Posted on 08/06/2002 5:10:58 PM PDT by nickcarraway
One picture told it all: At Toronto's airport, the world's eye caught little ten-year-old Georgia Rae Giddings as she emotionally burst into tears after Pope John Paul II embraced her. For the next hour, she recalled the moment repeatedly before crowds of journalists. "When I stood in front of the Pope, I just got dizzier and dizzier," she said.
"Out of Step" with the Contemporary World
She's not the only one. Many of the million or so attending the World Youth Day celebrations reported the same phenomenon.
Most people would be astonished to hear that the Holy Father might be the most beloved person in the world among young people. After all, we're always told the Catholic Church's message is irrelevant, outmoded and - worst of all - square. Cynics charge it has nothing meaningful to say to today's fun-loving, hedonistic youth.
According to the press, polls repeatedly show the Pope's relentless opposition to contraception, abortion, homosexuality, pornography, pre-marital sex, easy divorce and other fruits of the sexual revolution is anathema to the modern and fashionable. (It goes without saying that no one knows the mind of the modern and fashionable like the media.) The Holy Father, they conclude, is out of step with the contemporary world.
A Rebuke to the Modern Age
Okay, then how do you explain nearly a million kids at the Pope's World Youth Day? And where else would the gathering of that many youngsters be termed a "disappointing" turnout?
Perhaps it's because young people's love for the Holy Father is a direct rebuke to the modern age, and thus to its primary megaphone, the modern journalist. No institution has been a more powerful force for secularism, materialism or sexual freedom than the media.
Most reporters today are alienated from religion, looking at faith as little more than an ancient superstition. They don't understand it, so they don't cover it - unless a "religious" story involving scandal or human weakness pops up. That they comprehend.
In listening to World Youth Day participants speak, their deep affection for the Holy Father is clear. The same words keep popping up over and over to describe him - "radiance," "hero" "world's role model," "leader of youth," "our rock," "following in St. Peter's footsteps," and "the person closest to Jesus."
Thus, reasons for the Pope's youthful legions are quite simple: When young people see the weary, lined, rugged, leathern visage of the Holy Father, they see the face of love. Not love the way Hollywood loves them - as walking wallets, rear ends in movie theaters, pairs of ears to listen to the latest CDs - but real affection, from someone who sees them rightfully as precious individuals with eternal souls. And when the Vicar of Christ's deep, aged, honeyed voice is intoned, it seems they're hearing the very Words of God.
An Inexhaustible Treasure of Grace
This, then, is the Papal appeal to the young: faith, as the steadfast leader of the Church, the eternal Bride of Christ; hope, offering refuge for the restless heart; and love, from a elderly man walking in persona Christi. Of these, as St. Paul says, the greatest is love.
This is what Georgia Rae Giddings reacted to. After telling the Pope she loved him, he tenderly stroked her head and whispered gently that he loved her too, the perfect personification of Cardinal Newman's great motto of "Heart Speaketh to Heart." It's hard to imagine any other world leader reacting this way to the presence of an unexpected young stranger - so fearless, so compassionate, so Christlike.
No wonder kids love him.
Catholicism may be known as the Old Faith, it's the Young Faith too, with a remarkable, time-tested ability to outlive every fad that mocks it as passe. Each Catholic generation discovers anew the richness and power of their ancient religion, finding within it an inexhaustible treasure of grace and beauty, boundless as the sea. Once that discovery is made, as a million young pilgrims recently learned, no worldly interest can ever again quite satisfy.
Balderdash! The faith of our ancestors recognized the supremacy of the papacy. The faith of our ancestors did not include disparaging the pope on a daily basis as if it were a religious discipline. You practice a faith that is little more than fifteen years old. It is protestant. Just as other protestants do, you misinterpret, assail the liturgy, criticize the saints, and twist and contort historical facts to support your demented opinion. At least other protestants are sane enough not to describe themselves as Catholic.
I, too, am sorry for your archdiocese. Sixty to sixty-five percent of your "Catholics" appear to living in a state of mortal sin.
