That's true; most of the meetings of dissident organizations seem to feature snow white hair, and I doubt that they have many members under 50.
Still, don't write off our experience. There was a really great moment in the Church when you actually could trust the clergy, when people really considered their lives in the light of eternity, when people took vows seriously, and when there was, oddly enough, a really great sense of Catholic cohesion. When you were at a dinner on a Friday and saw someone choosing the fish instead of the steak, silly as it sounds, you suddenly knew you had somebody who was on the same wavelength and would understand things the way you did.
I think that's going to have to be rebuilt virtually from scratch in many places. It's not going to be the same (and it shouldn't be) because times change and there are different needs and conditions. But those of us who were Catholics before Vatican II lived through something very special.
I think it fell apart for two reasons: one was the presence of modernists, who had been quietly digging away at the foundations for decades; and the other was, paradoxically, that we were too obedient, too trusting. We laypeople should have stood up on our hind legs and refused to go along with many of the things that happened, but we didn't feel we it was our place to complain or resist.
I think that's changed. And I think the resolute attitude of young traditionalists is evidence of this.
Thanks! You phrased that so well.
I wasn't writing off your experience. I am still amazed that Archbishop Sheen had a prime time TV show let alone that it won an Emmy Award (and Protestants and Jews watched, too)! I was reacting to NYer's comment that when his/her generation is gone there will not be anyone "to pick up the gauntlet."