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Catholicism is not only an urban religion in the United States but a rural one. Many Midwestern communities were founded by Catholic immigrants. Did you grow up in such a community, where the Catholic Church was often the only one or the largest one by far in town? This community may be an extreme example in terms of its tiny size, but it gives you the idea:
My mother spent a portion of her adolescence living on a farm in upstate New York in a farming community that was mostly Italian immigrants like her. Italians are generally catholic (Italian new worlders moreso than Italians in Italy outside of Sicily and Naples which has become really secular). The area used to be really rural so I guess it fits the bill. Now it's just NYC exurbs with a large Hasidic Jewish colony.
This makes me think of Westphalia, Michigan. I didn't grow up there, but it was nearby. A neat and tidy town of about 900 residents with mostly German heritage, built around a catholic church, and surrounded by well-kept farms and dairies. I would imagine that towns similar to it are even more common in Wisconsin, though.
Location: East Central Pennsylvania/ Chicago for 6yrs.
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In the East, it is still Suburban areas where Catholic's who grew in wealth, moved to and built homes. Not the Farming areas. Though many Suburban areas are former farming areas. The East is full of small towns where Catholic upward mobile families? Moved and built homes in the outskirts of the small towns in the 60s especially. I remember the story of how my former small town and others around it, having a high Catholic Population. Moving into basically the farming Protestant areas, creating basically a suburb of these small towns. Found the Protestant Farmers in the 60s all refused to sell land for a new Catholic Church. They finally did get their Church, the wealthiest Parish of the County and a Monastery. Of course today it is no issue with inter-marriages and all accept each other not really worrying about your neighbors religion.
But though some new Churches get built as Catholics moved to newer developments. The Church began consolidating and closing many Catholic Churches through small towns all over PA . In fact... 1/3 of all Catholic Parishes were consolidated in PA in the last 3 decades. My former Small hometown once had 5 Churches, it now has 2. Same with other small towns all through the state. The Coal region small towns of PA were heavy Catholic and were hit especially hard.
The Harrisburg parishes here listed were closed by the late Bishop Dattilo. HARRISBURG DIOCESE Almost all were debt free and financially well endowed. The closings were opposed by the parishioners. The churches were sold very cheaply to both Protestant and Moslem organizations and the monies confiscated by the diocese. That was in the 80s. Other Diocese have had more recent closings.
My mother spent a portion of her adolescence living on a farm in upstate New York in a farming community that was mostly Italian immigrants like her. Italians are generally catholic (Italian new worlders moreso than Italians in Italy outside of Sicily and Naples which has become really secular). The area used to be really rural so I guess it fits the bill. Now it's just NYC exurbs with a large Hasidic Jewish colony.
In the North Country area of Upstate NY, you have a lot of people of French descent that area largely Catholic as well. Any decent sized community in that area had a K-12 Catholic school at one time.
There are any number of small towns in the midwest that have a substantial Catholic population, esp in MN, NE, IO, WI. One parent of mine was a product of such a place..
This sounds like much of Wisconsin or Michigan. Many German Catholic towns there, but that does not mean Catholicism dominates in the Midwest the way it does in the urban Northeast. There are even more Lutherans, Methodists etc. Even so Catholics are a very large group of people with a fair amount of influence in the Upper Midwest.
I grew up in a small town in New Hampshire with a lot of French-Canadian descendants. We had 2 Catholic churches for our pretty small town. Although the religious tradition in general is dying throughout the state and most of the people you would see now at Mass are the 65+ age group.
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