How many years have the PTB tried to come up with programs and gimmicks, new liturgies and old liturgies, to keep people, especially the young adults, in the pews?
How many years have they refused to look in a mirror.
How many years have they refused to examine their collective conscience to see how they and the doctrines they hold onto as if they were "Truth" - rather than doctrines that very often reflected the cultures of earlier eras - to see how these doctrines have driven and continue to drive people from the church, especially the young.
For years they have blamed everything and everyone but themselves. Ultimately they blame those who leave. Blame the victim, Catholic church style.
NCR recognized this years ago. Now there is to be a new program, a Synod no less, and there was a sort of kick-off conference at Notre Dame with Barron as a key speaker. Barron! So the young neo-cons, the young Latin mass types will cheer, and the rest will just continue to head out the doors.
This is NCR's editorial
Editorial: Young people are not the problem
rawpixel-com-196464-unsplash.jpg
If the recent conference at the University of Notre Dame [1] — where speakers postulated reasons for young people's disassociation from the Catholic Church — represents the approach going into the upcoming Synod of Bishops on young people, we would beg church officials to postpone the gathering.
What we heard was a familiar litany, placing blame for missing young people on:
What we heard was a familiar litany, placing blame for missing young people on:
- Technology — specifically youths' obsession with smartphones — which supposedly robs them of the contemplative mind and makes them "suckers for irrelevancy."
- An aversion to "orthodoxy," a term the user brandished with the certainty that his strain of orthodoxy is the immutable version of the truth.
- The "dumbing down of our faith."
- The pervasiveness of pornography and relativism, of course.
- And a new danger — the "bland toleration" of diversity, a curious addition.
What a self-satisfying assessment. And what a relief. It isn't that healthy young people might be repulsed by the way that church leaders mishandled the sex abuse crisis for decades. Nor is it the money scandals or callousness toward gay and lesbian Catholics or the bishop-driven one-issue politics that has reduced religion and faith to a bumper sticker in the culture wars
.
No, they say, the problem lies with young people who have acquired culturally influenced defects.
The cultural critique has value, of course, and the disaffection of young people from all manner of institutional involvement — from the local symphony orchestra to the Rotary Club — needs continued examination to figure out how institutions can be relevant to young people.
While dwindling numbers of Catholics are no doubt due to some extent to these social forces, there is much more to consider in the case of the church. Before becoming too convinced that the reason for the disaffection lies with everything and everyone else, church leaders need to seriously examine how their own shortcomings and failures have contributed to young people leaving the church.
It is reasonable to understand that teens and young adults, living in a civil culture that increasingly accepts their LGBT friends and family members, find unacceptable the intolerance and outright discrimination of some Catholic officials and organizations.
It is understandable that a young person would rather not be part of an institution that preaches God's mercy but shows little mercy toward divorced and remarried parents.
Young people, especially young women, who know how their mothers and grandmothers struggled to gain equality in the wider culture, don't care to become involved in an institution where women are marginalized. What can they think of an institution that bars women from its most important deliberative bodies while women hold the vast majority of ministry positions in parishes and dioceses?
Is it surprising that young women might avoid an institution where only men are ordained to preside over the community's most profound moments?
Isn't it also reasonable, speaking of vocations to the priesthood, that parents might hesitate to encourage their sons to join a clerical culture that has been depleted not only in numbers, but also in credibility and moral standing?
It is reasonable to understand that teens and young adults, living in a civil culture that increasingly accepts their LGBT friends and family members, find unacceptable the intolerance and outright discrimination of some Catholic officials and organizations.
It is understandable that a young person would rather not be part of an institution that preaches God's mercy but shows little mercy toward divorced and remarried parents.
Young people, especially young women, who know how their mothers and grandmothers struggled to gain equality in the wider culture, don't care to become involved in an institution where women are marginalized. What can they think of an institution that bars women from its most important deliberative bodies while women hold the vast majority of ministry positions in parishes and dioceses?
Is it surprising that young women might avoid an institution where only men are ordained to preside over the community's most profound moments?
Isn't it also reasonable, speaking of vocations to the priesthood, that parents might hesitate to encourage their sons to join a clerical culture that has been depleted not only in numbers, but also in credibility and moral standing?
