Why does DC seem like such a Catholic town with so little Catholics?

[Anonymous]

The universities, the churches/cathedrals, and yet I never meet any Catholics out in this area at all.

What gives?

[Anonymous]

Try hanging out in Brookland - they call it Little Rome for a reason. Aside from all the Catholic U iconography and the Basilica, there’s the Franciscan monastery, do you’ll run in to legit Friars wearing brown robes and sandals in line at Potbelly.

But I do sort of wonder, aside from the Friars or other ministers of the cloth, how you would know you have or haven’t met regular Catholics out and about in DC?

[Anonymous]

Church is pretty well attended. Have you looked there?

[Anonymous]

What are you talking about? I'm a native Washingtonian and a Catholic. There are lots of us here.

[Anonymous]

They are having babies and living in university park

[Anonymous]

There are Catholics here for sure, but it’s not nearly as heavily Catholic as Boston, New York or Philly. Historically it was always more African American and AAs aren’t real Catholic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The universities, the churches/cathedrals, and yet I never meet any Catholics out in this area at all.

What gives?

The ones with black splotches on their foreheads on ash Wednesday are Catholics.

[Anonymous]

Omg I feel like everyone is Catholic! I live in Northern VA

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What are you talking about? I'm a native Washingtonian and a Catholic. There are lots of us here.

Not compared to Boston, Ny, Philly.

Boston and New York City are 36% Catholic, Philadelphia 33%, and D.C. is 19%.

DC seems to be a Southern city. I think Baltimore had more Catholics than dc in the past

[Anonymous]

Come on over to Chevy Chase MD. Tons of Catholics here. Every other car has a big G or SR or BSS sticker on it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Omg I feel like everyone is Catholic! I live in Northern VA

Same! And I grew up in a different area with fewer Catholics, so it’s kind of surprising to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The universities, the churches/cathedrals, and yet I never meet any Catholics out in this area at all.

What gives?

This is a hard town to be openly Catholic with people that you don’t know well. Although the majority of US Catholics and Catholics in this area particular, are not social conservatives, you will be tar-brushed as right wing.

Before the pandemic, I volunteered for years with a nonprofit that did art therapy. In 2019, someone joined the board who assumed that I and another volunteer would be anti-LGBTQ because of our religions. She demanded that we quit because she said it made her feel uncomfortable and she was certain we made the population we served uncomfortable. She only knew I was Catholic because she asked to change a meeting to accommodate her religious holiday and I said I couldn’t attend the new date because my religious holiday was the next day.

When I was told I had to quit because I was Catholic, I fought back a bit, pointing out that 1)one of my kids was an out lesbian and very active in our parish, 2) the witnesses at my wedding were a gay couple, and 3) I had been the volunteer who brought in a trans masc artist (a friend’s partner) to work with our Haitian clients.

It didn’t work. The knee jerk on her part was that as a Catholic, I had to be a bigot so I had to go.

Since then, I have been hesitant to identify myself as Catholic. When it happens online, I see that same knee jerk response even when I am clearly protesting socially conservative policies and ideas.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are Catholics here for sure, but it’s not nearly as heavily Catholic as Boston, New York or Philly. Historically it was always more African American and AAs aren’t real Catholic.

This area has a huge historically Black Catholic community. Add Black immigrants from Catholic countries and you have a lot of predominantly Blavk parishes in DC and suburban MD.

[Anonymous]

Answering from the VA side, this is a very, very conservative parish. It's not just conservative, but inflexible. I wanted to marry DH (protestant) in the Catholic church I'd been attending for years and the priest just wouldn't budge on DH converting. I realize we probably could have fought harder. We would both have attended the catholic church and raised our children catholic, but DH didn't want to go through RCIA. We had multiple meetings with the priest about it, so we left.

The current Catholic church near me (Arlington diocese) is very political and even makes political statements during the homily. My parents have a lot of trouble with it.

Interestingly enough, DC proper has a lot of Opus Dei.

[Anonymous]

DH (Protestant) and I married out of my Catholic home parish in NoVa with clergy from each side co-presiding. So there’s that.

Agree that the Arl diocese has long been a conservative diocese. But there are plenty of less conservative parishes and Catholics in DC and have been for generations.