P.S. This is not my personal judgement, it's what I was taught as a young Catholic by my parents and the good nuns and priests at my parochial school.
I agree with you wholeheartedly. Catholics who fail to fulfill their Sunday obligation without grave reason are committing a grave moral evil. I've been involved with programs to try to get Catholics back to the faith for 15 years. It grieves me that we are missing the majority of our brothers and sisters each week.
But the fact is, statistics are thrown around here that suggest that even fewer Catholics are at Mass on Sunday. And that isn't true. Polls purporting that Mass attendance is in the teens cannot be cited against actual counts performed by the parishes at the instruction of the bishops of dioceses.
It's very sad that only about 35% - 40% of Catholics go to church on Sunday in my archdiocese, and likely, in most dioceses in the United States. But it still isn't 17%.
The truth is important.
sitetest
I've never met an SSPXer that didn't make that point. Is that part of the talking points you are sent out with? The truth is that the mass requires you to pray for the pope; it would be impossible for you to do otherwise. Nevertheless, your prayers probably ask for deliverance from the pope's apostacy. Sheeesh.
Good for you, I wish you well.
Under the brilliant leadership of one of our deacons, we're going to try a little bit different approach: Do what we can to keep 'em from leaving in the first place!
To that end, one of the things that we are going to do is to introduce a new Catholic-viewed Scripture study program in the next few weeks (I went to the leadership training - the materials are excellent, scholarly, well-written, clear, and quite Catholic.). For me, the goal is to provide enough Catholic catechesis about Scripture to give people more of the ability to understand their faith, especially when under assault from those who would try to take them from it with non-Catholic views of Scripture.
It is one of several programs that we hope to introduce over the next few years.
sitetest
Oh, I forgot. Please pray for us.
sitetest
We do disagree very much on theology, but I think we both agree that Jesus is Lord.
;-)
sitetest
Proselytizing by traditionalist orders is virtually non-existent when compared to the efforts evangelical Protestant denominations make to lure away mainline Catholics.
The SSPX could have used the sex scandals to recruit thousands of disgruntled mainline Catholics. But do we see them running a massive ad campaign? Talking on chat shows and writing articles? Organizing pressure groups? Handing out leaflets on street corners? Inviting mainline Catholics to drop by for an open house?
The SSPX seems averse to building a higher profile among mainline Catholics. Perhaps it's because they are too enamoured with their image of being 'the faithful remnant'. Maybe they're afraid of being swamped by ex-Novus Ordo Catholics and losing control of their order. Or maybe they don't want the problems of running a larger organization.
Theoretically the SSPX could attract 15 million American adherents. But the SSPX doesn't seem to want to put in the effort necessary to attract even a tenth of that number.
I certainly will.
"Indeed. Thanks for putting up with my interjections and comments."
If all interjectors and commentators were as courteous as you, we would send out engraved invitations.
sitetest
I don't know why the SSPX behave as you say they do. Your analyses could be quite on the mark.
However, it seems that more folks go to indult Masses than go to SSPX Masses. I suspect that if the SSPX were to act in a way to create more desire for the old Mass, the bishops would simply authorize more indult Masses, and most folks would go to those.
I'm not sure that they would ever attract anything near to 15 million folks. Ever. I'm not sure that they could ever create the demand for the indult Mass that anything approaching 15 million folks would want to attend. Ever.
I spend most of my free time with Catholics who go to Mass every Sunday. And not just in my parish. There just isn't any great desire to return to the old Mass for nearly all these folks.
I also have met many fallen-away Catholics, those that have become irreligious, and those that have converted to new religions. A few of the irreligious might be tempted back by the old rite. But frankly, most of 'em like being their own lords, and aren't interested in any form of rigorous Catholicism, whether revolving around parishes that have the new rite or the old.
As to the folks who have gone off to other religions, they are often in revolt precisely against the Catholic Church as it sounds in the old rite.
sitetest
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