<<Do you think that uneducated Mexican peasants are more likely to save their souls in Guadalajara--or the slums of Los Angeles?>>

Honestly, what’s the difference between Guadalajara and the slums of Los Angeles?

<<Which is a more wholesome atmosphere for their children?>>

Once again, what’s the difference between the two places?  Now, if you were to compare, say, Aguascaliente and Detroit, you’d have a point.

“Every single adult convert to Catholicism I have known has complained about the 4th-grade intellectual level of the programs for the “Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults"--whose initials (RCIA) should really stand for “Repelling Converts In-Advertently.”

This made me laugh out loud. Add me to the pile. Despite my coming from being an observant Anglo-Catholic and holding a BA degree in Philosophy and Religion and enduring nearly a year of seminary in the Episcopal Church and having published a bit in some Anglican Theological journals I had to go through RCIA taught by a nit-wit feminist hippie on the parish council. I couldn’t stand it anymore and dropped out. Mercifully, the priest at our Parish where we settled in France was just so darn glad to have another family showing up to weekly Mass he didn’t insist I start over. I suppose some local battleaxe is angry that her opportunity to subvert me into being a “dissenting” Catholic was thwarted and the Bishop probably takes a dim view of the sloppy process of my reception, but France is a nation of miracles. And I pray for the recovery and restoration of the Holy Ampoule.

Our Pastor was the one who personally instructed and converted The Bride.

and practice her ancient liturgy with reverence

Nine Americans even know about the Old Liturgy. Of course it is the fact that The Mass is the Mass is the Mass and has ever been so since the Last Supper and so all Liturgies are the same Mass but the idea the Catholic Church is ever going to restore the Old Liturgy as the normative Liturgy is a pipe dream.

And it is a tautology that all Liturgies ought be celebrated with reverence beauty and solemnity but that ain’t the world we are living in.

The Old Liturgy I grew-up with was nothing like the extraordinary Liturgy folks experience today. Back in the day it was a cold formulaic rite in which the priest sped through the prayers and one we did not participate in. We were mere observers fulfilling our Sunday ob;ligation.

All of the young men I grew-up with and went to Mass with went to Mass solely because we knew that if we didn’t we’d go to Hell.

The fact is that I, and millions like me in America, were not raised in an atmosphere of love. We were raised in an atmosphere of rules and fear.

While it is true old school Catholicism began with love (check out, say, the old Catechism of Trent, for instance) the AmChurch I grew-in was one ruled by fear and loathing. And the loathing was for the other - prots and jews. (And hatred of the Jews is rife in a not insignificant percentage of those who soley attend the Old Liturgy)>

It was the elimination, the cessation of its celebration, that made the Old Liturgy once more attractive but the idea it will save the world is silly.

When it was normative for the entire planet it sure as hell did not preserve the world from falling into a new dark age/totalitarianism.

What will restore our Churches to a sense of reverence and mystery and solemnity is the coming state peresecution of it.

Enjoy the Mass above ground while there is still time…

Now, everybody should understand what Vatican II was all about...John Courtney Murray did...so does John Richard Neuhaus & Avery Dulles...in fact, Catholics are the largest “protestant sect"(unitarians)in the world...as intended...that’s what the counter-reformation was all about...hell, when the Pope finally gave the Jeppies the boot...they all went to P[russia] & Russia...that’s where German Idealism came from....and it landed at Harvard & Oxford about three days later...Roman, not Cata Holica....not ultramontane...Transcedence has given way to inversion as Constantine insisted....One God, One Empire, One Emperor...The “volk”, Histoouy, as Divine...Civitas Dei my ass.. Nationalism does not tolerate democracy, or capitalism...and certainly not christianity....whether understood or not...all worship at the Church of America(modernity)....and those that kneel at her altar...all depart smelling of kerosene...The State is now indivisible, immutable, omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient...The Sermon on the Mount was about feeding “spirits”...not stomachs...We are created in the image of God’s mercy & humour(the only two traits that distinquish & recommend “spiriti sapientis’)...not his power & justice....God has no need of power or justice…