Could it be that only the tiniest representation of young people will be attracted to parishes and dioceses dominated by legalists and doctrinal "rigorists"?
Fear no longer works to fill the pews or keep people compliant. The people of God are looking for inspiration. The young — all of us really — are looking for authenticity. Examples of people who walk the faith and live the heart of the Gospel are more convincing than hours of apologetics and glitzy presentations on up-to-date delivery platforms.
Unless church leaders at the highest levels thoroughly examine how our community became so distorted — corrupt like a white sepulcher — a synod about attracting younger members will ultimately prove a waste of time and effort.
Perhaps the breathless pursuit of young people in its embarrassing obviousness should be set aside to give church leaders time for deep reflection on what it means to be authentically humble. Replace fanciful answers to questions few are asking with a simple sign, containing one line, in each bishop's office: "You may be the problem."
https://www.ncronline.org/print/news/opinion/editorial-young-people-are-not-problem
I don't know what the PTB is.
ReplyDeleteI think there are a lot of things about religion generally that don't make sense to Our Young People. Perhaps the way that religious people are angry and judgmental about the Culture of Death and Distraction is one of them, as the editorial suggests.
But I think it's more that religious instruction doesn't really address what they care about. My students often want to talk about religion and how they want to find a "good one." When I ask why they want to find religion, they say because they want to live a good life.
Heaven and hell, praising and fearing God, or even searching for the purpose of life are not on their lists.
So, what if the Church, instead of putting the focus on God in heaven right out of the gate (which seemed to be the pattern for CCD), put the focus on "how religion can help you be a good person"?
A friend in the Episcopal Church was tapped to take the confirmation class one year. Probably because she was single and had no children, she went in with a clear idea of her own cluelessness about teenagers, and so she started by asking the kids what they cared about. Someone mentioned the environment, so she asked what they wanted to do about it that might make a difference in the local area. They ended up making bird houses in a nearby wilderness area, and she arranged to have them put these up on St. Francis's Day. This became a segue into conversations about how St. Francis was not just the "animal saint," and what he really thought about people and God.
As a teacher, I've seen classes full of glassy-eyed dullards who won't get offa their phones perk right up when I give them two different brands of paper towels and tell them to come back in 30 minutes having devised several tests for analyzing which is the better buy. Only proviso is that they cannot light anything on fire or flush anything down the toilet.
Having had a kid with ADHD and worked with college students for 35 years, I think we forget that inspiration (and God) often enter, not through the eye and ear, but through the hands.
Jean, your Episcopal friend who was teaching the confirmation class listened to her students. The clerics of the RCC almost never listen to anyone but themselves.
ReplyDeletePTB - Powers That Be
The young people who are not very interested in religion are also not very interested in politics in general. However they did come out to vote Obama into office. And more recently that tried to get Bernie Sanders chosen as the Democratic candidate.
ReplyDeleteI find it very interesting that Sanders has such a high approval rating not only among adults in general but particularly among the young. A lot of the things that attracted people to Sanders have also attracted people to Pope Francis. So much that Sanders decided to point out the similarities, and consciously framed his campaign as a moral campaign because he saw Francis as an attractive moral leader.
Unfortunately the leadership of American Catholicism is much like the leadership of the Democratic party. They are all living in the past, and more interested in pleasing the wealthy than the serving the young and the poor.
I don't know whom they listen to. I think that, at the parish level, a lot could be done to address the concerns of young people, but they never are. I could cite examples, but it would mean bashing the Church Ladies, and I gave that up for Lent, along with Netflix and Amazon Prime.
ReplyDeleteThe point is well-taken that the church needs to continually look to the beam in its own eye.
ReplyDeleteThat doesn't mean that the other factors discussed at the Notre Dame conference are wrong. There is no reason that this exercise needs to be either-or.
Jim, I agree that it doesn't have to be either-or. Certainly there are things such as pornography and a toxic internet culture that need to be addressed.
DeleteNor do I see, based on what was presented in the NCR article on the Notre Dame conference, that the conference leaders were blaming the kids. Things have changed since yesteryear in the wider culture, and some of those things are corrosive to discipleship. I don't think that would be seriously disputed.
