On measuring Catholics

Well, last week, Andrew Brown missed the point, and this week he’s missing questions...

He writes about assessing the true number of Catholics in the UK, no easy task. He gives three ways of finding out this figure. He starts by showing how baptism is not a good marker as people leave religions. Baptismal figures (estimated from “Religion one was brought up in” – this does seem a fair proxy) come out at 14% of the population baptised as Catholics. He then presents a false dichotomy. The remaining two ways, he says, are to ask people what their religion is, or to ask Catholic priests about the numbers of their flocks. I think there would be more than two ways to find out this figure – but before that, let’s first start with a definition. What counts as a Catholic? This isn’t as ridiculous as it sounds, the comedian Dara O’Briain puts it well:



He may be a “bad” Catholic, but I hope we can all agree, that for the purposes of counting the number of Catholics in the UK (yes, I know he’s Irish, but is a more entertaining and amusing way of illustrating my point), a “bad” Catholic like this shouldn’t be counted.

The blog post finishes:

"The wide range of answers is significant in two ways. The first is – to labour the point – that none has been obtained by counting baptisms. At the very least, they measure the people prepared to say, when asked, that they are Roman Catholics. The second is that this carries a wide range of meanings. It certainly doesn't mean that there are 4 or 5 million people who agree with the pope about everything. But that's not how religions work in any case. It's certainly not the way atheism works."

This is true, people may well call them selves Catholics (more on this in a bit) – but how much of the Catholic Churches teaching can be dropped before the individual stops being counted as a Catholic, along the lines in the video above? This is more a rhetorical question. It’s not going to be as simple as a checklist, with x% and above of belief in Catholic dogma meaning a “good” Catholic, and anything less a "bad" Catholic. I do think at the very least, however, there should be some sort of belief in God. Also, some practice of the religion. It’s a difficult one. I don’t profess to know the answer.

This is where we get on to my third option. We could ask: Do you regularly practice a religion? If so, which religion, and how often? This is, of course, won’t be perfect either. Many people may slip out of the habit of going to Church, praying etc but still regard themselves as “good” Catholics.

The two options of Brown’s are likely to give us higher answers. It’s a peculiarity of the UK, that whilst we are becoming one of the most secular countries in the world, we’re not quite up for leaving “Religion” blank on forms. The British Humanist Association recently highlighted this. People who nominally call themselves Catholics may not fit the definition of a Catholic. This is important, as for example, they don't believe any dogma; don't go to Mass; are happy for men to have sex with men; gay couples to adopt children; women to be ordained; contraception to be worn; and stem cell research to go forward, so would it really be meaningful for them to be included in the numbers?

Asking Priests the size of their congregations can also be tricky – is it just Mass attendance. Does he include the husband and children of the lady who comes to Mass each week, but the rest of the family are somewhat more lax with their Catholicism?

To be sure, it is hard to estimate the numbers of people that hold a belief system. But let’s not make it harder by restricting avenues of finding this out (like basing figures on active practicing of a religion), even if they give lower numbers than would be liked. Church attendance is falling across the board.

However, we must concede that when Richard Dawkins says:

"Adolf Hitler was a Roman Catholic. Or at least he was as much a Roman Catholic as the 5 million so-called Roman Catholics in this country today. For Hitler never renounced his baptismal Catholicism, which was doubtless the criterion for counting the 5 million alleged British Catholics today. You cannot have it both ways. Either you have 5 million British Catholics, in which case you have to have Hitler too. Or Hitler was not a Catholic, in which case you have to give us an honest figure for the number of genuine Catholics in Britain today – the number who really believe Jesus turns himself into a wafer, as the former Professor Ratzinger presumably does."

It’s not entirely fair, as if we do count the number of baptisms, we get a higher number of UK Catholics than the Catholic Church use. However, is it unfair to include Hitler among the number of the world’s deceased Catholics? Well, he never renounced his faith, and he did say stuff like this:

"I am now as before a Catholic and will always remain so" [Adolph Hitler, to Gen. Gerhard Engel, 1941]

So no, it's not unfair at all, here's maybe what Richard Dawkins should have said:

"Adolf Hitler was a Roman Catholic. Or at least he was as much a Roman Catholic as the 5 million so-called Roman Catholics in this country today. For Hitler called himself a Catholic, which was doubtless the criterion for counting the 5 million alleged British Catholics today. You cannot have it both ways. Either you have 5 million British Catholics, in which case you have to have Hitler too. Or Hitler was not a Catholic, in which case you have to give us an honest figure for the number of genuine Catholics in Britain today – the number who really believe Jesus turns himself into a wafer, as the former Professor Ratzinger presumably does."

He was certainly more of a Catholic than Dara O’Briain. As for the half of Catholics who aren't aware that Jesus turns himself into a wafer, I'm not sure.

Not quite, Pope

Well, now the Pope has thankfully left the UK, as is custom, he has summed up his visit saying that "Christianity is still strong and active" in the UK. Whilst I"m all for people changing their minds given the evidence (for, his initial address was on the threat from us nasty, Nazi, atheists), this isn't actually the case, though his conclusion is unsurprising given that he must have spent his time surround by sychophants.

Religion is in decline in the uk.

With over 170 distinct religions counted in the 2001 Census, the religious make-up of the UK is diverse, complex, multicultural and surprising. Less than half of the British people believe in a God, yet about 72% told the 2001 census that they were Christian, and 66% of the population have no actual connection to any religion or church, despite what they tend to write down on official forms. Between 1979 and 2005, half of all Christians stopped going to church on a Sunday. Religion in Britain has suffered an immense decline since the 1950s, and all indicators show a continued secularisation of British society in line with other European countries such as France.

The decline has been nicely visualised (do check out that link, it's report that goes with this graphic):

Missing the point

It bugs me that Richard Dawkins now seems known more for his atheism writing than his excellent science writing.

It also bugs me that he always seems to get mis-quoted or quote mined when reported on.

Take the latest from Andrew Brown:

There was a picture of the pope holding a golden swastika, which the organisers apparently took down later, as offensive. I don't know why, since Richard Dawkins later published on his web site the speech he meant to deliver, comparing every Catholic in Britain to Adolf Hitler: "Adolf Hitler was a Roman Catholic. Or at least he was as much a Roman Catholic as the 5 million so-called Roman Catholics in this country today", although in the event he said something less gratuitously provocative: "Adolf Hitler was a Roman Catholic ... If the church wants to claim [5m Britons] as Catholics, then they have to claim Hitler as a Catholic".

Actually, the full quote, in context:

Adolf Hitler was a Roman Catholic. Or at least he was as much a Roman Catholic as the 5 million so-called Roman Catholics in this country today. For Hitler never renounced his baptismal Catholicism, which was doubtless the criterion for counting the 5 million alleged British Catholics today. You cannot have it both ways. Either you have 5 million British Catholics, in which case you have to have Hitler too. Or Hitler was not a Catholic, in which case you have to give us an honest figure for the number of genuine Catholics in Britain today – the number who really believe Jesus turns himself into a wafer, as the former Professor Ratzinger presumably does.

This is quite different, I think you'll agree. If you've the time, read the whole piece, it's worth it.

A lot of people seem turned off by Dawkins, because of how he's reported (it's the impression that I get), which is a shame, as he is a superb writer, and has written some of my favourite books.

If people could read what he has to say, not what people have thought he's said, or, at the very least, take the full context of what he says, then that would be a good start.

Here's his speech at the Protest the Pope rally: