From my studies, I have concluded that the very existance of protestantism is due to this. They did not like this or that about the Catholic Church, ie, king henry and wanting an anullment, Martin Luther and his 95 Thesis, The anabaptists, Calvin, Jan Hus, etc... All removed elements ABC and from there, followers split to remove through XYZ until it no longer represented anything of the original.
We now have mega churches refusing to take a stand on any issue that is divisive (Joel Osteen) to only preaching on the one or 2 issues that they, as their own pope feel are relevant (John Hagee).
I feel comforted to know my church is the same yesterday, today, and always; steeped the the scripture and Tradition of millenia past, given to Peter by Christ. As to liberal catholics, they are self excommunicated whether they like it or not if they hold a gravely moral belief and live in opposition to the church on the issue,ie abortion, homosexuality etc. It is not rocket science, and I do not understand for the life of me why they would want to belong to a church that does not preach what they hold so sacred.
In this country especially, we are all free to believe what we choose. We do NOT have to change our beliefs or our time honored faith to accomodate the new age or their belief system. It is the ultimate oxymoron, you are not catholic if you do not believe what catholics believe. We are not obligated to change our beliefs to fit yours since you are the one who changed.
In this world of political correctness gone awry, I thank God the church is moving, albeit slowly, back to its core and correcting the misconceptions and poor catechesis stemming from Vatican 2.
Protestantism exists because the Church of Rome became an oppressive political regime and extremely corrupt. Things ebb and flow in this world. There are resurgent Protestant denominations that reject secular liberalism. There are plenty of Catholics that embrace secular liberalism. These groups are not monolithic so trying to generalize too widely is an error.
This is a touch off topic for the thread, but I read somewhere that after any and all councils, for about 50 years, chaos and insanity happens. We're in the last seven years of that and things are gradually going back to the way they should be. The Church hasn't changed, and sadly enough the humanity of the men in it hasn't either. Man is still prone to sin and without proper guidance will sin.
I've been thinking about the falling away recently as so many of my childhood friends have. It's more out of apathy than anything else. That's a personal decision. And, yes, right now the larger culture is playing a huge role.
bttt.