A Thought on Cafeteria Catholics or Who ever heard of a Cafeteria Baptist?
This is a rough thought, not too polished yet, but I think we do a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth over fallen-away, lapsed, and cafeteria Catholics, instead of taking advantage of what is actually an advantage to the Church.
Like the title says, who ever heard of a cafeteria baptist? No one has, because they leave the church they belong to and become atheists or start a new one, or find another one. But Catholics are a different breed. They will identify as Catholic a long time after they are no longer practicing ones.
We focus too much on the fact that their ties to the Church are getting thin, rather than trying to take advantage of the fact that they still have ties at all. Once a baptist leaves their church, it would be hard for that church to reclaim him, but when a Catholic starts to leave the Church, there is still a ready tether for evangelization.
Just an optimistic thought.
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