Posted on 09/08/2005 1:37:09 PM PDT by NYer
In the mid 1990s, I attended a clergy meeting in the diocese where I was employed as the newspaper editor. The meeting was to discuss ideas to increase vocations to the priesthood, because the diocese was facing a crisis. Predictably, the discussion was going nowhere until the retired archbishop raised his hand, stood up and said, “Why don’t we study those dioceses which are attracting vocations, like Lincoln, Nebraska, and Arlington, Virginia, and see what they are doing and what we can learn from that” I smiled to myself, eager to see the response to his suggestion, because I knew that the reason those dioceses were attracting so many vocations would be utterly unacceptable to this group of priests. Predictably, the priests just looked at each other and said nothing. No one responded to the archbishop’s suggestion.
The answer was obvious. I may have even taken the retired archbishop aside and told him, but I suspect he already knew. The plain simple answer was that the bishops of those dioceses, Bishops Fabian Bruskewitz of Lincoln and the late John Keating of Arlington, were both explicitly, vocally and publicly committed to orthodoxy in Catholic teaching and practice. Meanwhile, the dominant priests of this diocese were known for being firmly committed to dissent.
Leaving aside the question of whether the Lord is going to bless dissent with abundant vocations is the other more practical question of what young man, firmly committed to and in love with the Lord and His Church, is going to seek ordination in a diocese where the clergy has a reputation for chewing up orthodox people, both clerical and lay, and spitting them out? Martyrdom is sometimes inevitable, but what sane person seeks it?
There is no reason a young man wanting to serve the Lord should be expected to put up with the nonsense of running the gauntlet of dissent and homosexuality in the seminary only then to face constant vexation and opposition from his fellow clergy once ordained.
The young man attracted to priesthood today is not the “young Turk”of the 1960s who enshrines rebellion and views the Church as part of the “establishment.”
No, today’s youthful instinct to be countercultural takes the form of orthodoxy, and sees the mission of the Church as an uphill battle in a hostile world. Youth is attracted to challenge and orthodox Catholicism offers it. It was their siblings who were murdered in the womb by the Culture of Death. They are the survivors and motivated to oppose what once threatened their lives in the name of “liberation.”
Their youthful rebellion is engaged in the battle against the world, the flesh, and the devil. They never knew a time when abortion was not legal and they never knew another Pope besides John Paul II. The mainstream media was baffled to see the seminarians from the North American College in Rome cheering wildly at the election of Benedict XVI, who is just as much their hero and champion as John Paul II.
And this does not only apply to men. In the 1980s, I knew a young woman at Boston College who expressed an interest in the convent to one of the feminist nun chaplains, who chimed, “Oh, I know a great place! You don’t have to wear a habit or anything-but ... oh,”she caught herself, “maybe you want to wear a habit..”“Yes, Sister, I do,”the young woman replied.
Twenty years later, perhaps it is beginning to dawn on some mid-level Church authorities that dissenters are not producing any progeny or followers - spiritual children. I call this ecclesiastical contraception. How can you inspire lifelong commitment and sacrifice in others to a Church you are constantly at war with?
Still, dissenters disparage the younger generation as “too conservative”What these young people seek to conserve is human life, sanity and Western Civilization, all of which are under attack from modern liberalism.
Jesus Christ is still producing followers who deserve to take their place in the Church and not be treated as crackpots and undesirables.
There is a solidarity among the orthodox youth, which John Paul II wisely and shrewdly nurtured as the future of the Church in his World Youth Days and his plain, simple love for them, which was direct and unmediated.
I have glimpsed this phenomenon first hand.
When I worked and studied theology at Boston College in the 1980s, there was a widely celebrated theology department, boastful of its dissent. The professors counted their undergraduate theology majors in the single digits. When I sought my master’s degree in theology at Franciscan University of Steubenville, a university explicit in its orthodoxy, and ridiculed for it by larger schools, it had a smaller theology faculty but the largest number of undergraduates in the country, at the time, as I recall, 140.
At the Jesuit-run Boston College, I do not recall many students pursuing a religious vocation. I recall two who did who received hostility from the Jesuits - for their orthodoxy. At Steubenville, there were so many vocations they started a pre-theologate program, and a group for young women considering the convent.
This worldwide community of youth nurtured by John Paul II is acutely well aware of what is going on in the Church and in dioceses around the world. When a bishop makes a strong statement in defense of orthodoxy, those young people inclined to religious vocations talk among themselves as to whether his diocese might be a good one in which to seek ordination. If that same bishop does something perceived as compromising the faith, their interest is withdrawn. A bishop who tolerates dissent is not even considered. A bishop willing to excommunicate pro-abortion Catholic politicians is likely to receive much interest from these young people. A bishop who waffles will not. A diocese which punishes good, orthodox priests or lay professionals while coddling or protecting dissenters will not. A diocese which punishes whistle-blowers while protecting abusers and active homosexuals in the clergy will not. A diocese where the bishop is ostensibly orthodox in his words but where the chancery, departments and clergy are dominated or ruled by dissenters will not.
The extent of this orthodox youth underground is truly worldwide. I have encountered it in all my travels throughout North America and Europe. I have bumped into students I knew in Steubenville in St. Peter’s Square and in St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna. A constant topic of discussion among those considering ordination or religious life is which dioceses and bishops are “good”(i.e. orthodox). It is also important that the seminary a bishop uses is committed to solid Catholic formation and free of harassment, either sexual or religious, and that the bishop monitor it closely.
