Posted on 08/12/2003 7:52:00 PM PDT by Land of the Irish
Kenneth Jones’ statistic research work first appeared in Latin Mass magazine in the Nineties. As a CPA working in the investments industry at that time, I was already immersed in charts, graphs and financial reports comparing projections and actual results. I knew the decline in the Church had been precipitous since the Sixties, but in page after page of simple bar charts awful truth sank in. A picture says a thousand words, good or bad. It occurred to me then that the quantitative approach to the charting the decline since Vatican II would make a good book someday, and that day has come.
Mr. Jones addressed the Catholic Citizens of Illinois monthly lunch forum on August 8th (held on the second Friday of every month at the Chicago Athletic Association) discussing his new book, The Index of Leading Catholic Indicators, (Oriens Publishing, St. Louis, MO.) He could have easily subtitled this work with any number of clever by-lines, but showing a lawyer’s restraint, he delivers the numbers straight up with simple charts and tables covering the period 1920 to 2000, and with projections through 2020 in most cases, based on the trends since the Sixties. His sources of data are independent and credible. The approach to evaluating data (specifically in the area of survey bias in determining Mass attendance numbers) is scientific and accurate. The results are bleak and depressing.
Mr. Jones is a very personable speaker, which was an asset as he recounted the grim statistics in Catholic vocations, beliefs and education to a scandal wearied crowd of traditional Catholics. From 1920 to 2000, the Catholic population in America grew from around 18 million to over 60 million, a 360% increase. During this same time, the number of priest steady rose, to a peak in 1970 of 59,000. In that same year, there were 161,000 nuns and sisters. But in the years that followed, vocations to the priesthood, sisterhood, and holy orders collapsed. There are one tenth as many seminarians today as in the Sixties. The nuns as most of us remember them - teaching and loving - have been cut by more than half. Everywhere there is a lack of, or loss of faith in Catholic teachings.
What could have gone so terribly wrong to produce such declines?
Jones believes, as do many Catholics, that the Second Vatican Council and the implementation of various reforms immediately following that Council are directly responsible. “No reasonable person looking at the evidence could come to any other conclusion. The beginning of the declines in all categories commences after the Council, and it’s been all down hill since. Yes, I believe there is a positive correlation.” Yet in spite of the post-Council wreckage, church leaders continue to insist that the Second Council was a smashing success, and the reforms should continue, in spite of the results. The disconnect between the causes and effects of the decline was the motivation for writing the book, which Jones hopes will help Catholics distinguish between the myths and realities of Vatican II.
The statistics related to Catholic attitudes on core Catholic values have changed dramatically in the last forty years. They reveal that since Vatican II, there are tens of millions of self-proclaimed Catholics in this country who aren’t Catholic at all.
Though the results in several polls vary, Jones believes that Mass attendance in the US is currently at 25%. In the 1920’s it was a time of huge urban Cathedrals, and tightly woven very ethnic and very Catholic parishes. Not surprising, Mass attendance was high, as high as 80% in some areas, but always a major of the parish members. Attendance began to crash in the Sixties, falling by double digits annually in the early Seventies to one in four Catholics today.
There are no lines at the confessionals either, because no one is going. In one survey, Jones noted, one in three Catholics today claim to go to Confession once a month. “All you have to do is look around on Sunday to know that something’s not right. It’s called survey bias. We suspect many Catholics surveyed knew they had to make an annual confession to remain Catholic, and they gave information that was not true.”
A 1994 New York Times/CBS poll showed that 70% of Catholics between the ages of 18 and 44 have lost faith in the Eucharist, believing instead that it was a “symbolic reminder” of Jesus. The same survey revealed that 51% of Mass going Catholics believed that the Eucharist was symbolic! If the majority of modern Catholics had their way, noted Jones, we would have woman priests and married priests, and all prohibitions on birth control would be lifted, including abortion. Jones traces the increasing gulf between Catholic actions and beliefs to the Second Council.
Faced with dwindling religious order teachers, and poor catechism and education quality, the numbers of Catholic schools and students declined dramatically from 1960 to today. There is good news: private Catholic schools (non-diocesan) have been increasing as orthodox home-school families have banded together, hired teachers and converted buildings.
