PJB: An Index of Catholicism's Decline

WorldNet Daily ^ | 12/10/02 | Patrick J. Buchanan

[ninenot]

As the Watergate scandal of 1973-1974 diverted attention from the far greater tragedy unfolding in Southeast Asia, so, too, the scandal of predator-priests now afflicting the Catholic Church may be covering up a far greater calamity.

Thirty-seven years after the end of the only church council of the 20th century, the jury has come in with its verdict: Vatican II appears to have been an unrelieved disaster for Roman Catholicism.

Liars may figure, but figures do not lie. Kenneth C. Jones of St. Louis has pulled together a slim volume of statistics he has titled Index of Leading Catholic Indicators: The Church Since Vatican II.

His findings make prophets of Catholic traditionalists who warned that Vatican II would prove a blunder of historic dimensions, and those same findings expose as foolish and naive those who believed a council could reconcile Catholicism and modernity. When Pope John XXIII threw open the windows of the church, all the poisonous vapors of modernity entered, along with the Devil himself.

Here are Jones' grim statistics of Catholicism's decline:

• Priests. While the number of priests in the United States more than doubled to 58,000, between 1930 and 1965, since then that number has fallen to 45,000. By 2020, there will be only 31,000 priests left, and more than half of these priests will be over 70.

• Ordinations. In 1965, 1,575 new priests were ordained in the United States. In 2002, the number was 450. In 1965, only 1 percent of U.S. parishes were without a priest. Today, there are 3,000 priestless parishes, 15 percent of all U.S. parishes.

• Seminarians. Between 1965 and 2002, the number of seminarians dropped from 49,000 to 4,700, a decline of over 90 percent. Two-thirds of the 600 seminaries that were operating in 1965 have now closed.

• Sisters. In 1965, there were 180,000 Catholic nuns. By 2002, that had fallen to 75,000 and the average age of a Catholic nun is today 68. In 1965, there were 104,000 teaching nuns. Today, there are 8,200, a decline of 94 percent since the end of Vatican II.

• Religious Orders. For religious orders in America, the end is in sight. In 1965, 3,559 young men were studying to become Jesuit priests. In 2000, the figure was 389. With the Christian Brothers, the situation is even more dire. Their number has shrunk by two-thirds, with the number of seminarians falling 99 percent. In 1965, there were 912 seminarians in the Christian Brothers. In 2000, there were only seven. The number of young men studying to become Franciscan and Redemptorist priests fell from 3,379 in 1965 to 84 in 2000.

• Catholic schools. Almost half of all Catholic high schools in the United States have closed since 1965. The student population has fallen from 700,000 to 386,000. Parochial schools suffered an even greater decline. Some 4,000 have disappeared, and the number of pupils attending has fallen below 2 million – from 4.5 million.

Though the number of U.S. Catholics has risen by 20 million since 1965, Jones' statistics show that the power of Catholic belief and devotion to the Faith are not nearly what they were.

• Catholic Marriage. Catholic marriages have fallen in number by one-third since 1965, while the annual number of annulments has soared from 338 in 1968 to 50,000 in 2002.

• Attendance at Mass. A 1958 Gallup Poll reported that three in four Catholics attended church on Sundays. A recent study by the University of Notre Dame found that only one in four now attend.

• Only 10 percent of lay religious teachers now accept church teaching on contraception. Fifty-three percent believe a Catholic can have an abortion and remain a good Catholic. Sixty-five percent believe that Catholics may divorce and remarry. Seventy-seven percent believe one can be a good Catholic without going to mass on Sundays. By one New York Times poll, 70 percent of all Catholics in the age group 18 to 44 believe the Eucharist is merely a "symbolic reminder" of Jesus.

At the opening of Vatican II, reformers were all the rage. They were going to lead us out of our Catholic ghettos by altering the liturgy, rewriting the Bible and missals, abandoning the old traditions, making us more ecumenical, and engaging the world. And their legacy?

Four decades of devastation wrought upon the church, and the final disgrace of a hierarchy that lacked the moral courage of the Boy Scouts to keep the perverts out of the seminaries, and throw them out of the rectories and schools of Holy Mother Church.