ReplyDeleteI don't agree with the suggestion that if only the church would somehow run down a checklist of hot button issues and change all the Nos to Yeses and vice-versa, that the church would magically become more appealing to young people. If NCR is invested in that approach, that's its problem.
Just one more random thought: if those five youngsters are supposed to be representing all of young Catholicism in America - that's a lot of pressure on them. Really, it's kind of silly. I see in the Notre Dame article that a social scientist is calling into question the methods used by the church in the US to surface feedback for the upcoming synod. I confess to having completely snoozed through this latest round of synod prep, but if they did it this time same as they did for the Synod on the Family, with an open-to-everyone website to post comments, and some dioceses answering the questions on behalf of the people they serve - I'd say the social scientist is right. Neither approach is likely to yield an accurate picture of reality, except insofar as the famous stopped clock is right twice a day.
I don't see a need to change doctrine. I think it's a matter of attitude and approach.
DeleteMy guess is that those who are happy in the Church are happy to blame outside forces for dwindling membership. Those unhappy in the Church blame inside forces. Kind of obvious, no?
Too easy, Jean. I am (basically) happy in the Church and place most of the blame on people inside the Church taking their eye off the Gospel. I think Francis is trying to restore the good to the Good News, and I think too many PTBs are scared witless by the effort.
DeleteTom, if you're happy in the Church, why do you see that any blame needs to be meted out? Blame for what? Maybe I'm missing something, but I do see this as an either/or thing.
DeleteJean, Oh, I do not see it as either/or. I have never been associated with anything that can't be improved. I became a Cubs fan in 1945. Life is improving on messes other people made, and making messes for other people to improve on. (see also what I wrote 3/20 at 2:20 p.m.)
Delete"The young people who are not very interested in religion are also not very interested in politics in general. However they did come out to vote Obama into office. "
ReplyDeleteJack - that is a really interesting insight - especially the first sentence. Disengagement with religion, disengagement with politics, disengagement with many forms of civic engagement.
Ross Douthat recently wrote a column about Pope Francis (which Jim McCrea recently forwarded on via email) that, among other things, looked at why Francis continues to be so popular despite the fact that he's had some issues and controversies, his reform efforts seem to be running into obstacles, and so on. Here is Douthat:
"What my friends and acquaintances respond to from this pope, rather, is the iconography of his papacy — the vivid images of humility and Christian love he has created, from the foot-washing of prisoners to the embrace of the disfigured to the children toddling up to him in public events. Like his namesake of Assisi, the present pope has a great gift for gestures that offer a public imitatio Christi, an imitation of Christ. "
I think Douthat is right about the iconography. Francis's success is a success of word, imagery and gesture. It seems to me we might say much the same about President Obama - people love him for who he is and what he represents, but they never really embraced him in the role of president, at least not after the elections ended.
We could even say similar things about Donald Trump and his still-loyal-in-spite-of-everything base. In fact, it's rather striking, whenever reporters ask a Trump supporter about the president's racist comments, his lying, his ineptitude and so on, that it seems the supporters rarely or never dispute the facts and the details; but they insist that's not why they like him. They like him because of his words, images and gestures. One of my takes on Trump is that he governs by gesture rather than by policy. He can hardly be bothered to formulate or pursue an actual policy. Whatever policies have emerged from his administration are conventional conservative policies that are championed by others. The president himself lunges from tweet to tweet and is much more in reactive mode - witness this past weekend and the string of tweets about McCabe and Mueller.
I know my comment has drifted rather far from Catholicism and young people. But I'm trying to illustrate that Jack has touched on something important, with applicability far beyond the struggles of a single religious group.
Well, I don't think my generation was all that red-hot as incipient Apostles and disciples. I seem to remember juvenile delinquency, Blackboard Jungle, Old Golds, eight-pagers, the birth of Playboy and all the other ways we were going to Hell in a hand basket.
ReplyDeleteSo I offer no particular brief for or against the current generational upset -- which is my grandchildren, who are a mixed bag or, on other words, like my generation.
