At the same time, the same group rarely makes it to weekly Mass.

In a twist, Catholics filling the pews today may have looser ties to the Catholic Church but hold onto its key beliefs, such as the importance of the sacraments and the belief in Jesus’ life, death and resurrection.

“It’s a different time. It’s a different tone,” said William D’Antonio, a fellow at the Life Cycle Institute at Catholic University. “They see a different world than we did growing up in the 1930s and 1940s.”

Close to 100 people attended D’Antonio’s lecture at Our Lady of the Assumption Church Tuesday, Feb. 5. It was co-hosted by the parish’s adult religious education program and the Aquinas Center of Theology at Emory University. D’Antonio presented findings from the 2007 book “American Catholics Today: New Realities of Their Faith and Their Church,” which he co-authored with three other leading experts in the study of religious behavior and beliefs. The book studies the views of Catholics from 1987 to 2005 taken during five Gallup polls, starting with Catholics raised in the pre-Vatican Council II church and concluding with what the study calls “Millennials,” those born from 1979 to 1987.

Pollsters questioned by telephone more than 800 people in each of the surveys. The margin of error was plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

Attitudes affected by the times

The Catholic Church has undergone a tumultuous time in recent years. From the sexual abuse scandal to the death of a popular pope, John Paul II, church members have not been unaffected by what is going on around them. The Catholic sociologists examined the attitudes of Catholics that will shape the future church.

Among the findings:

• Catholics raised in the post-Vatican Council II environment, people born from 1961-1978, make up the biggest share of church members at 40 percent. • Small Christian communities are a hopeful sign and a popular choice for young people, where they can talk about their faith, express doubts and grow spiritually. Weekly Mass attendance of 18 to 29-year-olds is 26 percent, but among small Christian communities, attendance is 90 percent. • About one of three Catholics goes to weekly Mass, a 10 percent drop since the first survey.

Mark Dannenfelser, OLA parish director of religious education, said the church message of serving the poor is being heard. Dannenfelser said a question he always asks church members on hot-button issues is “tell me more.” It opens a conversation with people and builds relationships, he said. “The church is a bunch of relationships,” he said.

Nick Meyer, of Our Lady of the Assumption, said the talk left him wanting to learn about the positions taken by the church, especially to read the church’s views on birth control, “Humanae Vitae,” the 1968 encyclical by Pope Paul VI on married love and procreation.

Lynn LaBudde, a parishioner of St. Brendan the Navigator Church, Cumming, and a theology student at Spring Hill College, said the surveys give church leaders an opportunity to look deeper at the issues facing the church. “I thought it was great and really refreshing,” he said.

The insights of the small Christian communities are especially helpful because they can lead people from the margins of the parish to ministry, said LaBudde, who is a member of a small group at his parish.

Young eager to learn

Dorothy Polchinski, the director of Atlanta Archdiocese Young Adult Ministry, said young adults want to learn about the faith.

“The church teaches that parents are the primary catechists. Yet many parents themselves have lacked proper faith formation. So we now have a generation of young adults that don’t really understand their faith—many go through the motions and have a deep conviction of their Catholic identity, but seem to lack articulation of what they believe and why they believe it,” said Polchinski in an e-mail.

She said the archdiocese offers programs for young people to learn about their faith, from Theology on Tap, where conversations about God are talked about in bars and restaurants, to Revive, with its upbeat, evangelical-style presentation of Catholicism. Some programs draw a handful of people, while others, like Revive, attract a few hundred young adult Catholics, she said.

Overall, D’Antonio said there is a “growing gap” between the views of the laity and church officials, and commitment to the church falls from the older generations to the younger.

For instance, on the issue of sex before marriage, among the oldest and most traditional Catholics in 1987, close to half said church leaders should have the final say on the issue. By 2005, among the same group, that number dropped to 30 percent. It is even more problematic for the youngest Catholics where 2 percent agreed that church leaders should have the final say on the ...