American religion (or religions) is just English religion of the 17th Century – same styles, same diversity, same passions, same antagonisms.  Even the non-churched are just backsliding Unitarians.  Denominations with Continental roots quickly fit into the English pattern. Case in point: Catholics.  Most are now Latitudinarians, who took over the C of E in 1688, the Mainline Protestants c. 1900, and the Catholic Church in 1968, the gringo RCIA a Broad Church movement.  Low Church Catholics, since the 1990s, are put by the Broads into a ghetto (Charismatics, “Casuals”, Guitar Pluckers, and Teen/Family Masses). The rest of Low Church Catholics at the moment leave for No Church or the Protestant Low Churches.  Summorum pontificum is now bringing back a High Church revival; call it the Oxford Movement of contemporary Catholics, meeting the same harsh resistance from Broad Church bishops and pastors.

American religion (or religions) is just English religion of the 17th Century – same styles, same diversity, same passions, same antagonisms.

Tell that to Bishop Benedict Fenwick, S.J. who, in 1827, wrote in his diary about visiting the injuns in Maine where the Passamaquoddies processed from their village to the Church singing hymns in their own tongue. After Mass he visited their camp and heard them sing Vespers.

Denominations with Continental roots quickly fit into the English pattern. Case in point: Catholics.

Balderdash. Catholics were ghettoised until yesterday.

Most are now Latitudinarians, who took over the C of E in 1688, the Mainline Protestants c. 1900, and the Catholic Church in 1968,

So, the Pope and the Bishops are Latitudinarians?

the gringo RCIA a Broad Church movement.

Is this Irish-Algonquin a “gringo?” Where did you come from and where do you life and what is it that causes you to call men like me gringo?

Low Church Catholics, since the 1990s, are put by the Broads into a ghetto (Charismatics, “Casuals”, Guitar Pluckers, and Teen/Family Masses). The rest of Low Church Catholics at the moment leave for No Church or the Protestant Low Churches.

The Church has always consisted of a divers group of folks.

You, sadly, either do not know that or think yourself superior to the poor nose-pickers deluded by a Hierarchy you clearly can’t stomach.

High Church indeed.

Sid,
“American religion (or religions) is just English religion of the 17th Century” It ainnot so!  Read Bishop Jeremy Taylor’s “Holy Living” and “Holy Dying.” Those books were among the most popular manuals of religion in 17th-century England, selling about 60,000 copies each, and there is nothing in modern American religion—Catholic or Protestant—that comes even close to what they describe. 

The same applies to Catholicism.  Read any of the late medieval or early modern confessors’ manuals.  Those manuals sold by the hundreds of thousands at the time, and the morals they described were applied to the general population by the confessors.  Nothing in modern Catholicism comes even close to what you can find in those book.

It is astonishing how much religions can change, while at the same time emphatically arguing that they are adhering to their original principles.  This phenomenon may be relevant to the decline John complains about, because, counterintuitively, those religions that make the most demands of their members have persistently been be the ones that expand.  (A possible explanation for religions’ astonishing flexibility can be seen in John’s reliance on what he calls “the virtue of prudence,” which can rationalize away just about any moral command.)

It’s worse than Mr. Zmirak thinks. The Church in Latin America is in even worse shape than in North America, so we are importing a class of “Catholics” who msotly enter the Church three times in their lives (baptism,matrimony, funeral). There are more practicing Protestants down south than observant Catholics.

John,
Thanks for this insightful article and also for the link over to your articles at VDare, with respect to one of which, some day we shall have to discuss Vichy in greater detail. The stuff I have read is evidently not the same as what you have read.
All the best.

There is a strong campaign against Catholicism in America, coming from the political elites (if one studies how the paedophile scandals were reported and executed one can not escape such a conclusion).  And perhaps many choose the easy way out for the sake of goals such as careers, financial security, or in some circles just to be accepted.  But even without that I think America is very much a protestant (actually fundamentally Calvinist) country, it is very difficult to be American and Catholic at the same time.

