Demographics

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Catholic voters and the midterm elections: Mainstream news blitz ignores major voter bloc

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Catholic voters and the midterm elections: Mainstream news blitz ignores major voter bloc

We are in the middle of another election season and in full mud-slinging mode.

Elections are an annual occurrence, to one degree or another, but the vote that will dominate this Nov. 8 are known as the midterms. It’s when a majority of seats in both the House and Senate are up for grabs, allowing for the party in the minority (in this case the Republicans in both chambers) to potentially becoming the majority. Midterm elections are also traditionally viewed as referendums on presidents.

This takes us to the Catholic vote and its impact on the outcome. This is a topic that is receiving little or no mainstream press coverage. As we say here at GetReligion: “Hold that thought.”

While inflation and crime will certainly be on the minds of most as they cast ballots, “culture war” issues are very much alive and well. Abortion, especially after this June’s Supreme Court decision that once again made it a state issue after Roe v. Wade was rolled back, will certainly be an issue.

There have been many, many news stories about how the abortion issue will motivate those on the political left to come out and vote following the Dobbs decision. The Washington Post, on Oct. 8, reported on the issue in a news feature that appeared under the headline, “Women powered Democrats in the 2018 midterms. Will they again in 2022?”

After opening with two Colorado women, Robin Kupernik and Elizabeta Stacishin, who had joined forces in 2016 to combat Donald Trump, who was elected to the presidency that year. This is the feature’s thesis:

In the 2018 midterm elections, women like Kupernik and Stacishin were part of a women-led army that changed politics. Women who had never been particularly active politically worked phone banks, wrote postcards and sent text messages to voters. They were repulsed by Trump and determined to do something about it.

They met in small groups, marched in the streets and went door-to-door to encourage people to vote for Democrats. Their passions were palpable. Many of the congressional candidates they were supporting flipped Republican-held seats, all part of a political tide strong enough to flush the GOP from control of the House, dealing Trump a major defeat. The Pew Research Center has estimated that 62 percent of White women with college degrees backed Democrats for the House four years ago.

That has become the major press-coverage storyline of the midterms.


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Faith, family, dating and the looming marriage crisis in America (Part I)

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Faith, family, dating and the looming marriage crisis in America (Part I)

For decades, viewers have enjoyed the Japanese reality-TV series "Old Enough!" in which preschool children venture into the streets alone to run errands for their parents.

What if American women asked their live-in boyfriends to stop playing videogames, leave their couches and run errands? In the Saturday Night Life sketch "Old Enough! Longterm Boyfriends!" guest host Selena Gomez asked her helpless boyfriend of three years, played by cast member Mikey Day, to buy her eyeliner and two shallots.

This man-baby ends up in tears with a big bag of onions and "a blush palette for African-American women." The frustrated girlfriend says she may need a mid-morning glass of wine.

There was wisdom in that comedy, for pastors willing to see it, said sociologist W. Bradford Wilcox, director of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia.

"There's a whole class of young men who are not flourishing personally and professionally. … The systems have broken down that help raise up attractive, successful men. Churches used to be one of those support systems," he said, reached by telephone.

"The future of the church runs through solid marriages and happy families. The churches that find ways to help men and women prepare for marriage and then encourage them to start families are the churches that will have a future."

The crisis is larger than lonely, under-employed and Internet-addicted men. Rising numbers of young women are anxious, depressed and even choosing self-harm and suicide.

The coronavirus pandemic made things worse, but researchers were already seeing danger signs, noted San Diego State psychology professor Jean Twenge, in a recent Institute for Family Studies essay.


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Ryan Burge at RNS: Thinking about the impact of political sermons, on left and right

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Ryan Burge at RNS: Thinking about the impact of political sermons, on left and right

Hey churchgoers: How long has it been since you heard a political sermon?

Wait. We need to pause and discuss what a political sermon might sound like. For example, I think everyone would agree that an open endorsement of a political candidate from the pulpit would be “political.”

But what if a congregation or a denomination invited a political leader to speak in a worship service or some other event? This is something that happens on the political left and right. For generations, to name one example, Democrats have accepted warm, strategic invitations to speak — or perhaps simply exchange greetings — in African-American churches. It makes headlines when GOP leaders address major evangelical bodies (think Vice President Mike Pence and the Southern Baptist Convention).

More questions: What if a bishop or a preacher addresses issues that are clearly both doctrinal AND political, such as right-to-life concerns or threats to the environment? What about a conference focusing on ways religious groups can defend First Amendment rights, such as freedom of speech, freedom of association and freedom of religious practice? Is a liberal rally on abortion more “theocratic” than one organized by believers on the doctrinal right?

