The latest Saint Leo University poll shows Americans' favorable opinion of the Catholic Church in the US remains almost the same as in November, the public's opinion of the Church's leader Pope Francis dipped.

The university's polling institute conducts surveys on topics that affect Catholics and the public's opinion of Pope Francis.

The February 2020 poll sought opinions from 1,000 respondents from across the US.

The US results

• The favorable opinion - those who responded strongly and somewhat favorably - was recorded at 73.5 percent, up from 69.3 percent in November 2019 and 57.1 percent in April 2019.
• Pope Francis's favourability rating dropped from 56.6 percent last November to to 52.2 percent in the latest poll.
• In April 2019 poll data shows his favourability rating was 57.9 among US Catholics.
• Past polls show, however, that the pope's favourability rating can vary significantly from poll to poll.
• As examples, he garnered a favorability rating of 55.6 percent in the February 2019 poll, 44.7 percent in October 2018, and 64.4 percent in August 2018.
• Among Catholics nationally, the pope's favorable opinion rating is 74.6 percent, down from 78.1 percent in November 2019.

In the UK, St. Mary's University in London also released new findings on "Catholics in Britain," last week.

The UK results

• Fifty-nice percent of all Catholics said Francis is doing an "excellent" or "good job" at spreading the Catholic faith.
• Seventy-four 74 percent of weekly Mass goers and 78 percent of Mass goers under the age of thirty said Francis is doing an "excellent" or "good job" at spreading the faith.
• Seventy percent of British Catholics think Francis represents a "change of direction" for the papacy.
• Eighty-seven percent of weekly mass attendees think Francis represents a "change of direction" for the papacy.

Questions about specific issues were also posed in the UK survey. In relation to these, Francis's least favorable results relate to:

• Addressing the clergy sex abuse scandals, where only where forty-two percent of all Catholics think Francis is doing an excellent or good job at responding to them
• Forty-five percent said the same about his efforts to reform the Vatican and address the concerns of women.
• Sixty percent of Catholics saying he is doing an excellent or good job at standing up for traditional moral values
• Eighty percent of weekly mass going Catholics under the age of 30 say he is doing an excellent or good job at standing up for traditional moral values

The survey was administered to nearly 2,000 Britons, in a country where Catholics make up nearly eight percent of the adult population.

Source

1. Crux Now
2. Saint Leo University Polling Institute
3. Image: The Sun

He said that doctors should be removed from any process aimed at making decisions about dying.

Doctors were not trained to kill people, were not equipped to determine whether a patient really wanted to die, and sometimes were just plain wrong about a patient's chance of recovery, Child said.

"It's not our bag. I think you really need to remove doctors from all of this."

Childs was responding to the results of a fax poll of general practitioners, conducted by magazine New Zealand Doctor and IMS Health.

110 doctors responded to the poll

Of those surveyed:

• 45.5 per cent believed the law needed to change to legally protect doctors who helped terminally ill patients die, compared to 44.5 per cent who did not.
• About two out of five doctors also said they had been asked to help a patient die, although most had refused.
• 12 per cent of respondents said they had helped a patient die.

Some doctors responding to the survey said even if they weren't helping patients die, pain relief could effectively have the same outcome.

"We don't give them high doses of morphine to end their life. We give it to help ease their suffering. Big difference in motivation, same outcome," one doctor said.

Child said there was an important difference, even if the line was not always clear.

"It is about intent."

He said it was a small survey and could be skewed by the phrasing of the questions.

However, it did reflect that some doctors were unlawfully involved in assisted dying.

"I'm sure there are cases and examples where doctors have participated because of their belief the euthanasia is part of their duty of care," he said.

Source

• stuff.co.nz
• stuff.co.nz
• Image: concernedchristians.ca

The poll - commissioned by the independent Australian think tank, the Lowy Institute - reveals that Bainimarama enjoys the support of 66 per cent of Fijians, with 39 per cent of those questioned strongly supporting the premise that he's doing a good job as prime minister.

Click here to see full report

Source

Grubsheet
Image: The Lowy Institute