I think part of it is that the Catholic Church is one big European (not only European, but significant to European culture) institution that so far has consistently refused to give in to the US warmongering policies.

It is probably true that the RCIA is low level, and many other such programs are similar.  However, I wonder what would happen if the Church pushed more to introduce the original Latin Rite mass, or the heritage of the Gregorian chants/Baroque music in the US.  HOw many high school kids would appreciate it more than what is on MTV?

MR. ZMIRAK IS REPEATING THE FICTION OF HISPANIC FAMILY VALUES.  WHY?  THE LATEST DATA AVAILABLE INDICATES THAT THE HISPANIC ILLEGITIMACY RATE IS 48%.  IS MARRIAGE NO LONGER A CONSERVATIVE FAMILY VALUE?

However, I wonder what would happen if the Church pushed more to introduce the original Latin Rite mass, or the heritage of the Gregorian chants/Baroque music in the US.

A major problem - unacknowledged or, if acknowledged, too seldom admitted by far too many soi disant traditionalists - was the Church in America had the Latin Mass and Gregorian Chant (we had in back in the day in the small VT. town I grew-up in) but the Church was so suffused with clericalism that when the culture corrupted there was no knowledgeable vigorous Laity to war against the collapse.

Existing as Church was something the Bishops and the Priests and the Nuns did.

Even now when the Catholic Laity seems so ignorant the blame for that reality is placed on the Bishops and Priests even though it is the family which has the primary responsibility to pass on the Faith and to educate the children.

If you ever read a rad trad publication blaming themselves or the family, you’ve got a scoop. Like the Liberals they ape, rad trads blame others first, last, and always.

So, be very suspect when you read (as one ALWAYS does) that Vatican Two, or Pope Paul VI, or the new Normative Mass, or Pope John Paul II is responsible for the collapse of this or that.

Back in the so-called Golden Age of Catholicism in America, there was a Church with a fortress mentality, highly clericalised, cold, ritualistic, that was a rules-based institution and it could not survive the cultural chaos because its children were unprepared to bring Christ to the world or to defend what they, supposedly, believed.

Maybe if the Church in America had as its educational locus a love of Christ and an evangelistic orientation the collapse would have been less stark. Who knows?

What can be known that a “return to the past” will not happen.

The Church moves through time in one direction - towards the Second Coming - always preserving the Dogmatic Truths but always changing Disciplines, Rites, Liturgies, Sacramentals, etc.

The Church is not the institution imagined by far to many soi disant traditionalists - one that tries to recreate some imagined past cultural perfection as a way to save the world.

There were a lot of problems with the traditionalist
Church and to deny them is folly. It is not a question
of pied pipers luring the faithful away with empty promises
but of the laity not finding what they wanted or needed
inside the Church, maintained there by the threats of
Hell, and made to feel like dirt if they questioned
the dicta of the priest or the bishops.

It was not that the Chruch had at some time or another
unworthy leadership, but that it made a point that all
leaders, good, bad, or indifferent were to be obeyed
without grumbling.  Inflicting poor leadership upon
your flock is not the best way to care for them.

Is it any surprise when those people when given a chance
to escape they did so?

The seeds were planted long ago. It is now the harvest
time.

Now comes Sid Cundiff/Andrew Capp/I am Not Spartacus (same person) to warn Catholics against looking back to the real, un-Judaized pre-Vatican II Church for spiritual sustenance. After all, only “filthy Judeophobes, Browns, clerical fascists, Nazis, etc” would consider that the Church existed prior to Nostra Aetate.

Beware the Judaizers.

It is reported that William F Buckley is dead...at last....nobody personifies the problems discussed here....more than this “Robert the Bruce”....Oil as Universality(that’s what lights up that shinning city on the Hill)....Amerika as Church without Christ....he was both Richelieu & Pere Joseph....this Pied Piper extra-ordanaire conned more people, sold-out more decency & dignity than Lenin or Lincoln combined(bloodless murder). He was living proof that “you can fool most of the people, most of the time...”...and have a Hell of a good time doin’ it...Buckley was the penultimate Augustinian...the complete materialist...may the Holy Spirit send him straight to Senori Dante…

Traditionalist. Please write a note to Mr. Cundiff explaining how it is you and your ilk have no intention of “reconciling” with a Church you think heretical and Judaised.