I ask these questions because of a piece GetReligion contributor Ryan Burge, he of the omnipresent charts and info on Twitter, wrote for Religion News Service. Here’s the newsy headline “When preachers get political, do they change minds? Preachers tend to risk political speech only when they know it will receive a warm reception.” The overture:

One of the most important and difficult questions among those who study religion and politics is just how important a pastor, rabbi, imam or other religious leader is when it comes to shaping the worldviews of their congregation. These figures get a weekly chance to dominate the attention of the people who come to listen to their sermons. They have a nearly unique opportunity to mold their congregants’ view of the theological, social and political world around them.

How often do pastors actually use that opportunity to speak out about the pressing issues of the day? Some new data gives us a look.

A Pew Research Center poll fielded in March of 2021 asked people if they had heard sermons that contained references to the fallout from the 2020 presidential election in the previous month. The survey asked about four topics specifically: the possibility that the 2020 election was rigged, former President Donald Trump’s inaccurate statements about election fraud, as well as support for or opposition to those who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

That is certainly a rather Donald Trump-era dominated list, but that reflects several years of headlines. Meanwhile, it’s safe to say that President Joe Biden is in the White House, in large part, because of support from voters in Black churches during several primaries. But I digress.


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Question for journalists to mull: What will America's religious life look like in 50 years?

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Question for journalists to mull: What will America's religious life look like in 50 years?

Scribes in the U.S. press snapped to attention last year when the Gallup Poll announced that as of 2020 less than half of Americans held religious memberships for the first time in its eight decades of asking the question. Only 47% of Americans said they belonged to a church, synagogue, mosque or other house of worship, a dramatic loss from the 70% as recently as 1999.

Now comes the Pew Research Center with a related pulse-pounder issued last week.

Pew figures that currently 64% of Americans (including children) identify as Christians in some sense, compared with 6% for other religions and a hefty 30% for “nones” and “nothing in particulars” — those without religious affiliation. Then we’re told that 50 years from now the Christian percentage may well fall to a modest 54% or even to a remarkable 35% in the worst-case scenario, while the non-religious population rises to somewhere between 34% and a slim majority of 52%.

Understandably, the Pew numbers became spot news for, among others, CBS, National Public Radio, the Washington Examiner and Washington Post, both newspapers in faith-focused Salt Lake City, USA Today, Britain’s The Guardian and a host of religious outlets.

This remains a good spot story for media that haven’t yet reported Pew’s basics. But even media that have reported the topline numbers could return to the theme with illustrative anecdotes and reactions from area religious leaders. And for sure journalists and religious analysts will want to give the full report some careful thought.

Pew emphasizes that its numbers are only “possibilities,” not “predictions of what will happen,” and comments that such a future would have “far-reaching consequences for politics, family life and civil society.” For example, also consider the multiple social science surveys that associate religious involvement with psychological and medical well-being and positive life outcomes for youths. Also, there is the impact of religious charity, not only effective huge organizations but private person-to-person interactions. Also, religions strengthen community in our “Bowling Alone” culture.

Pew calculated four future scenarios based largely upon the rates at which Americans may switch in or out of Christian identification and in or out of religious “none” status.


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Podcast: Why are churches closing? There are many forces at work, but doctrine still matters

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Podcast: Why are churches closing? There are many forces at work, but doctrine still matters

For years, there was a simple answer to the old question: Why do some churches grow, while others shrink?

You simply bought a copy of the 1972 book “Why Conservative Churches Are Growing: A Study in Sociology of Religion” by the late National Council of Churches leader Dean M. Kelley and that provided information answering lots (but not all) of the big questions. It was crucial that this groundbreaking book was written by a mainline Protestant insider, as opposed to a Southern Baptist or Assemblies of God leader.

Of course, everyone knew that some churches grew because of location, location, location. Also, there were always a few liberal churches that grew because of talented preachers or other strengths. Like I said: Kelley answered lots of church-decline questions, but not all of them.

What about 2022 in post-pandemic church life? For starters, many churches will never be post-pandemic — because many congregations (and maybe denominations or communions) were changed forever and we will see more evidence of that in the next few years.

All of this is an overture to this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (CLICK HERE to tune that in) which focuses on a must-read feature story by Godbeat veteran Bob Smietana. The headline at Religion News Service: “For a small Chicago church, closing down was an act of faith.” This was a personal, heartfelt story for Smietana, since this was a congregation that he once called home.

Like so many pastors around the United States, the Rev. Amanda Olson has kept one eye on the Bible and another on the evolving religious landscape.

She knew change was coming to the church in America.

Yet she hoped her congregation might be spared the worst of it.

“Everyone thinks that churches are going to close,” said Olson, the longtime pastor of Grace Evangelical Covenant Church on Chicago’s North Side. “But nobody thinks it is going to be their church.”


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What will American Protestantism look like after the wars inside the 'Seven Sisters' are done?

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What will American Protestantism look like after the wars inside the 'Seven Sisters' are done?

Over decades, the map of U.S. Protestantism has been redrawn by splits over the authority and interpretation of the Bible that eventually focused on the LGBT dispute. Now we have a major case study that journalists will need to cover at the local, regional, national and global levels.

