Parish Festivals

Much like June kicks off the beginning of county fair season, May kicks off parish festival season.  Here's a schedule of festivals in Southwestern Ohio, in case you need to see carnies, drink beer and/or gamble.

Faith, Education and Income

Interesting post from David Leonhardt:

The chart in the magazine looks at the percentage of people with a four-year college degree and the percentage of people with family income of at least $75,000 a year, using data from Pew. Here are the percentages if the education cutoff is changed to at least some college (including a two-year degree) and the family income cutoff is changed to $50,000:

	%, at least some college	%, family income $50k+
Hindus	84	80
Reform Jews	83	81
Unitarians	81	55
Conservative Jews	79	74
Anglicans/Episcopalians	76	63
Buddhists	74	56
Orthodox Christians	68	57
Presbyterians	64	60
Secular	60	55
Mormons	60	54
Methodists	56	53
Lutherans	53	54
TOTAL U.S.	50	48
Catholics	47	49
Muslims	47	41
Baptists	40	36
Unaffiliated religious	39	37
Pentecostals	33	29
Jehovah’s Witnesses	31	35

Here are the percentages of people with a post-graduate degree and with family income of at least $100,000 a year:

	%, post-grad degree	%, family income, $100k+
Hindus	43	48
Reform Jews	55	35
Conservative Jews	43	35
Unitarians	26	29
Buddhists	22	26
Anglicans/Episcopalians	35	25
Orthodox Christians	28	18
Presbyterians	26	18
Secular	23	16
Methodists	20	13
TOTAL U.S.	18	11
Mormons	16	10
Catholics	19	10
Muslims	16	10
Lutherans	16	9
Baptists	11	6
Unaffiliated religious	12	6
Pentecostals	7	3
Jehovah’s Witnesses	9	3

In every case, the correlation between education and income is extremely strong.

Being Catholic and Republican

Daniel Larison looks at Rick Santorum and analyzes the intersection of religious and partisan beliefs:

At the Republican presidential debate on Thursday Rick Santorum was asked about Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels’s suggestion that there be a social truce. Santorum answered, “Anybody that would suggest we call a truce on moral issues doesn’t understand what America is all about.”
That is wrong. In fact, it’s the precise opposite of what America is about. ~Jennifer Rubin

They’re both wrong in different ways. America is not “about” anything in the way that these two mean it. America isn’t a creedal or proposition nation, and it isn’t an idea or an ideological project. Genuine constitutional conservatism is worthwhile, and it involves more than Berkowitz’s warmed-over fusionism, but it isn’t reducible to individual liberty or limited government, and one cannot claim that America is “about” either of these things. Despite their wishes to the contrary, Christian and especially Catholic conservatives cannot correctly attach moral or religious significance to the founding principles of a Whiggish republic.
What I will say in Santorum’s defense is that he has made this mistake because he considers moral issues, especially those that concern the protection of life and family stability, to be vitally important to a healthy and flourishing culture. At times, Santorum seems to want to argue that eternal verities and pre-political loyalties should take priority in how we organize our society and our polity, and he is probably one of the few Republicans to have held federal office recently to understand that obligations to a community and the common good are not the same as accepting the encroachment of the state. Then he often veers off on some strange militaristic tangent or, as he did the other night, endorses the use of torture on detainees, because he has already made the earlier mistake of attaching too much significance to the nation-state. That in turn leads him to support measures that directly contradict the moral principles that he normally defends. Santorum’s views are the unfortunate mish-mash that results from combining Catholic social teaching with Americanism and militarism, as the latter two tend to overshadow anything interesting that Santorum might have to say from his understanding of the former.

There are a lot of significant points which can be made about this subject.  Daniel pursues how pro-life voters became enmeshed in a bargain with the international interventionalist in support of wars which run counter to their moral values, and how the culture war is a way for the war hawks to co-opt the social conservatives to their war views. 

I think it is interesting to look at how Democratic and Republican Catholics cater their views about which social teachings by the Church are important to follow based on their party's interests.  Democratic Catholics are more likely to support gay marriage,labor unions, the legality of abortion and welfare programs, while being opposed to the death penalty and the war in Iraq.  Republican Catholics often want bans on gay marriage and abortion, destruction of unions, an end to welfare programs and support both the death penalty and the war in Iraq.  It seems like political platforms trump Church teaching nearly every time.  Not exactly a good trend for the stability of the Catholic Church in America.  I would guess that is a contributing factor to making "Former Catholic" the second largest "religious group" in the United States.

Update:  I neglected to mention torture.  Santorum explicitly supported the use of torture on detainees during last week's debate.  Daniel mentioned it, and I hate to leave it off the list of positions against Catholic teaching which Republicans have embraced.

How Does Privatization Work in Indiana?

Kay at Balloon Juice challenges the alleged competency of Mitch Daniels:

Specifically, I’d like to look at one instance of his alleged competence and responsible stewardship of taxpayer money.
Daniels is currently, right now, embroiled in a lawsuit related to his failed privatization of the administrative services end of food stamp and Medicaid programs. Daniels outsourced the work to IBM. It was abundantly clear the privatization plan was a disaster right from the start for the people who receive food stamps and Medicaid, but Daniels waited two years to stop the statewide roll-out, because the conservative ideology behind the plan was pure and infallible.
IBM sued on the contract Daniels had negotiated and signed on behalf of the people of Indiana, when Daniels (eventually) fired them. That all by itself is amusing, because Daniels stripped middle class public employees of their bargaining rights with a stroke of his mighty executive pen shortly after assuming office. Sadly, Mitch found out IBM doesn’t go down as easy as teachers or firefighters do. They hauled his ass right into court, rather than having their lawyers march on the statehouse and sing solidarity songs.

One of the big things I noted in the discussion of privatizing the Ohio Turnpike was that Ohio's people said Ohio wouldn't get screwed like Indiana.  That takes a little of the sheen off of the mystique of one of the Indiana governor's signal accomplishments.

Caramel Delights

It might be a little too late to order some Easter candy, but you can still order caramels or other candy from the Trappistine Sisters at Our Lady of the Mississippi Abbey in Dubuque, Iowa.  Their candies are delicious, and they'll ship them to your door or you can pick them up at the monestary. 

Also, their brother Trappist monks at the New Melleray Abbey outside of Dubuque can provide you with caskets if you need them.

The Vatican Library

The third segment of this week's 60 Minutes.  There is some really cool stuff in there.