A wide-ranging sociological study commissioned by the Bayard group and published jointly by La Croix and Pèlerin sheds unpre-cedented light on the makeup of French Catholicism. The two authors have distinguished six profile types, which provide tools for understanding the logic of a Catholic world that is far more diverse than may have appeared.
Who are the real Catholics in France? The five percent who attend Mass regularly, according to opinion polls, or the 53% who describe themselves as Catholic? The broad survey carried out by Ipsos under the direction of sociologists, Philippe Cibois and Yann Raison du Cleuziou, shows that there is also a third possi-bility. Thus, 23% of French peo-ple can be characterized as “involved” Catholics, i.e. people who feel attached to the Church by means of their donations, their family lives or their commit-ments.
As a result, the study sets aside the traditional distinction between practising and non-practising Catholics and includes those who do not attend Mass regularly “but who consider themselves all the same as Catholics because they live out their lives differently,” as the authors note.