There is one point the NCR sneers at that seems to me to be not sneer-worthy: "(T)he problem lies with young people who have acquired culturally influenced defects." Hell's bells! The other generations share in the culturally influenced defects that are going to make us more like Russia and Turkey as they make our form of democracy unsupportable. Look who we elected president! And all his works and all his empty promises (today's: "Make America more like The Philippines, um? again"). There is something rotten in American life. But it ain't restricted to the young 'uns, and a lot of the deplorers (or PTBs) are as guilty as any recent high school graduate, with less excuse.
Tom, I agree completely that "culturally influenced defects" are not the exclusive property of the young.
DeleteJack mentioned something in his comment at 3:57 that is worth noting, "They are all living in the past..."
ReplyDeleteNowhere is this more evident than in ecclesial attitudes about women. I'm not really talking here about ordination of women, or women in positions of power in the Church. That is a discussion for another comment. I'm speaking more about the changing roles of women in society. Some of the clergy are still stuck in a 1950s image of homemaker moms with big families as being ideal. They don't have a clue about the married women who are going to school or pursuing careers. They double down on NFP as being the only acceptable birth control method. I see young women broadly rejecting that. A lot of them are pro-life, but they don't conflate abortion and birth control. A lot of parishes require NFP classes for pre-marriage. Just talking with some young relatives, that gets an eye-roll. I have made the comment to them that it is worthwhile in that it at least teaches you more about your own biology. But they see it as way too "iffy" for someone who has at least 3 or four more years of grad school ahead. The attitude they get from some clergy, is "why would a young woman who is getting married want to go to grad or professional school?"
Katherine - that is pretty surprising. I don't see much of that from the clergy in Chicago. Different cultures, maybe.
DeleteJim, to be fair, it's by no means all of them. I guess I'd say it's a subset of rather traditional types.
DeleteWell, I'm definitely not the biggest fan of my generation. I kept waiting for the Age of Aquarius and all I got was the Age of Reagan. Things got nastier and nastier. Democracy giving way to plutocracy. The luv generation must have used up all the luv.
ReplyDeleteYes, we were always a bitter disappointment to our parents. Now we are a bitter disappointment to ourselves, and wholly irrelevant to the kiddies.
DeleteOooh! I was just given a text for deplorers and worrywarts: "Do not say, 'Why is it that former times were better than these?' For it is not out of wisdom that you ask about this." (Ecclesiastes 7:10)
ReplyDeleteI don't disagree with anyone's views of issues that beset the church. I strongly agree that we can, and must, do better, in any number of areas. In holding members and leaders accountable, I start, but don't end, with myself.
ReplyDeleteAnd as I age and see new generations come into being (and see some of the predecessor generations dwindle away), I agree that no generation had a monopoly on vice, nor on virtue.
So let's agree on all of the above. But.
I'm pretty sure that the Holy Spirit, when it rushed upon the disciples like a mighty wind and initiated this rag-tag band of sinners we call the church, knew darned well that the entire enterprise was going to be one of sinners reaching out to sinners. If we wait until we reach perfection in order to pursue our mission, the mission never will be pursued.
Let's also acknowledge that criticisms that indict "the church" and/or "the bishops" and/or "the clergy" are simplistic and not wholly accurate. Because there is a lot of goodness in the church. There are some bishops who do good work. There are some members of the clergy who are doing heroic, saintly things. Let's not sweep them up in the net of our indictment.
And that doesn't even get to the people of God, whose faith continues to fill me with awe and gratitude.
The fact is that, in spite of everything, we have a lot to offer. And offer it is what we must do. Including to young people who think they know better, or don't have time, or whatever reasons they give for staying home or sleeping in on Sundays.
Jim, the last paragraph is an example of what the people at Notre Dame got wrong, that others in the RCC AND in all the other christian denominations - including the evangelicals - get wrong. So people continue walking out the church doors.
ReplyDeleteYou are judging the young adults who are staying away - because "they know better" or they “want to sleep in” on Sunday. They are in the wrong, not the church. "We have a lot to offer". Well, whatever it is that is on offer, a lot of young adults aren't buying it.
