Posted on 05/27/2007 7:17:23 PM PDT by Gamecock
The numbers tell the story.
Time magazine wanted to talk theology with Mel Gibson recently on the set of The Passion, his new movie depicting the last hours of Christ. Asked what he thought about the effects of the Second Vatican Council on the Catholic Church, the Braveheart of Catholic traditionalists said, "Look at the main fruits: dwindling numbers and pedophilia."
Gibson's post Vatican II ergo propter Vatican II argument would be enough to drive any high school logic teacher crazy. Is the Council responsible for all the Church's ills, including the priestly sex-abuse crisis, that have arisen since the Council closed in 1965? After all, many of the abuse allegations pre-dated the Council, and some of the most notorious offenders--like John Geoghan and Paul Shanley--were trained in the pre-Vatican II seminaries. Too many factors come into play to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the Council caused the pedophile priest phenomenon.
But Gibson comes closer to the mark when blaming the Second Vatican Council for the "dwindling numbers . In fact he is being generous, because "plummeting would be a more accurate term than "dwindling" to describe of the incredibly shrinking Catholic Church since 1965. In every area that is statistically measurable--such as the number of priests, seminarians, priestless parishes and nuns--the deterioration is obvious, and is the exact opposite of the trends before the Council.
EMPTY SEMINARIES
Beyond a vague understanding of a need for "more vocations," most Catholics are perhaps unaware of the disaster facing the American priesthood. After skyrocketing from about 27,000 in 1930 to 58,000 in 1965, the number of priests in the United States dropped to 45,000 in 2002. By 2020, there will be about 31,000 priests--and only 15,000 will be under the age of 70, according to a study conducted by Dr. James R. Lothian of Fordham University.
The shortage of priests has created a problem previously unknown to modern Catholics: the priestless parish. Only 3 percent of the parishes in the US--a total of 549--were without a priest in 1965. In 2002 there were 2,928 priestless parishes, about 15 percent of all US parishes. By 2020, a quarter of all parishes, 4,656, will have no priest.
As one would expect, the priest dearth has been fueled by a collapse in the seminarian population. There were 16,300 seminarians in 1930 and 49,000 in 1965. By 2002 the number had plunged to 4,700: a 90 percent decrease. Without any students, countless seminaries across the country have been sold or shuttered. There were 596 seminaries in 1965, and only 200 in 2002.
And empty seminaries result in declining ordinations. While there were 1,575 ordinations to the priesthood in 1965, in 2002 there were 450, a decrease of 350 percent. Taking into account ordinations, deaths and departures, in 1965 there was a net gain of 725 priests. In 1998, there was a net loss of 810.
RELIGIOUS ORDERS DISAPPEARING
The tragedy of the convents has been perhaps even more startling. A host of 138,000 sisters ran the Catholic education and health systems in 1945; their numbers swelled to 180,000 by 1965. In 2002, there were 75,000 sisters, with an average age of 68. By 2020, the number of sisters will drop to 40,000--and of these, only 21,000 will be age 70 or under. One does not have to be Chicken Little to predict that within a generation there will be no nuns.
The same is true for the once-proud religious orders of men. For example, in 1965 there were 5,277 Jesuit priests and 3,559 seminarians; in 2000 there were 3,172 priests and 389 seminarians. There were 2,534 OFM Franciscan priests and 2,251 seminarians in 1965; in 2000 there were 1,492 priests and 60 seminarians. There were 2,434 Christian Brothers in 1965 and 912 seminarians; in 2000 there were 959 Brothers and 7 seminarians. It does not require special training in statistics to conclude that by 2050, if these trends continue, the Jesuits, the Franciscans, and the Christian Brothers, will be the virtually extinct in the US.
Other statistics on the life of the Catholic Church in America tell the same story. At the time of the Council there were 4.5 million students in US parochial schools; now there are 2 million. Before the Council there were less than 400 marriages annulled by Catholic diocesan tribunals in an average year; now there are 50,000. Before the Council 3 out of 4 Catholics attended Mass each week; now the figure is 1 in 4.
Given these alarming facts, one wonders how a movie star like Mel Gibson can sense a Church in extremis, but the American bishops cannot. They know the statistics (which are published by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops), yet take no action to counter the catastrophe.
The bishops do not have a good track record when it comes to responding to crisis. Just as they showed no interest in the sexual abuse of minors--in fact they were sometimes complicit--it is a good bet that the bishops will neglect the emergency that threatens the very existence of the Church in the America.
[AUTHOR ID] Kenneth C Jones of St. Louis is the author of Index of Leading Catholic Indicators: The Church since Vatican II, published by Oriens Publishing Co.
Have had company all evening and tomorrow back to the grist mill. But I will come back and address this as soon as I can.
It’s all a part of our history.
I often think—”Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever”—but just as in natural, human life, his Bride has fluctuating cycles. ;-)
Meaning Calvinism? I cannot accept the idea of a God who loves the whole world and then chooses people to be saved or go to the lake of fire. No one can convince me that God is like this.
I would be careful with Calvinism, it reminds me too much of Fred Phelps and his “God Hates Fags” idea.
The examples of the former are numerous, and plenty are well known. Examples of the latter are unfortunately too numerous to count, hence Mr. Jones's findings. I pray that the tide is turning (and ever so slowly, it seems to be).
I pray you are right.
Catholic Priests in Latin America need to lay off the Marx based liberation theology and just preach Christ and maybe things would be different.
Could you please explain why you are posting an article from May, 2003 in May of 2007?
