Quote above from: Finke and Stark, The Churching of America, Ch 4

What other possible explaination was there?

--People who immigrated from Catholic countries were not necessarily Catholics

--Contemporary research makes clear that it was inappropriate to equate immigrants from a Catholic country with Catholic church identity.

The assumed overcount fed anti-Catholicism in two ways:

1. It led to the assumption that there numbers were larger than they were and pinpointed the source of the threat new immigrants represented to Catholicism.

2. It reinforced the idea that Catholicism was a false faith; otherwise why would so many defect.