There have been extensive studies done on the young "nones". But the PTB ignore them - they want the fault to be placed on those who don't come to church, and excuse their own behavior. "We are all sinners". "The church is not perfect". "There is a lot of goodness in the church" etc The young have no shortage of groups and institutions to join who are full of sinners, who are not perfect, yet have a lot of goodness too. And in the minds of the young, at least those imperfect groups of sinners aren’t flaming hypocrites, which is a main complaint about organized religion, revealed in the studies.
They see "christians" fight for their own religious freedom, at the expense of the religious freedom of others. Young adult Catholics see the bishops sit on their hands and passively endorse someone like Trump, while sending "thoughts and prayers" as each mass shooting occurs.
I have been looking in the bulletins of local Catholic parishes. The local Episcopal parishes are organizing groups to go to the March for Our Lives on Saturday, and organizing beds where Episcopalians from other areas can sleep while here. There is nothing in any of the local Catholic bulletins about this. Nor on the website of the Archdiocese of DC. It's a priority on the Episcopal Diocese's website. The two Jesuit high schools here are the exception, but only a handful of the thousands of Catholic young people in this area attend either of those pricey schools.
Perhaps in the RCC, if bishops had been held accountable for enabling priests who molested kids, the young adults might be more interested. Maybe if the ecclesial class would heed John Newman's advice in On Consulting the Faithful on Matters of Doctrine, the men in Roman collars and listen to what married people have been telling them now for more than half a century about birth control, teaching would change. Or listen to what the Holy Spirit might be telling them about women priests. Newman said that the Holy Spirit speaks through the entire church, not just through a handful of men in Rome.
"We have a lot to offer". Well, it seems that young adults aren't seeing that what is on offer is what they want. Businesses sell goods and services. If people stop buying in huge numbers, what does a decent business do? Blame the customer because they aren't buying a product that is "not perfect" but still has some "goodness"? Or would they try to find out how they are missing the mark?
The information is there, but it seems the professional class in religion does not want to be informed, much less to change. It’s easy for church professionals to fall into a trap of listening only to themselves. The Notre Dame conference cost $125/person (a lot of $), free for students or staff at the college. But, if they didn’t pay, they weren’t guaranteed admission to all the talks. How many students went? How many were invited to speak?
Silly stuff like blaming smartphones isn’t going to fill the pews. Not likely that anyone is going to ban them anytime soon. You can’t stuff the genie back into the bottle.
But there is a lot more going on than was touched on at this conference or others like it. I have read some interesting books by progressive protestant thinkers about the paradigm change that is happening in western religion, but have seen nothing by a Catholic author. Another post for that.
Anne - maybe I am too judgmental. My basic point in all this is that the church has to rediscover its evangelizing voice. And the time for that is not the day after tomorrow, after we fix everything that ails the church. The time is right now. Let the young people come in and help fix it. Or maybe they have smarter ideas than we do. Can't fix it if you're not part of it.
DeleteAnne, You are probably preaching to the choir here. I agree that there still hasn't been accountability for the priests who abused and their superiors who covered for them. But at this stage in the drumbeat of criticism, I suspect that only drawing and quartering with their heads impaled on spikes along the Tiber would satisfy the drum beaters. And I am not in favor of that, as a matter of fact.
ReplyDeleteThe Church is full of sinners and hypocrites. If we were not sinners and hypocrites -- if we were what we wish to be and are trying to be -- we wouldn't need a church. And then Notre Dame would not have to offend you by charging $125 to attend a conference that I, certainly, would have happily skipped.
The Jesuit schools participating in the Washington area, "pricey" though they may be, are probably more alert than diocesan schools which may be suffering under the "it couldn't happen here" syndrome, which, in the fullness of time, will bite them in the butt.
So the diocesan leaders lack imagination, and maybe guts. I could name a lot of organizations whose leaders that description applies to. And then there is, of course, the United States of America and its sterling leadership.
Though I was venting a bit previously about what I perceived as gender stereotyping, I am in basic agreement with Jim and Tom.
DeleteI think we (all ages) need to be careful about approaching church, and particularly Mass, as consumers. Worshipping God and having no other gods before him; and keeping holy the Lord's day are commandments. And Jesus' last request of us on the night before he died was to "do this in remembrance of me". Other churches obviously have their own ways of fulfilling these things, I'm not saying only Catholics do. However it seems like most of them are having the same problems we are with retaining their members and keeping them woke.
