VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican is admitting many Catholics around the world reject its teachings about
sex issues like artificial contraception as an intrusion into their private lives, and are ignorant of
other core doctrines about marriage, divorce and homosexuality.
The Vatican blamed its own priests for much of the problem. It says they simply aren’t doing a good
enough job educating the faithful about essential church teachings and helping out families when they
run into trouble.
The analysis was contained in a document released Thursday summarizing the results of a Vatican
questionnaire sent to bishops’ conferences around the world last year in preparation for a two-year
study on family issues launched by Pope Francis.
Thousands of ordinary Catholics, clergy and academics responded, providing the Vatican with unusual
grass-roots data for the discussion.