A balanced coalition of leaders in the large United Methodist Church (UMC) developed a treaty for mutually respectful separation — the Reconciliation and Grace Through Separation protocol — for that’s currently degenerating into a wasteful fight like other groups have suffered.

Reporters and concerned readers will want to dive into these commentaries and news stories:

* Look at a United Methodist timeline: Why are conservatives going nuclear with lawsuits?

* What happened to United Methodists’ proposal to split the denomination?

* Time is Running Out for Traditionalist United Methodists!

* For United Methodists, the center is not holding

* Special sessions of United Methodist annual conferences 2022

* United Methodist Church bishops mount defense amid conservative attacks (paywall protected)

* Liberal Bishops Have Redefined United Methodist Polity

The current maneuvers by the North American UMC establishment may well limit the number of dropouts joining the Global Methodist Church. Its vision has been to unite a million or more U.S. Methodist evangelicals with the growing Methodist churches in Africa and Asia, creating an effective and innovative international denomination dedicated to defending current Methodist doctrines. This could help counteract some U.S. conservatives’ drift into Christian nationalism. Is that still feasible?


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Plug-In: Why faith still matters -- Bob Smietana on how religion is getting reorganized

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Plug-In: Why faith still matters -- Bob Smietana on how religion is getting reorganized

Religion reporter Bob Smietana’s “aha!” moment came a few years ago while covering a hurricane.

When a tornado, flood or other disaster occurs, so-called faith-based FEMA organizations typically play a crucial role in the relief effort.

“Usually, a bunch of church folks and other religious folks show up,” explained Smietana, a Religion News Service national reporter. “They cook meals, they clear trees, and they help people rebuild their houses and put their lives back together.”

But given the decline of organized religion in America, might those helpers — at some point — disappear? And if so, what might that mean for the nation’s social fabric? Such questions came to Smietana during his “aha!” moment.

“Something in my head went, ‘Oh, wait. All those people doing this faith-based disaster relief are usually older church folks, and most of them are White,’” he told me, noting the shrinking proportion of White Christians in America.

Reflecting on the hurricane volunteers, he realized, “There’s no one in the pipeline to replace those folks when they’re gone.”

The veteran Godbeat pro shared that anecdote as we talked about the ideas behind his insightful new book, “Reorganized Religion: The Reshaping of the American Church and Why It Matters”, which releases tomorrow.

Here’s how Worthy Publishing describes Smietana’s book: “A look at the ways the Christian church has changed in recent years — from the decline of the mainline denominations to the megachurchification of American culture to the rise of the Nones and Exvangelicals — as well as a hopeful vision for reimagining what the church might look like going forward.”

My own take: The 200-plus pages of “Reorganized Religion” certainly are timely, delving into long-term demographic trends while exploring challenges such as the COVID-19 pandemic and post-2020 political division.


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Tip for reporters: Don't assume what Catholics believe based on politics or Internet memes

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Tip for reporters: Don't assume what Catholics believe based on politics or Internet memes

There are moments in journalism that stand out more than others. One of those moments is when a certain piece — whether it’s a news story, analysis or opinion — gets a lot of attention by a large group of people for good and/or for bad reasons.

For a set of bad reasons, The Atlantic piece on the weaponization of the rosary was that piece for many Catholics and those who keep a watchful eye on media coverage of matters pertaining to the largest Christian denomination in the United States.

The piece — not necessarily a news story, but it was not labeled as commentary or even analysis — became a viral conversation topic among many family and friends over the last week. While the issue of Christian nationalism is important to understand, the bigger discussion — and questions I had to field — was more like this: What’s wrong with journalism these days?

That’s the central preoccupation of many — especially those of us who have been doing this for decades. (For more on that, please check out tmatt’s post and podcast from this past Friday. This view of what was going on in this piece may shock you.)

There were many lines from the Atlantic piece that stood out, but one that did most was this one:

The theologian and historian Massimo Faggioli has described a network of conservative Catholic bloggers and commentary organizations as a “Catholic cyber-militia” that actively campaigns against LGBTQ acceptance in the Church. These rad-trad rosary-as-weapon memes represent a social-media diffusion of such messaging, and they work to integrate ultraconservative Catholicism with other aspects of online far-right culture. The phenomenon might be tempting to dismiss as mere trolling or merchandising, and ironical provocations based on traditionalist Catholic symbols do exist, but the far right’s constellations of violent, racist, and homophobic online milieus are well documented for providing a pathway to radicalization and real-world terrorist attacks.

There’s the thesis of the piece, the connect-the-dots language linking strange behavior to current tensions in Catholic life in America.

There’s plenty to unpack here, but the reality is that citing a few political websites claiming to represent Catholic thought and then adding a smattering of social media memes is no way to gauge for what anyone really thinks and believes.


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