Makes no sense to me. Old news.
The news today......be converted and save your soul.
It’s real simple, Alex: the ex-communicated aren’t Catholic.
The RCC is both shrinking and growing. In Europe and the US, most Catholics are merely nominal; they never bothered to leave after Vatican II, but they were left confused about what is true Catholicism, and perceived that they were being told that the New Catholicism would be very similar to the agnosticism-dominated pop-culture protestantism they were surrounded by.
After JP2, the sense of what “real Catholicism” was began to be reasserted, and the “real Catholic” church began to grown. But the rebounding numbers of real Catholics, led by Asia and Africa, have a long, long way to go before they re-fill the inflationary bubble of nominal Catholics.
The truth is that even before Vatican II there was a large bubble, of scarcely missionized Latin Americans, and post-modern Europeans.
But I really can’t imagine that you can’t grasp the concept of an automatically incurred excommunication, given that you’ve had it explained to you 100 million times... this post is mostly for people who are sincerely wondering.
>> And with all that growth, here in the USA more than half of all Catholics voted for Kerry in the 2004 Presidential election, and more than half voted in Democrat congressman and senators in the 2006 elections. Yep, you gotta love that Catholic growth! <<
That is simply fiction.
Actually, Catholics included in the count may not be very observant, but nowadays they must do something over the course of a year to be counted in a census.
Incidentally, Catholic church attendance in Europe is far higher than Protestant church attendance.
Doesn't that sound a little contradictory to you? The church gets smaller but evangelism grows?
If the church is getting smaller, then the evangelism is failing.
I agree that it will be the case that several orders are and will be struggling for the next couple years. I do know that isn't the case at all with some of the more newer orders that hold on to good Catholic tradition, some of them are bursting at the seems with those discerning vocations.
The truth is that at least for my parish church, it is seeing a new springtime or rebirth because it has a new priest who is in his early 40’s. He is part of the JPII generation of priests that are now stepping up to the plate.
250 million? That number doesn’t sound right.
Jones’s analysis is simplistic. Mass attendance began to decline in this country before Vatican II, peaking at 75% in 1955. By 1965, Mass attendance had fallen to 67%. There were other factors at work here besides the Council, although the liturgical and theological confusion that followed the Council was definitely a big factor. One of these factors was the cultural revolution that occurred in this country during the 1960s, especially the revolution in sexual values. Another was the fact that by the 1960s, Catholics were increasingly entering the mainstream of American society, abandoning their “fortress mentality.” Anti-Catholic bigotry was a sad fact of American life up until WWII and Catholics were very conscious of their second-class status. Hency they kept to themselves, maintained their own insitutions, and remained aloof from society. By the 60s this was changing and Catholics were becoming “regular” Americans. Unfortunately, many stopped practicing their faith in order to fit in better with American society.
The biggest cause of the decline in vocations to the priesthood and religious life has been the decline in Mass attendance among Catholics. Catholic families who do not attend Mass on Sundays, do not produce vocations. And contraception and divorce are largely to blame for this decline in Mass attendance. Moreover, Catholics’ acceptance of the divorce mentality has directly led to a decline in vocations to the priesthood and religious life. Those who do not see marriage as something permanent and sacred will not value the renunciation of marriage for the sake of the Kingdom of God.
Everyone is noticing the decline in vocations, but everyone seems to overlook one obvious, and perhaps chief reason--contraception. Without children, there is no future. The Western world has ignored Humanae vitae for nearly 40 years. And the result? the pews are empty (therefore Churches are closing), the seminaries are empty (close the seminaries), the religious houses and even entire orders aren't getting vocations.
The devil's plan is to destroy the family. "Be sterile and selfish" I seem to hear him say--population control, Planned "Barrenhood", contraception, abortion, sterilization, etc.
God's plan, "Be fruitful and multiply". As Pope John Paul II said to the families in the Jubilee Year 2000 A.D., "Do not be afraid to have children!" And to the Italians (who have been committing demographical suicide through contraception and abortion) he said, "Stop being selfish and start having children."
Families that follow God's plan tend to have more children and more vocations. We are getting lots of vocational inquiries from large Catholic families, frequently homeschooled.
If any of you are interested, there are some excellent Pro-Life vlogs at http://airmaria.com/?cat=8 Fr. Angelo is particular excellent on this subject. God bless you...
Since there are one billion catholics, and that poster said they add 250 million per year, that means they have gone from nothing to one billion in 4 years, presumably.
In short, the Catholic church didn’t exist 5 or 6 years ago.
(I, too, suspect something wrong with that number.)
At Baptism, the priest should mention to the parents that the child COULD become a priest or a nun if they would support it....and the same at First Holy Communion and Confirmation. Plant the seed, priests.
Most go to mass at Christmas... another tradition
Incidentally, Catholic church attendance in Europe is far higher than Protestant church attendance.
By percentage or number? Most of Europe is Catholic by definition.However it is only the traditional Protestant churches that have declining attendance, the evangelical churches are doing fine.
"Church attendance in Europe has been steadily decreasing in recent decades. Traditional Protestant and Roman Catholic churches have a hard time drawing in new members, particularly young people. But Evangelical churches are booming across the region, particularly those attended by immigrants from Africa, Asia, and Latin America.''
Article here
http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2006-07/2006-07-24-voa48.cfm?CFID=80781544&CFTOKEN=45335555
Doese God chose everyone everyone ?
Of course he does....it’s up to us to be open to it.
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