Through the papacy of Pius XII, the church resisted the clamor to accommodate itself to the world and remained a moral beacon to mankind. Since Vatican II, the church has sought to meet the world halfway.

Jones' statistics tell us the price of appeasement.

[yendu bwam]

The Southern Baptist and Assembly of God churches, which are the most conservative, are the ones that are growing the fastest.

And so will the European and American Catholic Churches grow, when they claw their way back to authentic Catholicism. The seeds for this renewal, I believe, are being sowed now.

[Alberta's Child]

The problem I have with Buchanan's premise is that he assumes Vatican II was "responsible" for the problems we see in the church today. As someone else has pointed out, it is likely that moral teachings would have been under pressure from the laity and generally ignored regardless of whether Vatican II had been a reality or not.

I have a friend who is a traditionalist priest in the Fraternity of St. Peter, and he has told me that the decades leading up to Vatican II were actually the low point in recent church history. The problem, he says, is that Catholic moral teachings were so "strong" at the time that the church ceased to be the counter-cultural force it had always been and became very much "part of the culture" (imagine Archbishop Fulton Sheen not only on network television, but generating the highest ratings in the New York City market!).

The result of this "cultural strength" was that people in predominantly Catholic areas no longer had to make an exceptional effort to distinguish themselves in a secular world -- why would anyone need to, when Catholics in most cities identified themselves by their parish instead of their neighborhood?). This "Catholic strength" was soon translated into the secular realm in the form of labor unions, corrupting political power, etc., and it was only a matter of time (specifically the post-WWII era when Catholics "came of age" and became typical American suburbanites) before "lukewarm" became the defining characteristic of Catholicism in the U.S.

Sure, things are messy right now. But increasing numbers of Catholics are seizing upon marvelous opportunities to turn away from the silly, bland Modernism that dominates the parish scene these days and are getting serious about their faith. The numbers that Pat Buchanan quotes are meaningless -- Christ Himself said that the gate to eternal life is narrow, so the notion that there are 52 million "Catholics" in this country is irrelevant.

[stuartcr]

If a person is a good person, how would not going to church have any effect on their soul?

[Hermann the Cherusker]

Some other statistics:

1965 Total Seminaries (Diocesean) - 117
1965 Diocesean Seminarians - 17494
1994 Seminaries - 74
1994 Seminarians - 4154

1994 Ratio of Baptisms:First Communion:Confirmation
1,180,707 - 789,538 - 530,924 (half of all Baptized do not grow up Catholic!)

Total Number of Apostates 1965-1992 (Total Catholics-Deaths+Baptism+Converts) - 5,540,618

Oh ... the Church has had ONE area of growth:

1965 American Bishops - 247
1994 American Bishops - 406

[Zviadist]

Well done!

[Stingray51]

I think your points are excellent. Vatican II was, I think, more a manifestation of modernism, which had been on the march for a very long time, than its cause. Still, it was no small thing for the Church to have had a council issuing documents that were, putting the most positive spin on it, less than clear and subject to abuse. As for the American scene, yes, I think there are still many who can't distinguish between their immigrant / ethnic culture and the truly Catholic culture that we should be attempting to forge.

[stuartcr]

The business parallels are interesting; less people to do the actual work, and more managers.

[Alberta's Child]

Finally, our sons know fully well (from us and from Boy Scout videos) that any man (including a priest) who approaches them in the wrong way should be repulsed and reported immediately to us.

Hmmm. My dad makes you seem mild -- he never wanted to have anyone like this reported to him. My family knew fully well that any man who approached them in the wrong way should be hunted down and beaten beyond recognition. In fact, the only stipulation was that we were not to get caught -- my dad didn't relish the thought of bailing any of us out of jail.

Maybe that's why potential molesters steered clear of us. Even the most depraved freak in the Catholic clergy would rather cast himself into the sea with a millstone tied about his neck than deal with the Alberta's Child clan.

[ex-snook]

"The more I read the Bible, the more I disagree with what is going on. "

You must be glad you were not born before the Bible was written. Jesus did not write a 'Bible'. Jesus selected Apostles and used the Holy Spirit to teach through them. Then and now.

