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Good news ping!
Uh-oh.
Popcorn in the microwave...
Welcome!
So we should be ready to nail the door shut. (joke)
Number me as one who went the other direction. 40 years and absolutely no regrets.
Interesting. I am sure I saw that poll recently where the Catholic growth in the US is mainly through Catholics coming in from South and Central America, and amongst the native US parishioners there is nearly a static situation, with as many coming in as going out.
I know that the local CC has been flooded by Hispanics, (their parking lot is right next to my church) and the few whites are mostly older couples.
Many of these people who were baptized Catholic are recognizing that they STILL are Catholic.
We are welcoming them back with open arms.
And many of their family members are also being baptized now as adults. Also their children are being baptized. We have a whole family coming into the Catholic Church at our parish. Two years ago both the mother and father and two teenagers joined the Catholic Church!
I have at least one gentleman coming into the RCC in my parish church community. Be it 1 or 50, it is truly a miracle.
For years we have talked about ‘Mass attendance’ as the criterion to look at when we define someone’s Catholicism. Of late, I have come to the conclusion that a more significant indicator of one’s active participation in our faith is whether or not one accesses the sacrament of confession. What was the sacrament that Protestant Revolt ushered out the door? Confession. What was the first sacrament to fall from radar screen post Vatican II? Confession. Catholic’s coming home to the Church will not be marked best by their return to Mass but by their frequenting of the Sacrament of Confession. And why is this significant? Because when one goes to confession one relinquishes the sin of our society - relativism which says that I am the determiner of good and evil in this work (a la Adam), I am God, and there is no objective truth. There are many Catholics sitting in the pews attending Mass who have not been to confession in years. They receive communion despite their sin and continue to have their faith eroded. I was one who never missed Mass but it wasn’t until I went to confession that my faith began to turn around. On another note, I would bet my life savings that NONE of those priest homosexual/pedophiles were frequent receivers of the Sacrament of Confession, although they said Mass daily for the most part.
In our parish church, we’ve got about 7 or 8 pews reserved at the front for RCIA folks who will become Catholics this Easter. Not too shabby!