The most recent parish staff meeting minutes mentioned that a nearby parish is going to open up altar server participation to adults and families. Apparently this idea was favorably received by our staff, and they're going to consider doing something similar.
Why we would consider this idea isn't really a mystery at all. On the contrary, it's plain to anyone who attends our masses: we have almost no altar servers anymore. Before the pandemic shut us down, we were doing pretty well: we'd have at least two servers at most masses, and three servers at quite a few. But nowadays, even though we've been reopened for over a year and a half, the families with altar-server-age children (4th grade thru senior year of high school) haven't returned.
I have no theological objection to adults and families serving at the altar. The age limits I mentioned above are enforced pretty strictly at the lower end (no second graders need apply) but there really isn't a hard and fast upper limit, and occasionally a college-age kid will help out. The custom at this parish is that, at the weekend masses, altar servers are children, but at the parish in Michigan where I was baptized, adult men used to serve on Sundays. My dad was an altar server at the 7:30 am Sunday mass for years.
But I admit I have a qualm. It's this: we'd be opening up the ranks of altar servers, not from a position of strength and generosity, but from a position of weakness and desperation. We'd be welcoming adults because we can't find any kids anymore. It's an attractive solution: it means we'd have servers who don't forget, don't oversleep, don't graduate and go away to college, and don't decide it's too uncool to be an altar server because what if my friends see me?
Altar servers aren't even required. We get by fine without them, although I'd much prefer to have them at each mass. But instead of settling for adults, let's try a little harder to welcome the kids back.
We have had servers back for nearly a year now. The problem is that a lot of them don't show up when they are scheduled. Even though they volunteered, and indicated their Mass of preference. It isn't a matter of the families not returning to church in person, these people are there at least part of the time, just not necessarily when the kids are scheduled. The ones who aren't there at all didn't volunteer. I think the problem is too much competition from other activities, even though most of these kids are grade and middle school. Especially sports. Don't get me started on that.
ReplyDeleteThe most faithful and eager server is a 15 year old boy who joined the church on Holy Saturday during the Covid lockdown in 2020. I think only the priest,his sponsor and his father were there.
Having servers there during a weekend Mass does save the deacons and priest a lot of multi-tasking.
We have always had adult servers from the K of C for daily Masses and funerals.
But nowadays, even though we've been reopened for over a year and a half, the families with altar-server-age children (4th grade thru senior year of high school) haven't returned.
ReplyDeleteWOW. In light of this bigger problem, being concerned about altar servers is rearraigning the chairs of the deck of the Titanic.
Are the families not coming back because they have discovered that livestreamed Masses are much easier on family life? No dressing and packing up the kids for church, no management of them in church.
At the virtual ND conference this past summer some of the pastoral staff reported this problem. Some parishes were considering ending streaming of Masses because of it. I suspect that people would simply find other parishes who were still livestreaming. Some places like Catholic TV have been livestreaming for years.
Parish shopping brings up the question about parish closings in Chicago. I guess there have been a lot of them. The winding down of the pandemic is a perfect time to reconsider the old parish that you have not attended much in two years.
If the pandemic does go away this summer, I have been thinking of going from parish to parish around the diocese. A lot of parishes livestreamed and still do. We would probably parish shop by internet. We really like our Sunday mornings with Heart and Voice followed by Mass either at Notre Dame, or National Shrine or Crystal Cathedral. I was thinking of doing a Saturday evening Mass at a different parish during the summers (if the virus like the flu becomes a winter event).
What is going on in your parish?
"WOW. In light of this bigger problem, being concerned about altar servers is rearranging the chairs of the deck of the Titanic."
DeleteYep. The parish staff is tired of hearing me in prophetic mode about this.
FWIW - the same meeting minutes that I mention in the post, also noted that our weekend mass attendance recently reached the halfway point of average attendance, pre-COVID. So, roughly speaking, half of our parishioners have returned to the pews.
Who hasn't come back yet? One contingent - an important contingent - are elderly parishioners who aren't comfortable being in a crowded room because of COVID concerns. I am able to see some of them from time to time because our parish offers drive-thru communion on Saturday afternoons. Most of the folks who drive through are elderly. They're really grateful we're offering this. I am sure that most of them do watch televised mass on Sundays.
The other contingent are the families with young children. Not many are present on weekends. This has been building (or declining, if you will) for years before COVID. It's been plainly visible on Sunday mornings when children are called forth for Children's Liturgy of the Word - the children ages 5-12 come forward to the front, are given a blessing by the priest, and then march out with some catechists to hear a children's version of the readings and a children's version of a sermon. The crowd of children was significantly larger in the 1990s than it was in recent years. COVID shut down that ministry, but I can just see with my own eyes that not many children are at the masses these days.