What the Catholic Church teaches is in the Holy Spirit's perfection. Not all Catholics including Priests and Bishops accept it. Vatican II provided an opportunity for dissent of different opinions (just as the Bible does). Catholic teaching agrees with you that things are not right and these statistics tell the same story.

[Alberta's Child]

See #82. I am more optimistic about the future of the church today than I have been in years.

[DCPatriot]

Tragic statistics that, even if "cooked" to a certain degree, display a death knell for the Catholic Church in the United States.

This country will not survive another 100 years without "The Opiate of the Masses", IMO.

[Jim Noble]

All of the Boston hyper-multiple offenders were ordained before Vatican II. Therefore, they were formed in the Church of the 1930s and 1940s, which many hold out as a golden age.

These sick freaks clearly have used the "spirit of Vatican II" to recruit a generation of gay religious, and to try (and they are still trying) to normalize homosexuality.

But it is an oversimplification to say that Shanley,Goeghan, and Birmingham were "caused" by Vatican II, when they clearly were not.

I suspect that there is still more to learn about the corruption of the Archdiocese of Boston, and I strongly suspect that that antedates Vatican II, as well.

[Chancellor Palpatine]

Ironically, it isn't a gay thing so much as it is a power and secrecy thing which has brewed for centuries, if not over a thousand years.

Think about what conditions had to be like during the Reformation - probably many, many times worse than history ascribes for a church peopled by largely unsophisticated peasants who didn't have access to information to be so riven. The theology and the rules were largely created in the image of the disinherited sons of the nobility - boys sent to the Church while they were sexually immature. In time, the clerical ranks became the repository for those young men who didn't exactly mesh with women as well.

Here is the really interesting part - in the 40s and 50s, gays were known of and identifiable. Parents wouldn't have trusted their children to the outwardly effeminate, but they would have trusted the guy who seemed all man. Meanwhile, the masculine priest could operate quite handily with a lot of trust if he had an interest in teenagers.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

This is Feeneyite territory.

It is impossible for a Catholic to declare that a virtuous person, not knowing of Christ, CANNOT be saved.

This would contradict Justice--not a likely event.

Hmmm ... I thought the Council of Trent was pretty clear about this:

Chapter 7. What the Justification of the Impious Is, and What Are the Causes Thereof.

Of this justification the causes are these: the final cause indeed is the glory of God and of Jesus Christ, and life everlasting; ... the instrumental cause is the Sacrament of Baptism, which is the sacrament of faith, without which (faith) no man was ever justified (cf. Hebrews 11) ... (Council of Trent, Decree on Justification, Session 6, January 13, 1547)

Ergo, there are no divinely virtuous people who do not know Christ.

Have you ever read the Holy Gospel according to St. John? From the Rheims New Testament and its original footnotes (1582):

3:18. He that believeth in him, is not judged. But he that doth not believe, is already judged because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten son of God.

18. Is judged already.] He that believeth in Christ with faith which worketh by charity (as the Apostle speaketh) shall not be condemned at the later day nor at the hour of his death. But the Infidel, be he Jew, Pagan, or Heretic, is already (if he die in his incredulity) by his own profession and sentence condemned, and shall not come to judgment either particular or general, to be discussed according to his works of mercy done or omitted. In which sense St. Paul saith that the obstinate Heretic is condemned by his own judgment, preventing in himself, of his own free will, the sentence both of Christ and of the Church.

3:36. He that believeth in the Son, hath life everlasting: but he that is incredulous to the Son, shall not see life, but the wrath of God remaineth upon him.

6:40. And this is the will of my father that sent me: that every one that seeth the Son, and believeth in him, have life everlasting, and I will raise him in the last day.

17:3. And this is life everlasting that they know Thee, the only true God, and JESUS CHRIST Whom Thou hast sent.

3. Life everlasting.] Both the life of glory in heaven, and of grace here in the Church, consisteth in the knowledge of God: that, in perfect vision: this, in faith working by charity; for, knowledge of God without keeping his commandments, is not true knowledge, that is to say, it is an unprofitable knowledge. 1 Io. 2.

And St. Paul's Letter the Hebrews:

11:6. But without faith it is impossible to please God. For he that cometh to God, must believe that he is, and is a rewarder to them that seek him.

