it is very true- I am Australian- both my husband and I were baptised catholic and went to the same school and even the same church as children- but both of us like MANY other people strayed from the faith. I have since returned to the catholic faith (my husband hasnt yet but is supportive of my return to the faith and does anything to assist in this) though after seperating from the catholic faith - conceiving our first child out of wedlock, having that child and our 2nd child in wedlock and now pregnant with our 3rd child- we married outside of a church so in the catholic churches eyes (despite being legally and emotionally married for around 3 years) are not seen as married under the catholic churches laws. So as you can imagine- my return to the catholic faith is producing many hurdles- our son was baptised Anglican like my mother and our 2nd child has yet to be baptised - we have found out that one of their godparents at least needs to be catholic- this is a hurdle as our children both have the same godparents who are fantastic especially their godmother who sees them all of the time, is there for them and is always good with birthdays, xmas and even gets them gifts if she goes away. But notone of them is catholic. So we have a HUGE delema in returning to the catholic faith- it is much easier to leave than return and there are a lot of laws/rules with the catholic religion including many sins that need to be avoided that you wouldnt HAVE to avoid if you were not part of that religion or even any religion. So many people have strayed,I have know many to be raised without any religion at all but to come back or start with a religion is esspecially hard.
I know of all tooo many christians here in Australia (many catholic) who feel and beleive that taking contraceptives/using contraceptives is perfectly okay- they will even go so far as to say that they can see nowhere in the bible that is speciffically says that it is a sin to use contraceptives that in fact we would be comitting a bigger sin to not use the contraceptives and bring more than 1 or 2 children into the world because no matter how much you try you could not fully provide for them and they would miss out.
Others who are baptized catholic, claim to be catholic but have procedures done to make them infertile, make inappropriate jokes and many other things that could be seen to be very sinful
In saying that too there still is a very small minority of people out there who follow traditionalized teachingss- often they are associated with the small-medium minority which homeschools- I knew a lovely family - they were Jєωιѕн-catholics or catholic Jєωs (not sure which) but they were LOVELY - the husband treated his wife well and his children, the wife was a good mother and wife, she was also a very generous kind women she would go on bread runs to bakeries collect all of the bread they would throw out and every week or 2 she would bag off large garbage bags full of bread for families with low income to just take free of charge. This family also had 7 children at last count, their home was clean, they homeschooled, the children were ALL well adjusted- they were not greedy, not jealous, they were friends with each other and actively tried to help each other and others. This family would go to church every week and the children that I have seen since have grown into fine young people (men & women) who dress nicely, have good jobs and they are also volunteering and helping others.
So I think its that small minority that still helps to change things for the better and on the grander scale - so few are turning away, straying or not following to the fullest but the small amount that are following are doing GREAT THINGS and changing SO MUCH