Why are these families staying away? Probably for a multitude of reasons. COVID-related fears surely are part of it. But it goes deeper than that. That generation of parents doesn't "attach" to institutional religion. It's manifest in mass attendance, and also in our religious ed program, where numbers also have been declining. The intergenerational passing along of the faith has been deteriorating over the course of my lifetime.
The whole concept of a parish is: build a church, assign a priest, throw open the doors on Sunday, and people will show up. But what happens if they don't show up? That calls for an evangelizing response: rather than have people come to us, we have to go out and find them. But American Catholics aren't very good at that. We're better at showing up, sitting down and letting someone else ("the church") run the show, so to speak.
Jim, "...our parish offers drive-thru communion on Saturday afternoons." I'm glad they are doing that, to make it easier for the elderly and immune compromised. That would have been such a logical, helpful thing to do during the Covid lockdown. No, we didn't do it. I wish we would have. I don't know if it was against archdiocesan directives, or if it was a local decision. Awkward to try and find these things out. I do know there was at least one parish which was a bit of a "maverick", in that it offered drive up Eucharist. The rest of us were without it for 11 weeks, which was painful. At least they did keep perpetual adoration open here. And there was a sign on the tabernacle that it was absolutely, positively forbidden for anyone to take a Host for any reason.
DeleteOne question that was not on the synodal questionnaire, was " Did we as an archdiocese do well in coping with the Covid lockdown, and thinking outside the box?" No, we did not.
Yep. The parish staff is tired of hearing me in prophetic mode about this.
DeleteAll the parish staff that I know are also tired of my being in prophetic mode, too. It seems that your ordination does not give you any more clout than my master's in theology and Ph.D. in social psychology.
It amazes me how unresponsive pastoral staff are to simple obvious issues that require neither ordination nor much education.
During my four years on pastoral council once a month I greeted people at Mass on "listening Sunday" where people were invited to share their concerns with a pastoral council member afterwards.
One guy repeatedly expressed his dismay that there were never enough handicapped parking places even if he arrived ten minutes before Mass. It took four years for the pastor to add them.
People repeatedly asked for a better sound system so they could hear and a better lighting system so they could read the missalette. We joked about it. Someone said we needed to hand out miner's lamps and earphones. I joked that we were certainly in need of a Messiah who could give sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, and let the lame walk. That was fifteen years ago. We got a new sound and lighting system about five years ago.
One lady repeatedly warned me that the parish needed a better traffic control system (one entrance and one exit rather than two roads that were both entrances and exits). No response. Finally the change was made because an insurance inspection required them to change it. Why don't they listen to parish members when they see a big lawsuit in the making?
Re evangelizing generally: It strikes me that trying to reclaim the Lost Sheep is a lost cause. These folks are either utterly indifferent to religion, or, like me, are curmudgeon with impossible expectations of parish life and find it aggravating and arid to deal with real people.
ReplyDeleteMy sense is that there are a lot of evangelicals yearning for more liturgical structure and the Church's social justice stances, who are aligned it its sexual and family mores, and who are open to Christian unity. As liberals and progressives leave the Church, the political climate of American Catholicism would also feel more friendly.
I don't think the think-and-do RCIA workbook approach would serve these folks especially well. They are too spontaneous, more attuned to personal witnessing, and would have lots of questions about the Scriptural basis for dogma.
Once in, though, evangelicals-turned-Catholics would make great movers and shakers, and their kids would be clamoring to be altar servers. I think Ross Douthat is an example of what evangelical energy might offer the Church.
Umm, be careful what you wish for. Some of the right wingiest Catholics are indeed converts from evangelical communities.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteI don't wish for it, but, let's face it, liberal Catholicism (and Christianity generally) is dead, and liberal Catholics have have, for good or ill, feel marginalized or have become secularized. The American RCC is moving right. Maybe Catholics should embrace that instead of rolling out the Come Home programs that fail all the time.
DeleteI'd be fine with Catholics like Ross Douthat. If a critical mass of them were more like Ginni Thomas I'd be pretty concerned.
DeleteOverly politicized Christianity is a failing of our time.