6. He that cometh.] Faith is the foundation and ground of all other virtues and worship of God, without which no man can please God. Therefore if one be a Jew, a heathen, or an heretic, that is to say, he be without the Catholic faith, all his works shall profit him no whit to salvation.

The new Catechism of the Catholic Church is perfectly clear on this point:

The Necessity of Faith - 161. Believeing in Jesus Christ and in the One Who sent Him for our salvation is necessary for obtaining that salvation (cf. Mark 16:16; John 3:36; 6:40; et al). "Since `without faith it is impossible to please [God]' and to attain to the fellowship of His sons, therefore without faith no one has ever attained justification, nor will anyone obtain eternal life `but he who endures to the end,'" (Vatican I, Dei Fillius 3; cf. Matthew 10:22; 24:13 and Hebrews 11:6; Council of Trent Decree on Justification, 8)

Please note it even refers you right back to the quotations from the Bible above.

If you would be taught by the Doctors of the Church, like St. Alphonsus de Liguori, you would not have said what you did.

"We should know that to believe some articles is necessary, as a means to obtain salvation (necessitate medii); and that to believe others is a necessary as a matter of precept. To say that it is necessary as a means of salvation to believe certain articles, implies that, unless we believe these articles, it is utterly impossible for us to be saved. To say that the belief of other articles is necessary as a matter of precept, implies that we are bound to believe in these articles; but, should we be in inculpable ignorance of them, we are excused from sin, and may be saved. To know and believe the two articles already laid down, viz.: that there is a God, and that he is a remunerator of vice and virtue, according to the words of the apostle, `For he that cometh to God, must believe that he is a rewarder to them that seek him' (Heb. 11:6), is certainly necessary as a means of salvation. Some authors hold that the belief of the other articles – the Trinity of Persons, and the Incarnation of the Word – is strictly commanded, but not necessary as a means, without which salvation is impossible; so that a person inculpably ignorant of them may be saved. But according to the most common and best opinion, the explicit belief of these articles is necessary as a means without which no adult can be saved. It is certain, as Innocent XI declared in the condemnation of the sixty-fourth proposition, that he who is ignorant of the two mysteries of the Most Holy Trinity, and of the incarnation of Jesus Christ, cannot be absolved." (St. Alphonsus de Liguori, Instruction on the Commandments and Sacraments, 1.1.8)

I would also encourage you to read the Summa of St. Thomas (another Doctor of the Church) on this point:

Pt. II-II, Question 2, Article 5 - Whether man is bound to believe anything explicitly?

Pt. II-II, Question 2, Article 6 - Whether all are equally bound to have explicit faith?

Pt. II-II, Question 2, Article 7 - Whether It Is Necessary for the Salvation of All, That They Should Believe Explicitly in the Mystery of the Incarnation of Christ?

Pt. II-II, Question 2, Article 8 - Whether It Is Necessary for Salvation To Believe Explicitly in the Trinity?

Pt. II-II, Question 5, Article 3 - Whether a Man Who disbelieves One Article of Faith Can have a Lifeless Faith in the Other Articles?

Pt. II-II, Question 10, Article 1 - Whether Unbelief Is a Sin?

Pt. II-II, Question 10, Article 3 - Whether Unbelief Is the Greatest of Sins?

Pt. II-II, Question 10, Article 6 - Whether the Unbelief of Pagans or Heathens Is Graver Than Other Kinds?

The faith of the Church has always been very clearly defined on this point by the Dogmatic Creed "Quicumque vult" also called the Athanasian Creed:

Whosoever will be saved, before all things, it is necessary that he hold the Catholic Faith. Which Faith except everyone keep whole and undefiled, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly.

