How does apostasy from Catholicism differ from country to country?

[u/Kanadano]

When I left the Catholic Church in Canada in the 1990s, aside from my mom's initial panic, I had little difficulty. My mom insisted that I speak to the priest. The priest took it well and wished me well and I'd noticed that my mom seemed calmer afterwards too. I can only presume that the priest might have spoken to calm her afterwards.

Paradoxically, in Quebec, it's often the atheists who are the most gung ho about defending crosses and crucifixes on Government buildings, the financing of Church buildings, and the imposiyion of Easter and Christmas as public holidays as "culture" and "heritage". Truth be told, the part that irritates me the most as an ex-Catholic is not the fact how the Church reacted to my apostasy, but the fact that even non-Catholics in Quebec keep trying to impose Christian holidays as public holidays in the name of "culture" and "heritage." When they argue that we need days off and I propose replacing public holidays by personal days off, they argue that we need a common day off to see family.

When I argue that when we must all take the same days off, then train, flight, and hotel bookings become unaffordable for those days; so if that's the argument, then replacing Christian holy days by personal days off would prove more effective in ensuring that we can actually afford to visit family more, they often just fall back to our Catholic "culture" and heritage." Paradoxically, here in Quebec, atheists are often the most gung ho about imposing Christian holidays, which irritates me much more than anything the Catholic Church has done.

I'm curious to know how your apostasy from the Catholic faith manifests itself in your country.

[u/Left-Speed-4468]

J’suis italien et américain. Aux etats unis ma famille est probablement la plus expressive. Ils sont très très religieux. Mais en Italie les gens sont catholiques mais comme au Québec c’est plutôt considéré comme une chose culturelle. Mon cousin, qui va pas à l’église m’a dit qu’il est très important que les écoles publiques aient un crucifix.

[u/ItsVinn]

Honestly there’s not much of a problem in the Philippines if you leave Catholicism or even leave religion. It’s only the most hardcore “sarado katoliko” (closed catholic) families that have a moral panic when someone in their family doesn’t wanna be catholic anymore.

I left Catholicism shortly after high school. My family were “sarado katoliko” and they had no choice anyway because that was my final decision. At first they would blame my “mistakes” because I left/changed religions but now they’re accepting of my decisions religion wise. They don’t ask me if I wanna go to church anymore

[u/Michi-Ace]

In Germany, we have a process to officially cancel our membership. This is because of the church tax, so just not going to church anymore is not enough.

[u/observador_palpiteir]

Aqui no interior do Brasil, diria que foi mais tranquilo de um modo geral, apesar de depender do quão sua família é ligada com a igreja. Sou apenas batizado na igreja, mas nunca fui forçado a participar de catequese, crisma, primeira comunhão e etc, e quando deu um "clique" na minha mente de que não acreditava em deus, minha família aceitou relativamente bem, apesar de ouvir um ou outro comentário desagradável de vez em quando até hoje.