DeleteJean, I think you are mostly right, with one exception. Through reading and via personal experiences with evangelicals I would agree about some being attracted by liturgy and ritual. For some, meeting in a gym like environment with folding chairs, a stage, and an atmosphere that sometimes resembles a rock concert, even if it’s christian rock, doesn’t do the trick. However, I doubt that many white evangelicals are attracted by the RCC’s social justice teachings. Since most Catholic parishes seem to ignore those teachings, evangelicals who want to join up won’t be put off by them. Most Catholics I know aren’t even aware of Catholic social justice teachings. They do charity - collect groceries, fill backpacks for back to school for poor kids, collect Christmas toys and thanksgiving turkeys and that’s usually about it. Social justice sounds like socialism to them; the word justice sounds like lefty politics, so social justice teachings and projects are ignored.
DeleteIn my experience, evangelicals come in various flavors. Most lean right, but are smart enough to know the diff between social justice and socialism.
DeleteAnd sometimes charity leads to an awakening of social justice when people get to know who the marginalized are. So not going to discount charity as a step toward a sense of justice.
Evangelicals also often have congregations that span class and sometimes ethnic boundaries. To that extent, they may be better able to discern a Christian response to social evils than Catholics who stay in their own neighborhood.
I just think that evangelicals would be far more receptive to Catholicism than those who have given up on it. Just speaking from my own experience, the longer you stay away, the easier it is for your disaffection to harden into a litany of grievances and objections that you haul out and feed every time you go back for Easter, Christmas, or some family event.
Two of the things we're discussing here, drive-up communion and missalettes (large print or otherwise), are popular with people but violate liturgist best practices (at least according to the pastoral training that seems to prevail). I don't wish to criticize liturgists. If we left every decision to the popular will, we'd still be praying in Latin and would have only one Eucharistic prayer. These decisions require discernment, including discerning whether whatever diocesan or Vatican rules in place make sense.
ReplyDeleteWell you know what they say is the difference between liturgists and terrorists.
DeleteI don't know why they would be against missalettes. Actually I do know why liturgists don't like them; because the Word is supposed to be "heard". But the missalettes are a boon to people with a hearing loss. My hearing is fine, but I'm a visual person, things sink into my brain better if I see them. Sometimes liturgists let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
I think the previous priest was doing drive up confession before Easter in 2020. That was quietly shut down, maybe by the diocese. I thought that the sacraments of Baptism, Communion, and Confession could be distributed anytime/anywhere there was an extraordinary need, but maybe that's faulty info on my part.
DeleteGiven that the median age in the pews these days tends to the gray haired set, not providing missalettes is foolish. The majority of Americans in their 60s and older have at least mild hearing loss. Most don’t have hearing aids if it’s mild to moderate because of the high cost of hearing aids, which are not covered by Medicare. Like Katherine, I’m a visual learner and need to read, not just hear. Now I can’t hear either. Fortunately the Episcopal parish we joined provides weekly liturgy guides, with everything in it except the homily. They also provide hearing assistive devices for people like me - I can hear the sound of the priest’s voice but have very poor word comprehension, even with hearing aids. The mic worn by the priest streams directly to the hearing assistive devices, enabling me to hear about 95% of the words correctly
DeleteAnne, great point about how useful the missalettes are for folks with hearing loss. They're also useful for children who are still building their biblical vocabulary and may not understand every spoken word. They're also useful for folks for whom English is not their first language and who may not be fluent in English. Those are three separate audiences whose numbers could be substantial in one parish or another.
DeleteKatherine, Ginni and Clarence Thomas were, and probably stil are, members of a very conservative parish in the very conservative diocese of Arlington VA. It is a parish that is closely associated with Opus Dei (which operates several programs there, including one for young women). I’m unclear about the current rules regarding the mass in Latin. Their noon mass is in Latin, but is Novus Ordo. The pastor is associated with a couple of very right- wing Catholic groups, and apparently is a fierce critic of Pope Francis and a Bigano fan. . Scalia was also a member of this parish, as was the notorious FBI spy, Robert Hanssen. Hanssen and his family were Opus Dei. His wife taught at te Opus Dei girls school and his sons went to their boys school. Our son was there for one semester. We didn’t know who Opus Dei was when we sent him there. But after a while I was pretty shocked about some of what they were teaching and promoting, so we took him out.Later I learned more about OD and knew we had done the right thing by taking our son out of the school after only one semester.
ReplyDeleteJim: Why are these families staying away? Probably for a multitude of reasons...But it goes deeper than that. That generation of parents doesn't "attach" to institutional religion. ...the intergenerational passing along of the faith has been deteriorating over the course of my lifetime.
ReplyDeleteWhy do you think this has happened? Do you think that anything can bring them back?
