Many active Catholics think as progressively about topics such as abortion, euthanasia or same-sex marriage as the average Dutch person. This appears from Thursday published research from I&O Research on behalf of the daily newspaper Fidelity, among nearly 2,000 active and former Catholics. Only one in seven active believers believes that the church is moving with the times.
More than half (52 percent) of active Catholics say they want to get rid of the ban on abortion, which is the same percentage as the average Dutch person, according to the survey. Almost three quarters of the former Catholics think so. Also, almost 70 percent say that the church should accept euthanasia and even 65 percent of the faithful are in favor of dying aid at the end of life. Furthermore, more than three quarters of active Catholics are in favor of gay marriage in the church and of women in the priesthood.
The positions often go against the views of the top of the Catholic Church. “There is a call to the management for change” to keep up with the times, says I&O researcher Charlotte van Miltenburg in Fidelity. Yet only 8 percent of that gap is reason to ponder their faith.
Celibacy
It is striking that young Catholics under the age of 34 are more conservative in their conception of celibacy than older people. They also believe in hell more often than the over-65s. Support for Catholic teaching is greatest in the 35-49 age group, but even there, no more than a third supports conservative views.
The I&O survey consists of a questionnaire, drawn up with the editors of Fidelity, which was completed by nearly 900 people who consider themselves active Catholics. More than 1,000 former Catholics participated in the survey. That group is even more progressive on all counts.
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