STATISTICS Polling the membership

A Zogby International telephone poll of 1,901 Catholics nationwide was conducted in March for The Philadelphia Inquirer and Le Moyne College in Syracuse, N.Y. On some issues, opinions varied little from the youngest to the oldest respondents. They found common ground in a question about abortion: About half of all age groups thought both the church and the individual should have a say. Across generations, two-thirds of respondents said the church should be more democratic in its decision-making. Of young adults ages 18 to 35, fewer than half said they:
Attend Mass weekly (46 percent).
Go to confession at all (31 percent).
Consider it important that priests be unmarried (48 percent).
Think that the church alone has the final say on sex outside marriage (25 percent).
Believe that same-sex physical relations are always wrong (47 percent).
Suppor2t the prohibition against artificial birth control (26 percent).
Yet even among those who eschewed some of the rules, the poll found a durable bond with Catholicism. The majority of 18- to 35-year-olds said:
There is "something special about being Catholic" (81 percent).
Their Catholic identity "connects" them with their families (86 percent).
It's important for younger generations of their families to "grow up to be Catholic" (91 percent).
They like the rituals, art, music (91 percent).