If so, what?
Jim mentions communion above, and I have been thinking about that as I try to figure out how to get messages of support to my fellow elders displaced in Ukraine. One of the reasons I stay connected with the larger Church is because of its outreach missions to those in need. The Jesuit Refugee Service has a postcard program for displaced children (no route to open Ukraine yet). If you want to see what kids have sent to other kids go here, but have a hanky: https://anyrefugee.org
ReplyDeleteJean, thanks for posting this. For years now, my connection to the RCC has been via automatic monthly donations to the Jesuit Refugee Service, Catholic Relief Services, and St. Ann's (which gives extensive support to expectant single mothers, both before and after the birth - with housing, job training, education etc so that these women will be able to support themselves and the child they brought to term in a decent way.
Deletehttps://www.stanns.org/
The RCC is unmatched in the extent and quality of its humanitarian programs.
A couple years ago Jim posted a program in the Chicago area that collects baby blankets for burial of abandoned babies. When I gave a few extra bucks, I knit some up and send them on (which reminds me that I haven't done any for quite awhile). So you and I may not be receiving Communion, but we are still in communion with the Holy Spirit that works through the Church. I bitch about the toxicity of parish life to a fault, but the Church does keep the flame alive for me in many other ways that I am grateful for.
DeleteDrive through communion turns the Eucharist into a thing rather than a communal action by the assembly.
ReplyDeleteEven if they use reserve hosts? Like when someone brings communion to sick people?
DeleteRight. I guess the paradigm the drive through is closest to is communion for the sick, or what used to be called the "shut-ins". These folks are trying to stay connected, but they don't come live to mass. In most cases it's because they have health conditions which make exposure to COVID a big risk.
DeleteThey are watching mass on television- in some cases via a livestream, in many/most cases a pre-recorded mass. Are they participating somehow in the Eucharistic action? I hope God sees it that way. If Jesus's sacrifice transcends time? They are getting as close to it as they dare.
Interesting historical sidetrack: In the bubonic plague pandemic of 1665 in London, Daniel Defoe wrote that people initially stayed away from church, and many C of E churches were closed. As deaths rose, those not under quarantine started going to any church they could find open, regardless of denomination, though they maintained distance and masked. Eventually fatalism set in, and people no longer bothered worrying about about how close someone was sitting or whether the person showed signs of sickness. If I recall correctly, ministers of all stripes refrained from hellfire and damnation preaching because so many people had lost family and friends. The emphasis was on prayers for abatement of the plague and prayers for the grieving. As the plague waned and more churches re-opened, people went back to their own houses of worship. Defoe laments that the unity people had found in worship at the height of the plague did not last.
DeleteIn a different political climate, could covid have united Americans instead of dividing them?
Jean, that is fascinating. Our own stupidity prevents us from seeing things as they really are. It's a shame that a situation as dire as the Black Death is needed to restore our blindness.
DeleteI often say a quick prayer for John Lawrence, mayor of London during the plague year. He and the city councillors rode out on horseback nearly every day to see what was going on and talked to people. His quick organization, quarantine policies, statistical tracking of where in the city the worst outbreaks were, and body collection and burial squads certainly saved lives. His tireless efforts to get food into the city likely prevented a wave of starvation deaths. Maybe an unsung saint.
Delete"Why do you think this has happened? Do you think that anything can bring them back?
ReplyDeleteIf so, what?"
Yes, I think God may decide to call them back. We need to be willing to be God's voice to invite.
Part 1
ReplyDeleteWhy do you think this has happened? Do you think that anything can bring them back? If so, what?"
Jim: Yes, I think God may decide to call them back. We need to be willing to be God's voice to invite.
A little vague and incomplete for a prophetic voice. :)
Jim, I would be interested in learning your opinion on the first question - what do you think are the main reasons that tens of millions of people, including tens of millions of Catholics, have decided to leave organized religion during the last 60 or so years to continue the spiritual journey outside of the institutions?
Secondly, if God “may decide to call them back” it raises the possibility that perhaps it was God who called them to leave in the first place. Perhaps that notion would be interesting to ponder for a while.