There is no secret to attracting vocations. There are plenty of them out there. A bishop who tolerates dissent and ignores abuses will not attract them. A bishop who boldly stands up for Christ and His Church, and Church teachings, despite all costs and opposition, will attract them.
These young people are the future of the Church. Whether or not they are welcomed into their rightful place to which the Lord is calling them lies in the hands of each individual bishop.
I especially appreciated that he required all of his catechists to sign statements attesting to their commitment to Catholic teachings. What a hullabaloo he caused. They howled at his being so unreasonable as to require that Catholic teachers believed and followed Catholic teaching. Imagine the chutzpah of that shepherd!!
In "Salt of the Earth," the then Cardinal Ratzinger talked about the mistaken perception that the priesthhod is a position of "power." The cliche that it is a ministry rather than power is no less true for being a cliche. Men like Loyola do not lust for power, are not proud prelates. IMHO, the liberal reformers are the ones who confuse spiritual and earthly powers. They would reduce the Church to a kind of polity, which is a thing of earth. They have not hestiated to impose their wills on the people they are suppose to serve, far more so than the most autocratic old priest of pre-Vatican II.
ping
Two choices. You can reread what I wrote (which wasn't about all seminaries, chanceries and dioceses) or we can just leave it that you don't get what I'm saying.
No. I'm afraid I don't see that as evangelization.
My oldest daughter had a very mild, chaste crush last year, on a cute young man who played the guitar for the youth choir. This fall he entered the seminary. However, he has a younger brother who is also cute, and taller!
"When you look at the likes of Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict, they have something very important to say us in part because they went through such diffuculties--WWII, Nazism, Communism, the disarray of marxist student rebellions."
So did thousands of others face difficulties and I cannot think of anything particularly illuminating said of their experiences by the two you mention. No doubt like most they kept their heads down and waited for posterior to fabricate something heroic.
Sadly, Wilton Gregory has taken his place and I fear it will all go downhill, though I hope I'm wrong.
Aw, jeez, Greeley ... is he still alive?
Yeah, I know. As far as I know, we're still stuck with "father" Greeley. He's the man I told Catholic friends some years ago (when I was still Anglican) was one of biggest episcopagans I'd ever seen!
LOL!
Do I'm afraid I don't. I just know of the huge number. I am planning on attending a dinner for the seminarians at the end of October with our church group. Maybe I can find out and report back to you!
Good to see you!
You are so right. It is a beautiful location. Some of my friends travel up there for vespers.
And the library is beautiful and extensive.
Yes, and as Pope Benedict XVI explained so eloquently in his inauguration Mass homily, the burden is light.
"The first symbol is the Pallium, woven in pure wool, which will be placed on my shoulders. This ancient sign, which the Bishops of Rome have worn since the fourth century, may be considered an image of the yoke of Christ, which the Bishop of this City, the Servant of the Servants of God, takes upon his shoulders. God’s yoke is God’s will, which we accept. And this will does not weigh down on us, oppressing us and taking away our freedom. To know what God wants, to know where the path of life is found – this was Israel’s joy, this was her great privilege. It is also our joy: God’s will does not alienate us, it purifies us – even if this can be painful – and so it leads us to ourselves. In this way, we serve not only him, but the salvation of the whole world, of all history. The symbolism of the Pallium is even more concrete: the lamb’s wool is meant to represent the lost, sick or weak sheep which the shepherd places on his shoulders and carries to the waters of life. For the Fathers of the Church, the parable of the lost sheep, which the shepherd seeks in the desert, was an image of the mystery of Christ and the Church. The human race – every one of us – is the sheep lost in the desert which no longer knows the way. The Son of God will not let this happen; he cannot abandon humanity in so wretched a condition. He leaps to his feet and abandons the glory of heaven, in order to go in search of the sheep and pursue it, all the way to the Cross. He takes it upon his shoulders and carries our humanity; he carries us all – he is the good shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep. What the Pallium indicates first and foremost is that we are all carried by Christ. But at the same time it invites us to carry one another. Hence the Pallium becomes a symbol of the shepherd’s mission, of which the Second Reading and the Gospel speak. The pastor must be inspired by Christ’s holy zeal: for him it is not a matter of indifference that so many people are living in the desert. And there are so many kinds of desert. There is the desert of poverty, the desert of hunger and thirst, the desert of abandonment, of loneliness, of destroyed love. There is the desert of God’s darkness, the emptiness of souls no longer aware of their dignity or the goal of human life. The external deserts in the world are growing, because the internal deserts have become so vast. Therefore the earth’s treasures no longer serve to build God’s garden for all to live in, but they have been made to serve the powers of exploitation and destruction. The Church as a whole and all her Pastors, like Christ, must set out to lead people out of the desert, towards the place of life, towards friendship with the Son of God, towards the One who gives us life, and life in abundance."
Maybe you can help remove the log from my eye.
Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own? How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me remove that splinter in your eye,’ when you do not even notice the wooden beam in your own eye? You hypocrite! Remove the wooden beam from your eye first; then you will see clearly to remove the splinter in your brother’s eye.”
I call this ecclesiastical homosexuality.
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