What Do Catholics Want

Abstract

Abstract Valuing the sensibilities of their parishioners, pastors are beginning to question affective dimensions as elusive and difficult to quantify as satisfaction. Responding to this concern, we have created a survey to ascertain parishioner satisfaction. Our initial results indicate a unanimity of agreement for community as basic for satisfaction. However, when parishioners express an interest in other factors, e.g., communication, contribution, and communion, differences begin to emerge. Within Rensis Likert's models for organizational structure, we argue that these differences reflect preferences for either traditional hierarchical structures or new participative structures for churches.