God gave everyone a mind and a conscience. Over the last two thousand years, christianity, in Richard Rohr's words, went from the catacombs to the basilicas. It became a church that changed focus from teaching about love, and caring for those on the margins, to an imperial religion, a religion that seemed more about obtaining and wielding wealth and power than about following the path and teachings of Jesus. Millions have died in religious wars, not just fighting “heathen” Muslims during the crusades, but all through the centuries when kings and emperors had to bow down to popes. Of course Christians didn’t just kill Muslims and persecute the Jews. Christians killing christians occurred during the reformation, during all the post-reformation wars, and continues to the present day. The wars in Ireland, in the former Yugoslavia, now between two branches of Orthodox Christianity in Ukraine are only a few recent examples. There are many, many examples of christians killing christians for the last 1700+ years.
Popes said it was ok to enslave conquered peoples who weren’t Christian. The church had literal witch-hunts, and condoned the torture and cruel executions of “heretics”. The Catholic church was well behind other Christian denominations in officially condemning slavery.
Christianity persecuted the Jewish people throughout christian history, and as recently as WWII, “christians,” including Catholics, went to church every Sunday in Germany and prayed for Germany to be victorious over the (christian) nations it had invaded, while looking away as the Nazis persecuted and eventually murdered their Jewish neighbors. Right now Orthodox christians in Ukraine are praying for victory over Russia, while Orthodox christians in Russia pray to conquer Ukraine.
Perhaps God decided that a few Francis of Assisis - a few truly christ-following individuals living the gospels here and there - isn’t enough anymore. Maybe God decided that the defection of millions of people from organized religion would be needed to shock the self-satisfied, holier-than-everyone else leaders in organized religion into looking into a mirror, into examining their own consciences, to see what they have done, are doing, to drive people out of the doors of churches. Generally christian leaders, including most Catholic bishops and priests and deacons, as well as Protestant ministers, blame those who leave, finding all kinds of ways to judge and condemn them (immature, lazy, hedonistic, shallow, incapable of having a relationship with God, etc, etc). What they don't do is ask themselves what they might be doing that causes people to leave. Or what they are failing to do to keep them. Perhaps God is trying to shock the church folk into starting anew to teach the way that Jesus taught, not the way taught by the imperial church.
You say that “we”, presumably those still in the pews, must be God’s voice to invite. Exactly how will this be done? Phone calls? Door knocking? Passing out leaflets on street corners?
How about not talking so much. How about listening. How about trying to do more to live what Jesus taught.
Part 2
DeleteFrancis of Assisi is the most famous and best loved saint ever. I read that when JPII decided to gather leaders of all the major world religions in 1996 to further ecumenism, that Assisi was the only locale that everyone would agree to.
I have also read in a number of (purely) anecdotal articles that religious groups (usually small groups of nuns) that focus on helping others attract many young adults to join them in their work. Many are not Catholic. But they live the gospels, side by side with a few nuns, or a few priests, or Christ-followers who live Matthew 25.
Maybe, just maybe, God is inviting the religious establishment to stop judging and blaming those who now seek to follow God outside of the institutions and instead start to listen to them. Perhaps they should ask whether they need to go back to the basics of early Christianity, eschew wealth and privilege (which will be really tough for all those "princes" of the church to do, mostly dismantle the hierarchy, perhaps even return to house churches where communion is shared both literally and metaphorically. In the early house churches, there were no ordained priests to magically turn bread and wine into Jesus’s (literal) body and blood. No intellectually questionable dogmas like trans-substantiation based on pagan philosophers. No plethora of man-made rules. The people themselves gathered and shared the bread and wine, and Jesus was present. No ordained priests required. They understood, as did Augustine, that Jesus taught them to share bread and wine to remind them of him, and that they were to do the same after he was gone -- gather to remind themselves of his teachings, to share the bread and wine, and then go out to follow his commands to love. Perhaps having people gather in neighborhood homes instead of in church buildings would provide the beginnings of a way back to living as Jesus and his disciples lived. After all, Jesus wasn’t too big on organized religion. His harshest words were for the religious establishment - the "hypocrites". Almost every study on the “nones” reveals that one of the major reasons they reject organized religion is because of too evident hypocrisy in both the leadership and in the people in the pews.
Jean says that both she and I are connected to the church through its humanitarian work. It IS the best aspect of Catholicism. If the RCC would shed the centuries of imperial trappings, return to the simplicity of the early church, focus on the RCC’s Social Justice Teachings (aka, the gospels) instead of ignoring them in most parishes, and begin to create genuine, small, house-based Eucharistic communities, the tide might turn. There are already a number of “intentional eucharistic communities”. Given the reality that the church now includes a billion people, all over the world, the house churches might be tied to a church building that serves occasionally to draw multiple house churches together for special celebrations. But regular worship and celebration of the eucharist would take place in the home churches.
