We live in the Bible Belt. Southern Baptists are predominant - especially in the rural areas where we live. On Sunday mornings you can still hear radio shows which denounce Catholics for allowing the races to worship together, being cannibals and idol worshipers, etc.
Thus it is with some surprise that I am starting to see in gas stations, convenience stores, and grocery stores throughout the countryside: votive candles with pictures of Our Lady, the Sacred Heart, and the saints on them; refrigerator magnets with Christ of the Divine Mercy and Our Lady, and like items.
The influx of the Hispanic population in the area (10 years ago they used to be just seasonal migrant workers) as a permanent population is starting to change the culture.
Of course there are also great efforts to "convert" the new Hispanic population to "Christianity". The Catholic Church is making great efforts to retain the faith of these Catholics - trying to have the Liturgy available in Spanish as widely as possible. (Of course some would argue that if the Liturgy was celebrated in Latin this would not be an issue.)
As Catholics have moved to the South in the last forty years as part of the general migration in this country to the sunbelt, we have been more or less accepted by Protestants in the South, but this acceptance has not gone so far as to find Catholic literature in the "Christian" bookstores, or Catholic artwork and statues in gift shops. So why the accomodation of the Hispanic population? I think it comes down to economics. The Hispanic population is very identifiable in South Carolina and thus also their catholicity. With this reconizable population migration in such a short time, the economic benefit of offering Catholic religious items has itself become recognizable and has outweighed other considerations.
In any case, the Catholics in South Carolina are the winners as we have a growing Catholic population.
From the small holding in Bethune ...
Oremus pro invicem!
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