Our local librarian has purposely made the library unattractive to teenagers because she doesn't want them in there talking loud and and cluttering the place up, using the computers, and printing off questionable materials.
ReplyDeleteI expect there are similar elements like this in the Church (and other organized groups) who only want the well-behaved and tractable.
When The Boy was about 8, we were getting settled in for the Easter Vigil. A woman brought in her retarded adult son. He was excited and happy to be there. He wanted to say hello to everyone and hug them.
The Boy said, They shouldn't bring him to church.
I asked why.
He said, Because they don't like it if you're not quiet, and I don't want to see him get in trouble because he doesn't know any better. Then he burst into tears.
No, we sure as shootin' don't want anybody in there screwing up our decorum and being happy.
That is sad if we don't welcome the handicapped. WWJD?
DeleteJean, I was at NCR from 1965-70, or 50 years ago, roughly. It was during that time, then, that Bob Olmstead (who was quick to notice such things) described some specific bishops as being like librarians who have everything perfectly catalogued and, therefore, don't want anything moved.
DeleteIt was early during that period when someone -- I vaguely recall it was Michael Novak, but it may have been someone else -- was in Rome discussing the Church with an Italian monsignor. "You have a nice church in America," the monsignor said, "but obviously it can't be as perfect as it is here."
"What are you talking about?," the American shot back. "In Italy nobody goes to church on Sunday, and back home everybody does."
"Yes," the monsignor replied. "But here the doctrine is so pure."
Tom: but here the doctrine is so pure.
DeleteI enjoy reading books by religious leaders across the spectrum. One is Brian McLaren, a protestant leader in the movement called "emergent church". One of his books is Finding Our Way Again: The Return of the Ancient Practices. I read it with a small group at my Episcopal parish a few years ago. It had been recommended by the bishop for Lenten reading. I was the only once-Catholic in the group, the only one familiar with spiritual disciplines, and so it was an interesting experience to discuss traditions familiar to all Catholics but unfamiliar to some others in the group, some who were former evangelical protestants, converted to the Episcopal church. He devotes separate chapters to traditional church disciplines such as fasting and abstinence, pilgrimage, prayer etc. It was a good experience for me, because sometimes we forget what is good about the too-familiar in our lives. Take it for granted.
Jim and others involved professionally with the church who claim that the church has a "lot to offer" the young who, according to the many studies that have been done, are seeking spirituality more than religion, seeking a way to live more than a way to believe might want to figure out a way to present these practices with a slant that is less traditional, and demonstrates that spirituality can be found in formal religion, and even enhanced by formal religion. It doesn't have to be either/or, which is the way the "SBNR"s see it.
At the beginning of chapter one, McLaren tells about interviewing Peter Senge (remotely, on a big screen) at a pastors' conference. Senge is a professor at MIT, and the founder of the Society for Organizational Learning.
McLaren opened the interview by acknowledging for Senge that the audience of pastors was probably different than his usual gatherings of business leaders. Senge replied,
“Well, Brian, you’re right. I don’t normally speak to pastors. Actually, I was thinking about that very question yesterday when I was in a large bookstore. I asked the bookstore manager what the most popular books are these days. Most popular, he said, were books about how to get rich in the new information economy, which didn’t surprise me. …Second most popular, the manager said were books about spirituality, and in particular, books about Buddhism. And so when I thought about speaking to five hundred Christian pastors today, I thought I’d begin by asking you all a question: why are books on Buddhism so popular, and not books on Christianity?”
McLaren returned the question to Senge, “How would you answer that question?”
“I think it’s because Buddhism presents itself as a way of life, and Christianity presents itself as a system of belief. So I would want to get Christian ministers thinking about how to rediscover their own faith as a way of life, because that’s what people are searching for today. That’s what they need most.”
Christianity was originally taught as The Way. Jesus was The Way. Long before hierarchies and priests, canon laws, and a 1000 page catechism, christians thought of themselves as following a way of life, The Way. Jesus seemed to be more concerned with orthopraxy than orthodoxy. As the centuries wore on, it became the other way around. One could be tried as a heretic and executed for not believing the "right" things, but I am not aware of people being tried and executed by the church for not giving alms to the poor.