Unfortunately the RCC decided to adopt trans-substantiation to explain the eucharist. This teaching allows the PTB to claim that only an ordained priest can invoke Jesus’ presence. Perhaps they should revisit Augustine – he believed that the point of gathering to share the bread and wine was for Jesus’ followers to become the bread and wine – the symbols of giving one’s life over to loving others. Perhaps Buddhism attracts so many westerners raised as christians because they see in those who follow this philosophy the compassionate love taught by Jesus, so often absent in their own churches.
I am a lousy christian. I don't really live what Jesus taught. We are fortunate to be comfortable financially, so I send checks. I try to be honest, kind - to love my enemies, to forgive them - but often fail, especially when it comes to loving my enemies (trump supporters) and to forgiving them. :) It’s easier to send checks to CRS.
I don't think God calls people to leave.
DeleteBut I think there are parish tables that don't offer much sustenance, and there are individuals in leadership positions who contribute to spiritual starvation with their rules, opinions, officiousness, exclusivity, etc.
As noted elsewhere, I have no faith in elaborate processes that simply strengthen the sense of virtue among the participants. The lost sheep know that schtick, and know that the voices calling them back do not speak for God.
Those who can't figure out that it's their own damn fault that people don't wanna come to Mass will be judged.
But so will I for not more seriously asking for the grace and humility to rise above their crap, instead nursing my beloved grudges.
Hi Anne - yes. I wasn't very Jeremiah-like in that comment :-). If it came across as a bit tentative, it's because I don't know what God is up to. It may be exactly as you describe - maybe he is calling the institution to reform. Or maybe he is up to something else. Or maybe it's not his idea at all - maybe young families are drifting away despite him, rather than because of him.
DeleteI think there is little doubt that COVID exacerbated and accelerated a trend toward un-attachment that had been gathering steam for years.
The original topic in this thread are young families who were still attached up until COVID came along, and who haven't begun returning to church yet. They may be newly unattached. Some of them may be nervous about taking their children to church because of COVID concerns. The practical fear that a child may test positive for COVID and then have to stay home from school for some quarantine period isn't just a health concern for the child - it's a huge family disrupter. It could easily mean that one or both parents will have to miss work; any infants/toddlers/pre-schoolers will have to quarantine; etc. It's a wonder any parents bring their children to church.
The macro topic is an entire generation which is not attached. In my observation, many folks in that generation never really got attached in the first place: they are the 2nd or 3rd generation in their families who never had a strong attachment. I believe that is the single largest reason that folks of that generation don't have strong denominational attachment.
Only a small minority of school age children attend Catholic schools these days. Only a small minority of marriages are between two Catholics whose marriage ceremonies were in Catholic churches. These are symptoms of unattachment, and perhaps causes of unattachment as well. (Of course, the same can be said of mass attendance, which is the original topic in this post.) Church affiliation was much stronger when the Catholic sub-culture was much stronger. That culture is nearly gone now.
Obviously, the abuse crises, the perceived politicization of Christian churches - these are disincentives for anyone to belong to a faith community.
People don't affiliate with many other mediating institutions, either. Active church membership is just one category among many which is going the way of the mastodon. For a while, Catholics were less affected than some other denominations - but that time also has passed.
These are the headwinds which any parish must navigate through if it wishes to call people back to church. And of course, some parishes aren't particularly interested in calling people back to church. Many/most pastors are just a few years from retirement. That is true of many parish staff members, too. "Young go-getters" doesn't describe them. They are not about to take big risks by changing what they have been doing professionally for the last 20 or 30 years.
Some trends, like the general trend toward disaffiliation from mediating institutions, are large cultural trends which a single church, even one as big as the Catholic church, can't control. But some of these things are within the church's control. And the imperative to go out, preach the Gospel and baptize hasn't changed.
Bringing them back involves the practical and the interpersonal rather than simply changes in doctrine and church rules.
ReplyDeleteIf at the next synod they decided to ordain married men and women as priests, few would come back immediately. Those who wanted such things will say “I will believe it when I see it.” When the local parish has one of its married deacons ordained a priest, and one of its women pastoral associates ordained a deacon, very few will return. Most would be greatly disappointed. “Couldn’t they find anyone better than Joe and Mary? “Just taking a survey of deacons and women pastoral associates in our parishes, I think that less than one in ten have the potential to be great preachers or pastors since in fact most of our priests and deacons are not great preachers or great pastors.