Jones concludes that the Second Vatican Council wasn’t so much a spark that lit a dry forest, but a force that broke a dam which held back oceans of dissent and heresy. The application of the reform of Vatican II says Jones, combined with the social and technological changes going on in the world, has been a complete disaster. It is difficult for Jones and many Catholics to reconcile the optimism of the pope, who lavishes praise on the many fruits of Vatican II that are spreading their branches in the New Pentecost. “If this is renewal,” said Jones wryly, “I don’t want to be around when the decline sets in.”
To avoid that decline, Jones suggested that Catholics resort to the most powerful and plentiful weapon in their grasp - prayer. Prayer for our families, our country, and most importantly for our priests and bishops, that they make the right decisions and provide faithful leadership. The second thing to do is evangelize, joining groups such as Credo, which Jones helped found in St. Louis in 1996, or like Catholic Citizens of Illinois (also founded in 1996.) “Through forums, newsletters, websites, phone calls, conferences, videos, tapes and TV the voice of authentic Catholicism is being heard.” Jones encouraged restoration oriented Catholics to keep the truth alive and in front of the Catholic laity and clergy, and not to be afraid to defend the Catholic faith, and the truth, when it is challenged.
It’s hard to argue with Jones’ numbers, but it is possible to look at them in different ways. We all know that there are many millions of inactive, self-described Catholics who ask nothing of their parish and give nothing. If we were to exclude non-Mass attending Catholics from the pool of people relying on vocations, catechism, and education to sustain their families, the numbers across the board look different. In the 1920’s two out of three Catholics went to Mass weekly, a number that was sustained though the early Sixties, then crashed to one out of four Catholics today.
Assuming we are concerned with a body of believers and a Church known as Catholics, I don’t believe it is reasonable to include Catholics-in-name-only, who show up at Church to be “hatched, matched, or dispatched” and never to be seen of again. The priest problem doesn’t look as bad when compared to the number of Catholics who come to Mass, in fact it shows improvement. From 1920 to 2000, the number of Mass attending parishioners per priest declined from 500 to 350. Conversely, during that period, the number of total Catholics per priest nearly doubled, from 843 to 1,429, demonstrating a “shortage” of priests. I would argue that a priest is primarily going to minister to the needs of Catholics who go to Mass, not the 75% who don’t show up for Mass. These projections get worse going forward, but by 2020, we can assume that there will be around one priest for every 500 mass going Catholics, or at the level experienced in the 1920’s.
The good news is that in spite of the collapse in vocations in the old-line religious orders like the Jesuits and Franciscans, there are new orders of priests that are booming with seminarians. The Legionaires of Christ, the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, the Society of St. John Cantius, for example, are highly orthodox and thriving communities. Even the bleak landscape of diocesan vocations is dotted with hope in unexpected cities like Denver and Lincoln, Nebraska, where orthodox men are being attracted by orthodox bishops.
In spite of the decline in Catholic education at the elementary and high school level, vocations are being created in great numbers as the number of orthodox universities increases. The greatest number of vocations recruitment up to the 1960’s was done in Catholic Universities. The collapse in the number of seminarians is mostly due to the collapse of faithfulness to traditional Catholic values in places like Georgetown, DePaul, and other universities that today are entirely secularized. With the rise of private colleges like Thomas Aquinas in California, Franciscan in Steubenville, and now Ave Maria in Florida, there are increasing numbers of authentically Catholic universities, and the consequence, as before, will be increasing vocations coming from them.
The decline in the number of Catholic schools and students is not entirely driven by Vatican II, though the collapse of authentic Catholic curriculum and catechism in these schools can find little other cause.
Affordability of Catholic education has been adversely impacted by taxes on working families, which rose from 15% of gross income to 45% of gross income today, all taxes (federal, state, and local) included. Under these circumstances, most Catholic families can’t afford to send their children to a private or parochial school, and without any other choice, are forced into public education and the propaganda that comes with it, reinforcing the secular and skeptic beliefs that plague us today.