Christianity often seems to have lost its way, lost The Way. It's all about "must believes". And so it has lost tens of millions of Catholics in Europe, and in the Americas. But the loss is across the board - not just Catholic but all variations of christianity - evangelical protestants included. If christianity can return to The Way, it might slow the hemorrhaging.
"Buddhism presents itself as a way of life, and Christianity presents itself as a system of belief."
DeleteInteresting.
My entry into the Church, Episcopal and RC, was through the saints. I certainly saw Christianity as a way of life that transformed the individual and those with whom he came into contact. It is a way of life that respects no person. Everybody from Queen Elizabeth of Hungary to Martin Dr Porres can do it. It means getting creative about where you are and what you have to offer.
The saints seem like relics of the Church nowadays. Kids don't learn about them much and no one does novenas or makes many pilgrimages. I wonder how we're supposed to understand Christianity as a way of life without them.
Good luck on this new attempt after a long line of attempts. After 70+ years of trying and trying and trying, I took a walk. Not "to" anywhere; just "from" Unholy Unmother the Former Church. As I've said more than one: it's hard to get out; it's very easy to stay out.
ReplyDeleteJimmy Mac, For someone who finds it easy to stay out you sure find a lot of time for keeping up with what's going on in.
ReplyDeleteJean,
ReplyDeleteYou wrote, "The saints seem like relics of the Church nowadays. Kids don't learn about them much . . . I wonder how we're supposed to understand Christianity as a way of life without them.
Here in El Salvador, Archbishop Romero is no relic; far from it. Kids, and others, are learning about him. His example helps them understand Christianity as a way of life.
Maybe that's simply an exception to the rule, but it does show what's possible.
Jean, your comment about being attracted to the EC and RCC via learning about the saints is really interesting to me.
ReplyDeleteI grew up as a good Catholic girl in the 50s and 60s with books of the Lives of the Saints more or less forced on me at various times. I don't know why I found them to be such a turn-off but I did. Maybe it was the awful illustrations in the books - but those stories were not attractive to me at all. With some, I may have felt it is an impossible thing to be that holy and good and virtuous unless somehow God had picked you out to be that way and so I figured it was not worth even trying to emulate these unreal people. I was also turned off by the virgin martyr stories. And by the sheer gruesomeness of some of the stories, especially of the martyrs.
As I became an adult, I was turned off by the fact that basically every "saint" was a priest or nun. No "normal", everyday people. Even when Rome belatedly got around to canonizing a couple of married couples in the last 20 years or so, they were couples who had chosen to give up sex, once they had produced a few priests and nuns to "give to" the church.
Francis of Assisi, is, of course, an exception. He was inspirational, as is a modern saint, Romero. I can tell you, the parade of popes who have been canonized in recent years is another turn-off.
I like that the EC's Calendar of Saints includes a lot of people besides the halo-topped folk of centuries past - people like Martin Luther King. I like seeing people who were imperfect, like King, be recognized for how the good they did so overwhelmingly overpowered the weaknesses. Oskar Schindler is one I would like to see "canonized" in the western church - not just by the Jews. I have known a few saints in my life, but none of them will ever be canonized.
Going back to Peter Senge, and Anne's point, quite clearly Christianity became alive and vibrant without a Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, much less a Holy Office of the Inquisition. Not that it didn't have doctrinal disputes. Disputes it had. People charged with finding disputes and Doing Something it had not.
ReplyDeleteSome of the modern lives of saints are very good. The ones I grew up with were mostly cloyingly unbelievable. Show the kids A Man for All Seasons. Or introduce them to scholarship on, say, St. Patrick, which is a helluva lot more interesting than the Legends. Or be really daring and let them see George Bernard Shaw's "St. Joan" (and read his introduction in which he proposes Joan as the first Protestant saint).
It was the last one (starring Siobhan McKenna) that got me off my pew and interested in Catholicism. (Peter Falk -- much later Columbo -- made his New York stage debut in that, too.)