This isn't affecting just Catholics, but practically all religious institutions. They are undermined by academic institutions.
Logic, Reason, Critical Thinking Skills, are all tenets of an educated, fully democratized society. Leaving behind religious and tribal privileges and corruption for a balanced, sustainable distribution of resources to maintain a peaceful social order without need for the use of threats or force.
Control over people is not really about any one particular religion. It's the depth of superstition within which they lurk. It doesn't matter who the god or the leader is, as long as the acolyte is devout. This may partly explain why Pope Francis resigned evangelism to the dust bin.
Hypothesizing from Jean Piaget's stages of cognitive development, it's not difficult to see that a large portion of the planet's population has suspended development at the Concrete Operational Stage, but how does superstition play into cognitive development?
- Locus of Control
- External locus of control. belief that they are not in control of their own lives.
- They believe in fate, that God has a plan for them.
- They defer the most personal decisions in their lives to their leaders.
- Internal Locus of control is the sense that you can control your life. That you have control over the outcome of your future. Confidence, Expertise. The ability to affect changes in one's community.
It may be more complicated that Just either Internal or External Locus of Control. There may be degrees of FAITH.
Academic consulting of military intervention, regime change, etc., has proven to be a complete disaster, unless of course you work the line at a weapons manufacturing facility.