{"id":605,"date":"2009-10-22T10:11:00","date_gmt":"2009-10-22T10:11:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/progressiverevival\/2009\/10\/vatican-woos-conservative-anglicans.html"},"modified":"2009-10-22T10:11:00","modified_gmt":"2009-10-22T10:11:00","slug":"vatican-woos-conservative-anglicans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/10\/vatican-woos-conservative-anglicans.html","title":{"rendered":"Vatican Woos Conservative Anglicans: This is News?"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

This week, the Vatican announced that it would make it
\neasier for conservative Anglicans<\/a> and Episcopalians–those uncomfortable with women priests and
\naccepting gay people–to join the Roman Catholic Church.\u00a0 <\/span>The move surprised Anglican leaders
\nwho, evidently, had no idea that the Vatican planned a massive sheep-stealing
\ncampaign.\u00a0 <\/span>The news sparked
\nlively–and sometimes mean-spirited–debate in both print and online
\nmedia.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

Most stories pointed to the historic nature of the Vatican’s
\naction.\u00a0 <\/span>Evidently, not since the
\nProtestant Reformation has Rome invited so many of its former children to come
\nhome.\u00a0 <\/span>There have been many
\nremarkable individual “returns” of Anglicans to the Roman Catholic Church–most
\nnotably the English theologian John Henry Newman or the American bishop Levi S.
\nIves in the nineteenth century.\u00a0
\n<\/span>But historians strain to remember a mass invitation like this one.<\/p>\n

Reporters, however, have missed something important.\u00a0 <\/span>While it might be unusual for Rome to
\nformally invite Protestant to return to Mother Church, it is in no way odd for
\nRoman Catholics–especially those in Europe, North America, and Australia–to
\nabandon Rome for Protestant denominations.\u00a0 <\/span>For decades, cradle Roman Catholics have been leaving their
\nchurch in favor of finding congregations that are open to divorce, practice
\nbirth control, support women in the ministry, and respect the dignity of gay
\nand lesbian people.\u00a0 <\/span>Indeed,
\naccording to a 2008 Pew survey<\/a>, one in ten adult Americans is an ex-Roman
\nCatholic–with the Roman Catholic Church showing intense decline among Anglo-
\nand African-American populations (Hispanic immigration is helping RC membership
\nhold steady).\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

A Catholic News service story from 2005<\/a> noted that the
\nchange was a “constant trickle,” saying:<\/p>\n

Among those
\nchanging denominations, the Roman Catholics generally say they long to breathe
\nthe “free air” of the Anglican Communion, with Catholic priests
\nusually saying they plan to marry, the bishop said. The Anglicans usually say
\nthey have had enough of the “woolly thinking” of their leadership, he
\nadded.\u00a0 <\/span>“Anglicans who become
\nRoman Catholic generally become very conservative Roman Catholics, while Roman
\nCatholics who become Anglican tend to become very liberal Anglicans,” he
\nsaid.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

These observations have been backed up in a number of academic studies–including
\nmy own work.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>From 2002-2006, I
\nconducted a Lilly Endowment funded research project on vital mainline churches (findings may be found in Christianity for the Rest of Us<\/a><\/span>)\u00a0and found that successful mainline congregations had large populations of
\nformer Roman Catholics, sometimes as many as a fifth of the members would have
\nonce been Catholic (in two Hispanic congregations, every member was a former
\nCatholic). Several of the project pastors had also been Catholic.\u00a0 <\/span>In every case, the former Catholics
\npraised the intellectual and spiritual openness of the mainline church as the
\nmajor reason for switching.\u00a0And the mainline congregations had accommodated many Roman Catholic faith practices–everything from centering prayer to Marian devotion–to help converts be more comfortable in the new Protestant setting. \u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

In western Christianity, religious switching is a way of life.\u00a0 <\/span>That the Vatican has just figured that
\nout only proves they read polls.\u00a0 <\/span>That’s
\nit.\u00a0 <\/span>This isn’t really news.\u00a0 <\/span>Churchgoers are a migrant lot–and they
\nare voting for their favorite theologies with their feet.\u00a0 <\/span>Sometimes they vote liberal (as in the
\ncase of RC’s leaving their church) and sometimes they vote conservative (as in
\nthe case of Protestants becoming Catholic).\u00a0 <\/span>But that they do it–and that their denominations engage in
\nsheep-stealing to boast sagging membership rolls–should surprise no one.\u00a0\u00a0When liberal Anglicans join the Roman Catholic Church en masse or conservative Catholics chose to become Episcopalians….well, that<\/span> would be news.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This week, the Vatican announced that it would make it easier for conservative Anglicans and Episcopalians–those uncomfortable with women priests and accepting gay people–to join the Roman Catholic Church.\u00a0 The move surprised Anglican leaders who, evidently, had no idea that the Vatican planned a massive sheep-stealing campaign.\u00a0 The news sparked lively–and sometimes mean-spirited–debate in both…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,32,14,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-605","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-catholics","category-christians","category-mainline-protestants","category-religion-in-the-public-square"],"yoast_head":"\nVatican Woos Conservative Anglicans: This is News? - Progressive Revival<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/10\/vatican-woos-conservative-anglicans.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Vatican Woos Conservative Anglicans: This is News? 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She holds a Ph.D. in religious studies from Duke University and is the author of seven books including A People\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s History of Christianity: the Other Side of the Story (HarperOne, 2009) Her best-selling Christianity for the Rest of Us (2006) was named as one of the best religion books of the year by Publishers Weekly and Christian Century, won the Book of the Year Award from the Academy of Parish Clergy, and was featured in a cover story in USA TODAY. Diana regularly consults with religious organizations, leads conferences for religious leaders, and teaches and preaches in a variety of venues. She regularly comments on religion, politics, and culture in the media including USA TODAY, Time, Newsweek, The Washington Post, CNN, FOX, PBS, and NPR. From 1995-2000, she wrote a weekly column on American religion for the New York Times Syndicate. She has written widely in the religious press, including Sojourners, Christian Century, Clergy Journal, and Congregations. From 2002 to 2006, she was the Project Director of a national Lilly Endowment funded study of mainline Protestant vitality\u00e2\u20ac\u201da project featured in Newsweek, U.S. News and World Report, the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times. Diana also serves on the board of directors of the Beatitudes Society. Diana has taught at Westmont College, the University of California at Santa Barbara, Macalester College, Rhodes College, and the Virginia Theological Seminary. She has taught church history, American religious history, history of Christian thought, religion and politics, and congregational studies. She lives in Alexandria, Virginia. She is a member of the Episcopal Church of the Epiphany in downtown Washington, D.C.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/author\/dbbass"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/66"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=605"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}