I just read an article from USA today that says the San Francisco archbishop has declared that Catholic Democrat Nancy Pelosi can no longer receive Communion in the Catholic Church in San Francisco because of her pro choice viewpoints. I know someone else has written about this but I wanted to ad a few thoughts.
These hateful, judgmental bishops should realize that this is why attendance for church is in decline.
Catholics are generally a Democratic leaning constituency, and have historically been so. JFK was Catholic, as is John Kerry, Pelosi and of course the current president. I believe Joe won the Catholic vote by a couple of percentage points in 2020 according to the exit polls. Many Catholics are Democrats and many are pro-choice. By constantly demonizing pro choice Catholic politicians and being so against abortion and gay rights, these bishops are pushing Catholic Democrats away from the Catholic church.
I don’t understand why they don’t realize this. They complain that attendance is down and that not enough young people attend church, and then they come out with this intolerant crap. Many Catholics are progressive and particularly the young ones, and they are being made to feel unwelcome in the church because of this.
Many of these church leaders have stated that you must vote republican in order to be a good Catholic. That is ridiculous, as the republican party stands for pretty much the opposite of Catholic teachings on most issues. Liberal Catholics and younger Catholics who attend mass are probably getting sick of being told they have to vote for aholes like trump and vote Republican in order to be good Catholics. Priests and bishops do everything in their power to make Democrats and pro choice people feel unwelcome in the church. And then they wonder why attendance is decreasing? Maybe because they are pushing liberal leaning folks away? Are they too stupid to realize this? Then they complain that attendance is down. They complain that there are not more young people attending mass.
They themselves are the reason attendance is in decline. Their radical intolerant conservative views and their insistence on shoving these down everyone’s throat is why attendance is down. Why would a progressive want to sit in the pews and be told their soul is in jeopardy because of their political views?
Let me give them some advice: Be more open minded and tolerant of different viewpoints, and maybe more people would come back to the Church. Instead of of saying you don’t belong in the church if you aren’t republican and anti-choice, they should be doing just the opposite. They should be saying that everyone who wants to worship in the church is welcome regardless of their politics or their views on abortion and gay rights, etc. Maybe if you made everyone feel welcome, more people would attend church. There would be more donations too. Remember when people leave the church, they take their donations away too.
But they won’t do this. They will continue to become more and more right wing and intolerant and attendance will continue to decline. And they will be wondering why.