Catholic Exorcism in America

The Atlantic has a thoughtful article on Catholic exorcism. There are several interesting facts reported in the article.  One is that rates if belief in demonic possession are still high in the United States;  about half of Americans believe demonic possession is real.  Another is that there is demand for exorcist services;  the official exorcists for Indianapolis has received 1700 requests in the year 2018, more than he has received in any earlier year.  Another is that that are many more known Catholic exorcists in the United States now than several years ago, and new exorcists are being trained.  But what the article does best is provide an in-depth perspective of a particular person who received an exorcism.  The focus is on Catholic exorcism, but exorcisms occur in other denominations in the United States.  The Episcopal Church, for example, still maintains the practice.

There are several other interesting elements.  A key issue in exorcism is identifying whether a person's condition is demonic possession or some other ailment, such as schizophrenia.  Exorcists have procedures they follow to determine if the case involves demonic possession, and then an exorcism is only performed if the evidence warrants it.  Another key issue is efficacy.  Sometimes the exorcism takes place over several sessions with an exorcist, and knowing whether the exorcism has been successful can be difficult to discern during the process.

Many members of the Catholic church, including many priests, do not believe in possession or in the efficacy of exorcism.  Perhaps this is a reason why there are actually very few exorcists relative to the size of the American Catholic population.  I wish the author would have spent more time exploring this idea.

Read to find out the author's best explanation for the rising demand for Catholic exorcisms.  The explanations relate to our understanding of the processes of secularization and forces that might work against secularization.

If you are interested, you can read more about Catholic exorcism at the web site for the International Catholic Association of Exorcists.  There are also several books that you can find on amazon.

Wild Wild Country

I highly recommend the documentary Wild Wild Country.  (available on Netflix).  Here's how the six-part series is described on imbd:

When a controversial guru builds a utopian city in the Oregon desert, it causes a massive conflict with local ranchers. This docuseries chronicles the conflict, which leads to the first bioterror attack in the United States and a massive case of illegal wiretapping. It is a pivotal, but largely forgotten, time in American cultural history that tested the country's tolerance for the separation of church and state.

Just watching the first two episodes alone provide a terrific insight into many of the ideas and topics from class.  You will get fresh insight into why people are drawn to new religious movements and how those movements encounter tension with their surrounding environments.  The creators of the documentary do an excellent job of letting both members of the group and members of the surrounding community provide their sides of the story.

Watching the series is not required for the class, but it is a great opportunity for you to see how many of the ideas we have discussed come to life in the real world.

Should the Government Collect Donations on the Church's Behalf?

Monetary donations to churches in the USA are made voluntarily and directly to the churches.  As a consequence, if a member of a church wants to skimp on her donations, she can easily do so, and it is difficult for a religious leader to know if the person donated a fair or proper amount.  Our economic senses should be tingling here.  There's a clear free-rider problem, and we should expect there to be quite a bit of free riding (or easy riding) as people hold back on contributing proper amounts.

Hence, the "church tax."  Under a church tax, the government works in tandem with religious groups in the collection of donations.  The proper donation amount (e.g., a particular percentage of income) is taken directly out of the person's paycheck, given to the government, and then passed from the government to the church.  The government already acts as a tax collection agency for itself because it removes regular government taxes from paychecks, but with a church tax, the government also becomes, in effect, a tax collection agency for the church.

By having the government collect the donations straight from paychecks, the church is able, in theory, to receive much larger donations from those persons that are skimping in their donations.  For one, the government can just take the donation directly, bypassing altogether the individuals' temptation to free ride.  But if a Catholic individual claims to not be Catholic to become exempt from the tax, then the government can report that claim to the church, and then the church can without religious services from that individual.  Read an earlier post about the church tax in Germany here.

Why bring this up?  Two reasons.

First, this is a form of government intervention in religion, and we will soon be discuss government interventions in religion in lecture.  So this is a opportunity for you to learn about actual church-state religions around the world.

Second, just last month, Catholic Archbishop Cyprian Kizito Lwanga of Kampala, Uganda, asked the Ugandan government to institute a church tax for Ugandan Catholics.  Read the story here.  The Archbishop had the German church tax in mind when making this request.  Identify the reasoning for the Archbishop's request for the church tax, but also identify the reasoning used by those who dislike the request.

Do you think that instituting a church tax in Uganda is a good idea?  Why or why not?  Will instituting help the Catholic Church in Uganda?  Or will it hurt?  What might be the effects of a church tax in the short run?  What might be the effects in the long run?

Faith Groups and Election Turnout

There's a nice article yesterday at the Religion News Service about the efforts that religious groups are making to increase voter turnout.  See article here.  These efforts come from religious groups on both sides of the political spectrum.

Religious groups and political activism have gone together for centuries in the USA.  This should not be too surprising when you remember that religious groups in the USA are collective action machines.  In theory, once they have solved their own collective action problems associated with religious production, they can branch out into other forms of collective action, including political activism.