The numbers of sisters, many of them teachers, declined from 138,000 in 1945 to 75,000 today, forcing Catholic schools to hire lay teachers and pay them competitive salaries. Not only was this more expensive, but many Catholic parents reacted by sending their kids to the public schools if brothers or nuns weren’t teaching anymore at their parish school. During his talk, Jones correctly pointed out that the tragic demise of the sisterhood worldwide needed to be better appreciated by Catholics. In spite of heroic popular saints like the Therese the Little Flower, and Mother Teresa of Calcutta, the orders of sisters have been co-opted by feminists and dissenters to an astounding degree.
Fortunately, just like in the priesthood, the orders of sisters that are growing and thriving are those which have clung most tenaciously to tradition and orthodoxy. The great orders of tomorrow are being founded before our eyes by the courage and faith of women like Mother Assumpta Long, TV evangelist Mother Angelica, and Mother Teresa. Just as the priesthood of the future will be populated by men of orthodoxy and faith, the liberal sisters of the 80’s and 90’s will soon have run their course, and the restoration will be aided by orthodox nuns.
Kenneth Jones has provided a wealth of information on the decline in the Catholic Church. What remains to be seen is whether the bishops will act on it, or continue to perpetuate the myth that everything is fine, and the fruits of the Second Council are continuing to unfold, when in fact, the exact opposite is true.
This isn't the Vatican. No, there are several of us here are sick and tired of having our faith questioned, the Novus Ordo Mass ridiculed, and our belief in the Real Presence put down because we attend the Novus Ordo. So, we' re just going to avoid those who do that sort of thing.
You don't do it, Hermann doesn't do it, and there are a couple of others.
And you're right. It IS a simple matter of charity. When I see the usual suspects exhibiting some, then fine.
I don't make it a habit to associate with people who spit in my face.
It will be a success for me. And, we're not talking about the traditionalist movement; we're talking about schismatics who won't accept Vatican II and the Novus Ordo.
I've got no problem with the Tridentine Mass, as I've said, over and over, and those who wish to attend it.
But, acting as if they are somehow superior, and translating that elitism into trashing the Novus Ordo is getting very old. And boring.
One can have a preference for one over the other and still respect the other.
Antoninus, here's Exhibit A.
Ahem: Brother is a lapel-graber: "But don't you see, man, your souls and the souls of your CHILDREN are in grave danger because of that heretic Novus Ordo priest who is so ignorant or heretical that he thinks Credo means WE believe instead of I believe (it's a satanic plot, that's what it is) and they think Christ shed His Blood for all men and not just for US. Don't you see the peril? If you don't, then damn you too! The truly faithful seem now to come down to just thee and me and to tell you the truth, I am getting skeptical about thee!"
Brother then offers a cornucopia of generally subjective excuses in the last two paragraphs that the schismatically inclined can access to excuse not attending Masses of obligation.
We then note that the publication in which this stew of disobediences and gross rationalizations is not mentioned. Was it printed in the Angelus (SSPX) or the Remnant (raving anti-American nutcases like Solange Herz and John Rao and sneakily pro-schismatic without the guts to say so outright) or "Catholic" Family News or maybe some FerrraraWoods fantasy or what?
You describe Brother Bugnolo as moderate traditionalist and not radical. Moderate traditionalist SSPXer? (in which case, contradiction in terms alert) Leaving the editorial strainer aside, how about just facts: You report, we decide?
Do you ever wonder why the liberal bishops give permission easily in most instances for some Tridentine Masses and that the conservative bishops are often (not in Rockford) more likely to be wary?
From January 2002 when Mahoney ordained three priests through this last ordination in May of 2003,Los Angeles ordained no more than a total of 8 priests.
As I mentioned and Black Elk confirmed and raised the numbers,his diocese of Rockford ordained 11,just this spring and have 43 more in the seminaries.
I also noticed that Los Angeles lost about 100 priests over the last year. Some of this could be due to poor records keeping,a few might have been removed because of the scandal and many may have retired but I have reason to believe that several left the diocese to continue their priesthood in more orthodox dioceses.
A huge AMEN to that!
The Pius XII quote is, according to Cardinal Bea, SJ, through Fr. Malachi Martin: Quite often in crises, Pius XII would turn to his inner circle and say: Bring me the head of John the Baptist (referencing Janssens).
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.