council, says the exact opposite.

Trash it.