The Mormons have great research departments and have thoroughly studied conversion although they publish very little. They send out their young people as missionaries for a year or two to knock on doors; however, they get less than one response per thousand knocks. That novitiate is simply a bonding mechanism among young Mormons with each other and the church. It is like all initiation rituals such as hazing in fraternities. People who go through them come to believe that that the organization is worth their suffering.
On the other hand, Mormons have the custom of Tuesday family nights where Mormons at their family dinners in their homes discuss how they are doing as a family especially in light of their faith. Mormons are encouraged to invite non-Mormon families to these family nights. Actually, they target not just anyone but new people to the community who do not have much social support. If the new neighbors enjoy these family nights, they are then invited to other Mormon events that they are interested in. The success rate for these Tuesday nights is rumored at about one of every three families invited! The Mormon historically have had one the fastest rates of growth of any denomination.
Conversion is all about acquiring new relationships rather than new ideas. Once a new family has acquired a set of Mormon friends and become familiar with some Mormon practices, they slowly begin to understand Mormon beliefs and the process to become a Mormon.
How do we bring people back? People understand that religion is about love of God and love of neighbor not about doctrine and beliefs. When a parish dramatically increases the quality of its liturgies and its experience of community, that will overflow to relatives, friends and neighbors of those participating in renewed worship and renewed community groups.
That's very insightful, Jack.
DeleteSome of this is happening in the local parish, where "refugees" one town away have begun to congregate in large numbers. They felt ignored in their former parish, and are actively remolding this one, creating bonds with each other and calling in like-minded individuals in a 30-mile radius. There are younger couples with children and many new middle-aged people. They click with the new priest.
While all of this is still mainstream Catholicism with an emphasis on angels, rosaries, miracles, St Faustina, and JPII--nothing new as far as doctrine or "rules" go--there is clearly renewal going on.
This turn of events has a lot of gray heads from the original parish spinning and feeling marginalized and resentful. But it is bringing people in.
Jim, a lot of official church folk continue to find excuses that don't require examining their institutional consciences. So they think that they should just keep trying, using the old ways. Preaching at people with words won't bring them back. Recall if you will, the words attributed to St. Francis - Preach the gospel at all times; if necessary use words. (Apparently there is scant evidence that he actually said those words. However, they are still worth taking to heart.) The institutional churches, including the Protestants, very often don't preach by example- by how they live. Every study of the young adult "nones" has hypocrisy way at the top of the list of the reasons they walked away from formal religion. Remember - they not only are educated these days, they have access to information via the internet that previous generations never even imagined. They read, they learn, they think, and then many decide to leave. The institutional church clings to the old ways, to a time before widespread education in the western nations, before people mostly left superstition behind, and before many realized that their own minds were as good as those claiming to tell them what Jesus wants them to do, telling them what to believe.. They learned to think independently, to study on their own, to form their own consciences. Some continue(d) to go to church because of tribal identity, but even that hold has weakened dramatically, as you have noted (two or three generations now). It's happening now among Hispanic American Catholics, and even among the Mormons, who probably have the strongest tribal identity of the current American christian denominations.. The Baptists are also losing members, especially young adults. Small, independent evangelical churches are closing at a fast rate also, with many more closing each year than opening. This is happening throughout institutional religion in spite of the fact that studies also show that there is great spiritual hunger out there. Some new thinking is needed.
DeleteJack: People understand that religion is about love of God and love of neighbor not about doctrine and beliefs
DeleteThis implies that the important thing about church is not really religious - it is about making friends, being part of a tribe that shares your interests and preferred "style" of worship - high church or low, Gregorian chant or St. Louis Jesuits, or "christian rock". Formal rites and rituals or a preacher on a stage surrounded by a band, entertaining the congregation complete with strobe lights and "fog" and giant screens all over the place. Most stick with the tribe they were born into, but millions have decided that their tribe of origin isn't a good match anymore. Some seek a different tribe (denomination) and others find their community elsewhere, outside of formal religion, knowing that love of God and love of neighbor are not dependent on being part of institutional religion.
The practices of the Mormons seem almost too similar to those of cults, cults that recruit members they spot as being "lonely" in some way, who feel somewhat isolated and without friends, and cultivating a friendship with an ulterior motivation in the case of the Mormon practices - with the purpose of recruiting them. They are then immersed in the community (cult?), becoming involved in a myriad of activities to make them feel part of the tribe (cult?). I witnessed this up close at one time in my seeker stage, via invitations by a couple of women in a local charismatic community that took over a particular neighborhood near my home. Knowing how this charismatic, neighborhood-based community, works, and how they attempt to recruit, was an eye-opener. I'm not talking about a small parish-based charismatic prayer group, but a literal geographic community where almost every home had a family belonging to the charismatic group. It was one reason I was very leary about Amy Barrett being on the Supreme Court.
