According to the
Experts say the reasons for the drop are complex, but the ongoing secularization of the developed world and a growing culture that devalues celibacy are among them.
However the news is not all bad for the Catholic Church – it is growing in Africa and
The 40 years after the 1950s Seminary and priestly Ordination Avalanche due to the saintly witness of the pre-conciliar Popes Leo XIII, St. Pius X, Benedict XV, Pius XI and Pius XII, are over. The great dying of those priests ordained prior to 1965 has begun in 1995-2005.
The numbers are only growing in the
What’s the big deal? Well, it looks like the West will be de-pastorized, at least in the conciliar church, in not too distant future.
The decline in Mass attendance (“click” on highlighted texts) highlights another significant fact – fewer and fewer people who call themselves Catholic actually follow Church rules or accept Church doctrine. For example, a 1999 poll by the National Catholic Reporter shows that 77 percent believe a person can be a good Catholic without going to Mass every Sunday, 65 percent believe good Catholics can divorce and remarry, and 53 percent believe Catholics can have abortions and remain in good standing. Only 10 percent of lay religion teachers accept Church teaching on artificial birth control, according to a 2000 University of Notre Dame poll. And a New York Times poll revealed that 70 percent of Catholics age 18-44 believe the Eucharist is merely a “symbolic reminder” of Jesus.
A survey commissioned by the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) among Filipino parents showed that the institution is also wracked by falling Mass attendance (and issues of moral values).
Monsignor Bugnini, who was later made an Archbishop [and who, according to hard evidence was probably a Mason], assisted by six Protestant “observers” was the main architect of the Novus Ordo of the Mass which was promulgated by Pope Paul VI in 1969.
Pope Paul and Bugnini were confident that the New Order of Mass would be a success, attracting more of the faithful to assist at the Holy Sacrifice and helping to bring non-Catholics into the Church. As is now abundantly evident, things have turned out differently. In recent times Cardinal Ratzinger has frankly admitted this, and indeed that the New Mass is a contributing factor to the present crisis in the Church.
The Cardinal wrote:
“I am convinced that the present crisis that we are experiencing in the Church today is to a large extent due to the disorientation of the liturgy - in that it is a matter of indifference whether God exists and whether or not he speaks to us or hears us. But when the community of faith, the worldwide unity of the Church and her history and the mystery of the living Christ are no longer visible in the liturgy, where else, then, is the Church to become a visible essence? Then the community is offering itself, an activity that is utterly fruitless.”
Kenneth C. Jones, author of the Index of Leading Catholic Indicators, shares his thoughts how we can turn things around:
The first is pray. I used to think that advice was to some degree a prescription for doing nothing. But the older I get and the more I understand my faith, the more I conclude that prayer is really the only effective response to the crisis…A deep prayer life with regular, scheduled prayer and the reception of the sacraments is our only way out of the crisis. As Cardinal Ratzinger said, we don’t need more reformers, we need more saints.
That being said, the one piece of advice I can give is – do something. And don’t be afraid to be confrontational. The more I observe and experience the behavior of our shepherds, the more I’ve come to believe that they will make no concession unless they are forced to. They will act in the area of true reform as they acted in connection with the priest sex abuse crisis – they will ignore it until they are exposed.
That doesn’t mean we have to be rude, obnoxious or boorish. It means we have to know our principles and be willing and able to defend them, and to bring the battle to our enemies. Too often we are on the defensive. We have 2,000 years of tradition behind us, we have nothing to apologize for.
My final piece of advice is: Let’s turn back the clock. And don’t tell me it can’t be done, because it can. In fact, people do it all the time. Remember in 1985 when Coca Cola was the dominant producer of soda in the world? Company experts got the great idea of introducing New Coke and doing away with old Coke. How did people react – the statistics are undeniable. Sales of Coca Cola plummeted; the numbers proved that it was a failure. And what did the company do? It turned back the clock. It pulled New Coke from the market, and brought back Coke Classic, “the real thing.”
Chesterton had an apt comment in his book, What’s Wrong With The World: “The need here is a need of complete freedom for restoration as well as revolution... There is one metaphor of which the moderns are very fond; they are always saying, ‘You can’t put the clock back.’ The simple and obvious answer is ‘You can.’... There is another proverb, ‘As you have made your bed, so you must lie on it’; which again is simply a lie. If I have made my bed uncomfortable, please God I will make it again… This is, as I say, the first freedom that I claim: the freedom to restore.”
I say it’s time we discard New Catholicism, as we discarded New Coke. It’s time to bring back Catholicism Classic, “the real thing.”
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