And the Catholic Faith is this: That we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity, neither confounding the Persons, nor dividing the Substance. For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one, the Glory equal, the Majesty co-eternal. Such as the Father is, such is the Son, and such is the Holy Spirit. The Father uncreated, the Son uncreated, the Holy Ghost uncreated. The Father incomprehensible, the Son incomprehensible, and the Holy Ghost incomprehensible. The Father eternal, the Son eternal, and the Holy Ghost eternal. And yet, they are not three eternals, but one eternal. As also they are not three incomprehensibles, nor three uncreated, but one uncreated, and one incomprehensible. So likewise the Father is Almighty, the Son Almighty, and the Holy Ghost Almighty. And yet they are not three Almighties, but one Almighty. So the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God. And yet, they are not three Gods, but one God. So likewise the Father is Lord, the Son Lord, and the Holy Ghost Lord. And yet they are not three Lords, but one Lord. For like as we are compelled by Christian verity to acknowledge every Person by himself to be both God and Lord. So we are forbidden by the Catholic Religion, to say, There be three Gods, or three Lords. The Father is made of none, neither created or begotten. The Son is of the Father alone, not made, not created, but begotten. The Holy Ghost is of the Father and of the Son, neither made, or created, or begotten, but proceeding. So there is one Father, not three Fathers; one Son, not three Sons; one Holy Ghost, not three Holy Ghosts. And in this Trinity none is afore, or after another; none is greater or less than another; but the whole three persons are co-eternal together and co-equal. So that in all things, as is aforesaid, the Unity in Trinity and the Trinity in Unity is to be worshipped. He therefore that will be saved must thus think of the Trinity.

Furthermore, it is necessary to everlasting salvation that he also believe rightly the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. For the right Faith is, that we believe and confess, that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is God and Man; God, of the Substance of the Father, begotten before the worlds; and Man, of the Substance of his Mother, born in the world; perfect God and perfect Man, of a reasonable soul and human flesh subsisting; equal to the Father, as touching his Godhead; and inferior to the Father, as touching his Manhood. Who although God and Man, yet He is not two, but one Christ; One, not by conversion of the Godhead into flesh, but by the taking of the Manhood into God; One altogether; not by confusion of Substance, but by unity of Person. For as the reasonable soul and flesh is one man, so God and Man is one Christ; Who suffered for our salvation, descended into hell, rose again on the third day from the dead. He ascended into heaven, He sitteth on the right hand of the Father, God Almighty, from whence He shall come to judge the living and the dead. At whose coming all men shall rise again with their bodies and shall give account for their own works. And they that have done good shall go into life everlasting; and they that have done evil into everlasting fire.

This is the Catholic Faith, which except a man believe faithfully, he cannot be saved.

There are no exceptions for being a good or virtuous ignoramous, because our salvation is grounded upon faith in Christ, not goodness. Ignorance of Divine Truths, as St. Thomas makes clear, is a state of punishment, not a state of grace: "If, however, we take it by way of pure negation, as we find it in those who have not heard anything about the faith, it bears the character, not of sin, but of punishment, because suchlike ignorance of divine things is a result of the sin of our first parents. If such unbelievers are damned, it is on account of other sins, which cannot be taken away without faith, but not on account of their sin of unbelief." (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Part II-II, Q. 10, Art. 1)

"It is common complaint, unfortunately too well founded, that there are large numbers of Christians in our own time who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation. And when we mention Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life -- for these find some excuse for their ignorance in the fact that the demands of their harsh employers hardly leave them time to take care of themselves or of their dear ones -- but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the hardness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there. They rarely give thought to God, the Supreme Author and Ruler of all things, or to the teachings of the faith of Christ. They know nothing of the Incarnation of the Word of God, nothing of the perfect restoration of the human race which He accomplished. Grace, the greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things, the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments by which we obtain grace, are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it. And so they arrive at life's end in such a condition that, lest all hope of salvation be lost, the priest is obliged to give in the last few moments of life a summary teaching of religion, a time which should be devoted to stimulating the soul to greater love for God. And even this as too often happens only when the dying man is not so sinfully ignorant as to look upon the ministration of the priest as useless, and then calmly faces the fearful passage to eternity without making his peace with God. And so Our Predecessor, Benedict XIV, had just cause to write: `We declare that a great number of those who are condemned to eternal punishment suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of faith which must be known and believed in order to be numbered among the elect.' (Instit., 27:18)" (Pope St. Pius X, Encyclical Acerbo Nimis, 1-2, April 15, 1905)

[cherry]

"I am more optimistic about the future of the church today than I have been in years. "

yes, I am too...

we needed a good cleansing and it is being done, much to our humiliation and horror....

how I long for the Church of my youth.......

