WASHINGTON—As the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics looked toward their new leader Pope Francis I on the Vatican balcony, American Catholics appear divided on the direction they want for their church under a new pontiff.
According to a Pew Research Center survey last month, 51 percent of Catholics in the U.S. believed the next pope should maintain traditional positions of the church. Even so, the majority of Catholics in the survey sample supported non-traditional beliefs on marriage and some social issues. The poll said 58 percent of Catholics favored allowing priests to marry and 54 percent accept same-sex marriage.
“[A new pope] might be a chance for the Roman Catholic Church to turn around and turn the corner from some of those issues that have really taken the forefront of the Catholic religion versus the faith and what we believe in,” Kathleen Kirk, a Georgetown University student said.
Currently, the United States is the fourth largest Catholic country at 75 million, representing 7 percent of all the Catholics on the planet. While Catholics are more conservative in their political and social views than religiously unaffiliated Americans, 50 percent of Catholics voted for President Barack Obama in the 2012 election.
Religion commentator Robert Jones believes the divide between wanting the Church to maintain traditional, Catholic values versus preferring newer, even radical directions lies in how questions are phrased. At the Public Religion Research Institute where Jones serves as CEO, a study found that the 53 percent of Catholics believe the church should either adjust traditional beliefs and practices, or adopt new ways in light of modern circumstances.
“People can approach tradition in more than just a take-it-or-leave-it fashion,” said Jones. “When you only give people a binary choice, it tends to have people who care about tradition but might want to adapt it not have a place to go.”
Additionally, Jones argued that, “Catholics are willing to have a moral judgement in one place and a policy judgement in another.”
Only 37 percent of Catholics attend mass weekly, Pew found. Michael Miller, a research fellow at the conservative think tank Action Institute, believes there is a general misunderstanding of the Catholic faith and doctrine, even among believers, that leads to the tension between individual Catholics and the Church hierarchy.
Unlike a president or a CEO, Miller said the pope serves as “the steward of a tradition that is handed off to him” and thus leads by following church creed, not by listening to polls or pleasing followers.
“The church understands itself and the doctrines theologically and not politically; that’s hard for us to understand…” said Miller. “[People often] are actually being shaped much more by the news media or what they hear on television and newspapers than they are by actual Catholic doctrine.”
The newly elected pope from Argentina is the first non-European pontiff in the modern era. Pew Research found that nearly half of all Catholics in the U.S. under the age of 40 are Hispanic, which could help Jorge Mario Bergoglio, now known as Pope Francis I, gain acceptance here.
While the College of Cardinals’ selection of a Southern Hemisphere leader could signal a new era of the Church, few experts predict that major changes in Catholic doctrine or standards will occur anytime soon.
“With the next pope, we are going to see a lot more continuity than we will see change,” said Father Thomas Reese, a Jesuit and senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center at Georgetown University. He was interviewed before the white smoke appeared above the Sistine Chapel Wednesday night. “We are not going to see major changes in substance. What we will see changes in is personality and the style of the pope just because people are different.”
To some younger Catholics, the enduring traditions and rituals are appealing. Catholic University sophomore Johanna Gardner thinks that the unchangeable nature of the Church is what makes the faith alluring and reliable to many Christians.
“I think the beauty of the church is its universality,” Gardner said. “There are changes in leadership…things on the surface can change while that continuity stays the same.”
But not all believers agree. At Georgetown, Kathleen Kirk attends masses weekly and still hopes there is room for the Church to grow and adapt its social stances.
Kirk said her church needs to be more open. “Everyone has a right to their faith and a right to profess what they believe in…” she said. “I hope that the next pope does that and really unites [people] versus stratifying people and pushing people away.”
The conclave’s decision Wednesday will likely shape the direction of the church for the next decade. Former archbishop of the Washington Diocese Cardinal Theodore McCarrick is optimistic about the church’s future regardless of the papal decision.
“The church is young and the church is alive,” McCarrick said. “[The pope] has to make sure that [the Church] has enough life and joy in it that it can reflect the Lord’s message and really answer the challenges that young people face today.”
(McCarrick, and all others quoted here, were interviewed before Pope Francis I was elected Wednesday. Pew Research interviewed 1,504 adults, 18 years of age or older, between Feb. 13 and Feb. 18. Of the sample, 304 of the respondents were Catholic. The margin or error for that slice was plus or minus 6.5 percentage points.)
