Tuesday, October 23, 2012

U.S. Catholics want more of a focus on helping the poor

A new survey shows that a majority of Catholics think that the church should focus more on helping the poor than on abortion. This was probably widely reported yesterday, but we wanted to make sure to mention it at our blog. We are pretty excited about this news because we feel that this should be the greatest concern not only for the church but for the whole world.

The U.S. Catholic Bishops instead focus on abortion, and no matter what you might feel about this issue, let's face facts... Roe vs Wade is not going to be overturned anytime soon. The history of three pro-life Presidents since the legalization of abortion should be proof enough. No, Romney won't be able to overturn it, unless the entire Supreme Court retires during his presidency.

The church should instead focus more on something that could immediately impact lives, something that even non-Christians would support, something that is mandated by Scripture.

From Reuters Alert Net, writer Mary Wisniewski tells us more about the survey results.
The 2012 American Values Survey finding on Catholics goes against the focus of many U.S. Catholic bishops, who have stressed the church's ban on abortion and artificial contraception in their public policy statements.
The poll found that 60 percent of Catholics want a greater focus on social justice issues rather than abortion, while 31 percent support the opposite approach.
The divide was true even among Catholics who attend church once a week or more, a group often considered more socially conservative. A slim majority of this group, 51 percent, thought the church should focus more on social justice issues.
"The survey confirms that there is no such thing as the 'Catholic vote,'" said Robert P. Jones, chief executive of the institute and co-author of the report. The survey included more than 3,000 respondents. "There are a number of critical divisions among Catholics, including an important divide between 'social justice' and `right to life' Catholics."

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