But providing a way for people to "make" friends works in many cases, which is why my former parish's plan to cultivate small groups who live all in the same neighborhood (think Ward) to keep - or bring them back - to the tribe will probably have more success than their dozens of former Catholics Come Home efforts. People want to belong.
Interesting that Mormons have a way that people can officially disaffiliate, although it appears that they often resist doing it. I have read in several articles too that they tend to be shunned by some family and former friends if they choose to leave. Not officially, like the Amish, but as a practical consequence of leaving. The RCC claims every baptized person, even though millions of those people no longer consider themselves to be Catholic. The RCC has no mechanism through which baptized Catholic people can officially disaffiliate. But even the Mormons are facing losses in spite of the strong tribal hold they cultivate in their members..
https://www.mrm.org/declining-growth
Jean, what seems to be happening in your parish is that people who want the 1950s style of Catholicism are moving to parishes that provide it - such as your parish. I have read multiple articles on this trend. It's not "renewal" that's bringing them in, but a fair amount of parish switching.
DeleteAt the same time, the gray-haired VII generation, the progressives, find fewer and fewer pastors who identify with progressive, Vatican II theology. They are either just putting up with it, being pushed out in their old age, or staying away, and some are dying, as are the remaining VII pastors. Better to go to drive through communion than be surrounded by people who want to go back to an era that many happily left behind. Younger progressives are just quitting in droves, leaving the RCC behind, very often along with all of institutional religion.
Renewal vs parish switching is worth thinking about, but I do get the idea that many of the newer people are reaching out to those who have not been churches in awhile.
DeleteIn other news, I received another Jack Chick tract in the mail. This one was just addressed to "Neighbor." It shows how even people who go to church are going to Hell if they tell dirty jokes and think about baseball during services.
These things usually show up at Easter and Halloween, but they come from the Jehovah's witnesses and are always signed. This one was sent anonymously, and it was a little unsettling.
I can see that they might be unsettling. I’ve never seen a Jack Chick tract, but I googled it a few years ago after reading about people getting them. The JWs and Mormons occasionally knock on doors but not too often. This community is not prime recruitment territory, especially for the JWs. There is an active Mormon community here, with a church just a couple of miles down the main road. ( always on a main road it seems, for better visibility ). Marriott HQ is just a few miles from here, and since the Marriotts are Mormon, the corporate staff is also heavily populated by Mormons, who often live in the neighboring suburbs. We also get occasional tracts from the Messianic Jews who perhaps think they can draw in some of the many Jewish families in our area. From what I can gather, they are even less welcomed by our Jewish neighbors than by the christians in the area.
DeleteI don't quite get the Messianic Jews. Are they just thinly disguised evangelicals? The regular Jews don't like them, apparently feeling that they are out to proselytize them. Which they probably are.
DeleteAbout the Jehovah's Witnesses, their faith seems rather joyless, but the people I know who are JWs are good people who do a lot of volunteer work in the community. During Covid restrictions the JWs weren't doing house calls, but sending letters. I got a rather sweet one from a young girl in the neighborhood.
Katherine, yes, the Messianic Jews actively proselytize Jewish people and are NOT welcomed, at least not by the Jewish community where I live. The Mormons and JWs target everyone. I hope the Catholics don’t get so desperate that they resort to door knocking at least.
DeleteI have never met a JW other than the few door knockers we’ve had. Older couples, dressed in church going kinds of clothes, very polite. I tell them politely that I am happy with my religion and suggest that they save money on printing by not giving me their written materials when they try to give their brochures to me. A long time ago we had a few Moonies knock on our door. They would also approach me in stores occasionally. Haven’t seen any sign of them in about 25 years. Are they still around? .
I ask the JWs for as many Watch Towers as I can "for my friends," and then I throw their lies in the trash. My brother used to invite them in and ask them all kinds of questions so they would be too tired to bother his neighbors.
DeleteJean - maybe I’ll do that next time. But I doubt that there will be a next time. I think the door knockers realized long before Covid interrupted door to door anything ( although the window sales people are back) that trying to find converts in our neighborhood is a hopeless waste of time.
DeleteWhen I was in graduate school some group, I forget which one, knocked on my door and read me a verse from the NT. For a brief moment I thought of grabbing my Greek NT and reading the same passage to then in Greek. But then I quickly decided this might have provoked too long a conversation.
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