Mr. Cundiff is a highly intelligent and well-educated man but he is hopelessly romantic when it comes to those in the schism.

Back in the day after Mons. Lefevbre signed the Protocol with Rome, his Lieutenants read him the riot act and so he quickly reneged on his word.

Something similar would happen were Fr. Fellay try to reconcile with Rome. Can you try and explain that to Mr. Cundiff?

I’ll just note Pope Benedict has NO desire to reconcile with those like yourself. Anyone who thinks he does is flat-out crazy.

Y’all must repent first.

“This reaffirms the sad truth which I’ve been repeating for years: American bishops have largely given up on passing along the Faith to the next generation of native-born Catholics ...” JZ

One of my favorite parts of PJB’s “Right From The Beginning” was a story about his father William.  PJB’s grandmother did not have the funds to continue William’s education at a Catholic high school so William attended a public one.  After a few days a priest from the local Catholic school appeared at Grandma Buchanan’s door and asked why her son was not attending Catholic high school.  Grandma Buchanan responded that she could not afford the tuition ... then the priest said, “we don’t want your money Mrs. Buchanan, we want your son.” Arrangements were then made for William to attend, I believe, Gonzaga in DC. 

The church has priced itself out of the education market.  The tuition at the high school (just voted one of 50 best in USA) I graduated from in the late 80’s was $3 k.  Now the tuition is $10 k.  My high school recently opened a “Nativity model” school in our city.  A nativity model school is a tuition free school for minority (mostly non-Catholic) students from grade 4-8.  These students attend school from 7 am until 8 pm, their parents clean the school and perform other tasks on weekends.  The teachers are young and unpaid. 

The parochial schools in our city are closing for the working class ethnic Catholics.  The local Catholic high schools are unaffordable for the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the people that built the church in our city.  My point is, the Catholic Church has turned their back to the working class or poor ethnic Catholics.  It seems that the newly arrived, either from Mexico or the blacks from the American south, are now benefiting from the Church at the expense of others.

The complete, indeed total, disconnect with history, particularly Catholic history, displayed by some of the responders to the main article is just simply incredible to me.  And heart-breaking.  To read these remarks is to see why the Church is in such dire trouble.

I wonder if some of these benighted folks have ever heard the term “throwing out the baby with the bathwater.” One particularly - forgive me - ignorant responder laments over the days when he was young and the ancient Mass was said sloppily by some priest, a fact that apparently has scandalized him beyond repair.  Aside from the fact that he didn’t mention being horrified by some priestly idiots today saying their masses dressed in clown suits this responder seems to have forgotten some very fundamental points about what happens at Mass - despite the inadequacy of the priest saying it.  Has this person never heard of Transubstantiation?  The quality (or lack thereof) of the priest acting in persona Christi has nothing to do with confecting the Sacrament, assuming that the priest has the proper matter, form and intention.

I hope this person will not accuse me of being a “rad-trad” if I say that anyone who can prefer the utter banality and ugliness of what passes for mass today to an ancient liturgy which has nourished the Church for twenty centuries and produced its greatest Saints is someone who, if nothing else, hasn’t an artistic bone in his entire body.

To those who point out, somewhat amusingly, that the Church has had many problems in the past when the ancient liturgy was the norm I would suggest that they should have spent more time awake during Catholic history class.  But of course in fairness to them they were probably never taught the amazing history of the Church in their grade and high schools.  I certainly wasn’t.  I embarked on the road of joyous discovery of Catholicism with writers like D.B. Wyndham-Lewis, Archbishop Goodier, Hilaire Belloc, William Thomas Walsh, Dom Gueranger, Chesterton, James Walsh, et al.

Another responder accused those who attend the ancient liturgy today of being “haters of protestants and Jews.” This calumny is not really worthy of comment but I will allow myself one observation.  Without the benefit of any concrete examples provided by the accuser I will merely say that any normal Catholic worth his salt wants, as an act of charity, to see protestants, Jews, Mohammedans, etc. converted to the Faith so that they may save their immortal souls.  If that translates into “hatred” in the mind of the responder then I respectfully suggest he has serious problems.

Will the restoration of the ancient liturgy save the world?  I don’t know.  It certainly wont hurt.  And I am equally certain that the new liturgy will not save the world, and in fact will end up in the trash-bin of history where it so justly belongs.

This “Traditionalist” is an odd fellow.

By the way, I had the flu, but am feeling much better now.

Back on topic:

Me, a “Judaizer”?  Laughable.

First and foremost, I don’t hate “Jews”, but I DO hate Judaism (as well as it’s sister heresies of Mohammedanism, Freemasonry, Secular Humanism, etc.)

Do I attend the Old Mass?  Every chance I get?  Do I attend the New Mass?  When I must.

Does that make me either a “traditionalist” or a “Judaizer”?  I couldn’t imagine attending ANY of the two forms of the Latin Mass would make one a part of either group.  But, this isn’t about the Liturgy, is it?  I hope not.

What this article was about (or did everyone forget the article?) is the replacement of born-in-America [former] Catholics that have abandoned the Faith, with probably equally untrained Catholics from Hispania that haven’t [yet] abandoned the Faith.

Here is the dilemma: American “culture” will probably cause Hispanic Catholics to drop the Faith at the rate it has caused American “native” Catholics to drop the Faith.  So, we’ll be left with fewer Hispanic Catholics in Hispania, an abundance of secular Hispanics in America, and a Church in America that is need of a constant “blood transfusion”.  Not a pretty sight.

What to do, what to do?

Fight The Revolution.  Especially here in America.  If we can turn around America from Secular Humanism/Freemasonry then it will then put pressure on the Secular Humanism/Freemasonry controlled governments of Hispania.

There are indeed few parishes that keep alive the more consistently reverent ancient form of the Roman liturgy. There were very few Franciscans once, too.

On the other side, there were once only a few parishes using altar girls, offering Communion in the hand, or ripping out the tabernacles to make little thrones for the pastor.

Mr. Guenzel, benighted here. The SSPX teaches the Jews as a race are cursed. There are not a few in here who succor the schism.

Scratch a rad trad reveal an antisemite, while a bit crude, is too often apt.

As to the idea enmity twixt Catholic and Protestants back in the day was non-existent is absurd. I lived it.

The fact relations amongst Catholics, Jews, and Protestants has improved is much detested (always cast as indifferentism/syncretism) in the far right and blame is put upon Vatican Two for that imagined heretical state of affairs.

I didn’t mention clown masses because I have never been to one. I think it silly you object to what I wrote about my personal experiences and to cast those objections as attributable to my ignorance is prolly just a case of your cognitive dissonance being resolved in favor of a traditionalist pseudology.

The idea the Catholic Church threw the baby out with the bathwater when it reformed the ancient liturgy is an idea needing attachment to a weather balloon so it can rise to the level of absurdity.

It is, of course, common knowledge the recently reauthorised Liturgy was rife with abuse - at least it is to those of us who have read the Documents of the Council of Trent.

But, that has always been the case with the Church. Due to its sinful members, the Church is always, in its human element, either purifying or putrefying - not that any trad would admit to being complicit.

Oh no. When THEY oppose the Magisterium it is never about their personal preferences or proclivities.

What they personally favor is always, coincidentally, just what is right for Church and world

Thought-provoking article. Just an observation: The trend in Hispanic illegitimacy is such that it
will soon overtake the Black illegitimacy rate which is itself at a whopping 70% which begs the
question, “Are these folks really Catholics at all?” If so, what makes one a Catholic? Is
self-identification as such sufficient? If that’s enough, then the Church is actually in excellent
shape despite the fact that a huge majority of self-identified Catholics ignore Church teachings
across the board.

I suspect that the bishops have really dropped the ball on Hispanic immigration. They are hoping
for Church renewal but will get Bosnia, Rwanda and Darfur.

For further reading: http://www.city-journal.org/html/16_4_hispanic_family_values.html

mufti spartacus sez:

“ [He was] raised in an atmosphere of rules and fear....the AmChurch [he] grew up in was one ruled by fear and loathing...for prots and jews....” *** and that “millions like [him]” were “raised in the same way.”

mufti spartacus: speak for yourself and only for yourself.  No wonder you are so completely deluded with this modernist, heretical nonsense. You actually believe that your pathetic experiences, which shaped your bigoted delusions are, axiomatically, the experiences of millions of other Catholic Americans and, therefore, fully justify the present protestantization of the One True Faith.

Permit me to clue you in: while you were banging on a drum, singing kumbayah at some folk rock mass, those of us who knew our Faith decided to avoid the evils of the novus ordo (sired by a known mason with the active help of a few protestant friends and given a “blessing” by a homosexual).

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Rhodes/3543/fmass.htm

http://www.traditioninaction.org/ProgressivistDoc/A_083_MontiniHomosexual.html

mufti spartacus further sez:  The idea that the Mass, instituted by Christ, “will save the world is silly.” And then mufti makes a high schooler’s argument: look at what happened to the world while it was the “normative mass” [just like Lucy:...waaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh...].

“The Mass is the Mass is the Mass and has ever been so since the Last Supper...” exemplifies a crass stupidity that is absolutely inexcusable.  Very simple fact that even a mufti might understand: the True Mass was instituted by Christ.  mufti spartacus’ favorite Sunday diversion was bowdlerized by a known mason during a “pastoral council.” Not quite the same; see above.

“The Extraordinary Liturgy folks experience today....” Do you mean Fr. Elvis or the disco mass?

http://www.traditioninaction.org/RevolutionPhotos/A232rcRockPriest.htm

http://www.traditioninaction.org/RevolutionPhotos/A200rcDiscothequeMass.htm

The True Mass may be a “pipe dream” for your ilk but it will remain the Mass of Christ; the Mass of the Apostles; the Mass of St. Thomas Aquinas; the Mass of St. Robert Bellarmine; the Mass of St. Joan of Arc; the Mass of Pope St. Pius V; the Mass of St. Pio of Pietrelcina; the Mass of Martyrs who weep at the thought of the blasphemies committed by your modernist, questionably ordained clerics; the Mass which neither hell nor Vatican2 nor bongo drumming idiots can destroy.

mufti: just stick with your guitar-strumming cult, the “conciliar church”: Roncalli; Montini; Wojtila the not-so-great; Congar; Rahner; Suenens; all of the filthy masons who helped make it happen; and all of its ambiguous documents which you worship.  Obviously, it will help you control the demons of your youth.  If all else fails, try an exorcism...oops, I forgot, your cult indulges voodoo sects but has tossed exorcism out the aggiornamento window.

http://www.traditioninaction.org/bev/055bev7 6 2004.htm

The answer: NO.

The Question: Do American-born children of Hispanic immigrants keep their parent’s family values?

Next question: Do immigrants have stronger family values than American-born Hispanics.

Answer: YES.

The problem: American-born Hispanics are being assimilated into the anti-family “culture” of the Negro that has been grown over many decades of “Great Society”.

That is why there is a need for a continual “blood transfusion” from Hispania.  Something, I would hope, everyone sees as problematic.

Dear I am not Spartacus,

Precisely when was the Golden Age of Catholics in America? 

I do not hold conspiracy type views regarding Vatican2 or John Paul 2.  I find Benedict 16 better equipped to deal with the Church’s problems in the Modern Era, but I think John Paul 2 had some virtues, for example he was a very charismatic individual.  It appears that Benedict 16, did not find it hard to encourage the reintroduction of the Latin Mass and the Gregorian Chants and he did it without contradicting Vatican 2.  I also support his efforts to reclaim the position of the Church in the intellectual sphere.

On the other issue of America and Catholicism.  Surely Catholicism weakened in America especially in the last few decades.  But what alo happened during this time?  America has become a warmongering society which makes demands on the rest of the world, and when and until she is still able (even at the cost of debt to China) she will resort to force and aggression.  While this is the leaders fault mainly, it also has social dimensions.  Nowadays most children, if their wish is not fulfilled immediately, they also immediately turn to aggression, and often they are not taught when these tendencies should be curbed.

Let me recommend a movie about the life of Freud, interesting in its own right I think (regardless of what one thinks of Freud in particular), but pertinent here for the following reason: the movie clearly shows that in the 20th century the Western World was encouraged to live in its individual fantasy worlds.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2641575773935962254&q=Freud+happiness&total=68&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=3

I think that Catholicism (and Christianity) will always find it hard to live in an environment which encourages not looking beyond our personal fantasies.  On the other hand I do not think it should make compromises in that direction.

Dear Alphysicist

I consider the Golden Age of American Catholicism to be the post WW2 years with the Baby Boom, growth of Parochial Schools, Beautiful Churches, Bishop Sheen with the #2 TV rated show, the Sodalities, Confraternties, well-populated Seminaries, freq Confession, Communion etc.

And it was when it seemed it was at is strongest that the Catholic Church was at its weakest (like America right now, coincidentally) as the rapid collapse proved.

I was born into a brief and special time in America. I came into the world riding a cresting wave of Catholicism. It is only because I have read Ecclesiastical history, Liturgical history, the Early Church Fathers, the Ecumenical Councils etc that I can avoid being permanently crestfallen about the state of the Church.

It is in crisis. And that is normal.

I think that Johannes Paulus Magnus and Pope Benedict are among the brightest and holiest Popes who have ever lived.

I am the same age as Israel (born in 1948) and I consider myself to be blessed to have lived during the reign of excellent, intelligent, wise, and, even, Saintly Popes.

I do think you make some good points and I will take the opportunity to note that
I am fully in support of SUMMORUM PONTIFICUM. How could I be otherwise and claim to be a faithful Catholic?

On the other hand, abounding like sequins on a Porter Waggoner jacket, almost uncountable are the soi disant trads who routinely trash the Pauline Rite per se.

And they are all holier than the Pope, don’cha’know.

I think you are right in your last paragraph.  Unless our lives are centered on Christ there is little hope. For those with a vibrant life of Faith, it is easier to follow Christ than it is for those born into other Christian Churches (Orthodox) or Christian Communities (Baptists, Episcopalians etc).

Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life and the Christian Catholic follows Jesus in the Universal Church he established (formerly called “The Way") and receives his Truth through the Church which teaches in his name and receives his Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity (His life, in the Eucharist).

As Pope St Louis the Great put it (paraphrasing) “ The risen Christ has passed over into the Sacraments.”

I thank you for the link but right now I am busy reading Peter Kreeft’s “Christianity for Modern Pagans; Pascal’s
Pensees.”

Dear Alphysicist. I watched the video. Very interesting.

RE Freud. The Catholic Shrink, Dr Paul C.  Vitz, wrote a great rejoinder to Freud’s psychotic ramblings.

http://www.amazon.com/Psychology-Religion-Self-worship-Aslan-Paperbacks/dp/B000OIQCLY/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1204282358&sr=1-3

In it he has a diagram comparing man as imagined by Freud and man as created by God.

Freud comes out looking every bit the crackpot he was.

BTW, there exists a bumper sticker that reads…

Marx, Freud, Darwin. Two down. One to go

Patrick says:

“The parochial schools in our city are closing for the working class ethnic Catholics.  The local Catholic high schools are unaffordable for the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the people that built the church in our city.”

That’s because:

1) Working class ethnic Catholics have largely moved out of those neighborhoods;

2) The Church’s source of cheap teacher labor - religious orders - has mostly dried up.  Now they must hire laity, and that means paying a real wage.