[livius]

Some of these deviates were indeed ordained prior to VII, but virtually none of their activity seems to have occurred until several years after it, in the 1970s.

I think what happened was that an enormous "sexualization" of society occurred at the same time that the Church had been fatally weakened in its liturgy, prayer and practice by VatII. The Church was not only unable to resist it, but in fact even went running after it to hop onto the bandwagon. At the same time, many of the older clergy, including bishops, had no idea of how to respond to this situation, which was something they would never have dreamed of in their wildest imaginings.

A Franciscan priest friend who had been ordained just after WWII and had lived a very happy life in an urban friary told us that suddenly, one day in the 1970s, a team of psychologists came from provincial headquarters to give the friars a "retreat," in which they were told that homosexuality was normal, priests were supposed to "express themselves," and that for those who didn't have any special friends with whom to "express themselves," masturbation was a good solution. He lived in great misery at that friary for a few more years, while the younger brothers padded up and down the hallways at night, visiting their "special friends," and then finally retired to a friary with other shocked and horrified elderly brothers.

Evil has always been around, and there have always been corrupt people in the Church, at all levels. But VII somehow gave these people permission to act, and in fact, almost encouraged them to act.

Perhaps the real problem with pre-Vatican II Catholicism is that we were too confident that all of the problems had been overcome, and all that remained was a bit of work to improve music in the churches, make old Fr. McGillicuddy stop trying to get through the entire Mass in 12 minutes, and encourage Catholics to cease feeling that they were somehow still in the status of immigrants in America. Vatican II knocked the pins out from under us, and we didn't know it until it was too late.

[stuartcr]

There will always be opiates, as long as there are masses.

[stuartcr]

Aren't all faiths defined by human men, interpreting something written by human men?

[Stingray51]

Your comments were brilliant. I do think, however, that the new catechism introduces great ambiguity and sows great confusion with the following provision: “Every man who is ignorant of the Gospel of Christ and of his Church, but seeks the truth and does the will of God in accordance with his understanding of it, can be saved. It may be supposed that such persons would have desired Baptism explicitly if they had known its necessity.” Here it is in context:

1257 The Lord himself affirms that Baptism is necessary for salvation.[59] He also commands his disciples to proclaim the Gospel to all nations and to baptize them.[60] Baptism is necessary for salvation for those to whom the Gospel has been proclaimed and who have had the possibility of asking for this sacrament.[61] The Church does not know of any means other than Baptism that assures entry into eternal beatitude; this is why she takes care not to neglect the mission she has received from the Lord to see that all who can be baptized are "reborn of water and the Spirit." God has bound salvation to the sacrament of Baptism, but he himself is not bound by his sacraments.

1258 The Church has always held the firm conviction that those who suffer death for the sake of the faith without having received Baptism are baptized by their death for and with Christ. This Baptism of blood, like the desire for Baptism, brings about the fruits of Baptism without being a sacrament.

1259 For catechumens who die before their Baptism, their explicit desire to receive it, together with repentance for their sins, and charity, assures them the salvation that they were not able to receive through the sacrament.

1260 "Since Christ died for all, and since all men are in fact called to one and the same destiny, which is divine, we must hold that the Holy Spirit offers to all the possibility of being made partakers, in a way known to God, of the Paschal mystery."[62] Every man who is ignorant of the Gospel of Christ and of his Church, but seeks the truth and does the will of God in accordance with his understanding of it, can be saved. It may be supposed that such persons would have desired Baptism explicitly if they had known its necessity.

1261 As regards children who have died without Baptism, the Church can only entrust them to the mercy of God, as she does in her funeral rites for them. Indeed, the great mercy of God who desires that all men should be saved, and Jesus' tenderness toward children which caused him to say: "Let the children come to me, do not hinder them,"[63] allow us to hope that there is a way of salvation for children who have died without Baptism. All the more urgent is the Church's call not to prevent little children coming to Christ through the gift of holy Baptism.

[stuartcr]

Just a thought, but perhaps the brothers padding around at nite, were not really evil?