Having been born in the 60s, I have no strong recollection, beyond some overheard conversations, of what it must have felt like to witness the tearing down of everything. It must have felt to many that all was ending and that God must surely act to defend His Church from the destruction.
Alas, it was not to be and the destruction continued, most people just cared less.
As a child with no recollection of what came before, I still had a sense of loss. It is hard to explain, but I knew something was wrong. Ask my family, they will tell you that I have always been like this, of course they would say it mockingly.
I also wondered why so many people, at that time, failed to see it for what it was. They smiled and called it the new springtime even as everything died around them. They called it opening the doors and letting fresh air into the Church, as everybody inside choked on the smoke of Satan. How did they not see what was happening?
I have often wondered what it must have felt like to live through that era. I wonder no more. In fact, I think that perhaps today’s high speed death spiral may be worse in some ways. Having never been through it before and unable to see its logical end, many well meaning Catholics perhaps opened themselves up to the false optimism of that era.
Today, having seen what the last 50 years has wrought, I have, we have no such luxury.
Today is not 1970, but I sometimes imagine I feel as some must have felt back then. I know some people and I am acquainted with more people who are really struggling in this time. I know that so many ‘Catholic’ pundits and wannabe pundits would mock them for their worries even as they celebrate every novelty and heresy that infects the Church as, you guessed it, a breath of fresh air.
I can see it. I can see it so clearly. The only question that remains is whether this time, the Lord will act.
I have often pondered this question. Will I live long enough to see the Church fully transmogrified into syncretistic modernized mess it seems hellbent on becoming or will the Church be rescued by the Lord.
As I said, I have often wondered what it must have felt like. I don’t wonder that anymore, I know now. The only thing I wonder now is when God will choose to act and rescue us, His Church, from us, His Church.
We have partied on the train tracks for so long, we delude ourselves into thinking them abandoned. But the train is coming, I can see the light in the distance and I know with certainty it will arrive. I cannot tell how far out is the light of the train and I can’t say how fast it is moving. But it is coming, of this I have no doubt.
When will others see it and will it be too late?
As a blogger, I pray and ask for guidance. Lord, should I just pack it in and just focus on getting my family through this time. Or, should I be shouting the obvious from the rooftops, even though I know I will continue to be ignored and vilified. I don’t know, I guess I will keep praying.
**Note. If you don’t sympathize or understand this post, that’s fine. Just let it go please. Anyone who chooses to use the comment box to mock me and my fellow travellers will be deleted and likely banned. So again, just let it go please.
April 29, 2014 at 10:40 pm
Ha, you're paying close attention today.
April 29, 2014 at 10:41 pm
I guess you know how close to intellectual schism you are…and you're corrupting all these nice people. Shame on you. You should stop blogging and do penance.
April 29, 2014 at 10:41 pm
I love how some anonymous blowhard who is to chicken to use his own name guy makes side comments about Pat's supposed lack of courage.
April 29, 2014 at 10:42 pm
"You'll know you should pack it in the day you're getting Catholic $$ and feel compelled to censor what you know to be true so as not to offend a bishop."
…Like writing for the Register?
April 29, 2014 at 11:16 pm
I have to say, I don't understand stories like this. How could a parish so vibrant deteriorate so fast? If things were so great, why did all but three of the nuns abandon their vocations? If parish life was so vibrant, why didn't the parishioners fight tooth and nail to keep it alive? If the "folk mass" was so much worse compared to what they had, why didn't the parishioners beat it back with sticks?
I don't deny your experience, but it raises very troubling questions for me about the health of the Church. What were we doing as a Church to foster a faith so shallowly rooted, so easily overturned by revisionists and revolutionaries? What kind of Catholics were we raising who would just roll over as their paradise was being despoiled? What kind of vocations did we have if they were so easily cast aside?
For me, tales like yours of paradise lost lead me to think that the Church was even less healthy than tales of a wheezing Church do.
April 29, 2014 at 11:44 pm
There are people with impeccable credentials on the traditional side of things who would agree with much of her analysis. The folks at the New Liturgical Movement (and more importantly, their forbears) were engaged in the movement precisely because chant and sacred polyphony had disappeared from wide swaths of the Church. And in places like Ireland, most Sunday masses were quick, mumbled low masses.
Fr. Phil Wolfe FSSP (who has an influential web presence, albeit under anonymity) has often argued that the collapse after Vat II was only because the Church had been failing in it's mission before Vat II (and that the subsequent effects were actually a chastisement).
All in all, I thought "wineinthewater" was trying to offer a balanced perspective.
April 29, 2014 at 11:45 pm
Seriously. You use disqus. You can have as many disqus accounts as you want. It takes literally 30 seconds to create one. So why fight it?
You are just a lay person with a blog…and yet a bunch of other confused lay people are flocking to you because you claim to ;see so clearly'. You see nothing clearly, except the limits of your own knowledge and experience. I've seen you make more than your fair share of mistakes here, I have to presume from the level of writing that you don't have a degree in any Catholic discipline. What you are doing is dangerous to you and others.
Yes, you should pack it in.
April 29, 2014 at 11:59 pm
I'm sorry for your feelings of loss and despair, but I am gladdened by your hope for the Church's future through your prayers.
I cannot sympathize with you, but I can empathize. I too saw the end, the decaying Church being stripped of its truths was a nightmare to witness. We are born of different decades, but surely we can share the sense of doom. However, this doom, this loss, this despair are the fruits of the Devil, and they are death. He wants us to be suffering over the state of God's Church, and he does so by twisting the truth. I came to realize that God's Church is not dying when I came to college and witnessed the Truth being lives out by the faithful young men and women there. At my university, the University of Texas at Austin, we have FOCUS missionaries, the only active Schoenstatt University branch in the US, a Catholic fraternity and sorority that is spreading throughout Texas and into other states, and organizations that focus on putting on high school retreats, organizing social service events, leading the pro-life movement here on campus, organizing retreats for college students, and much more.
Please, my friend, the life of the Church is being activated and moving out into the world around you! It just might be hard to see for whatever reason. Please, pray for us, pray for the New Evangelization, pray for God's Church. We need your prayers. I will be praying for you.
April 30, 2014 at 12:10 am
I agree with him. I also agree with Stephen's comment, though I admit to being baffled by both him and his successor, Justin Welby.
April 30, 2014 at 12:17 am
This was worse and maybe even more widespread within the Church. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arianism
April 30, 2014 at 12:57 am
Seriously, Pat. I wonder if you consider what you're doing to your brother. Matt still has a pretty good reputation, I guess, but you've ruined this blog for his readership. My wife found CMR years ago when Matt was writing funny and interesting things here, but she left when you started your reign of traditionalist terror. I'm no snotnosed internet kid who writes "Kill yourself" because that's probably a mortal sin…no, instead I'm a Catholic who says "You should definitely stop blogging. It is bad for you and for others."
Ban me and I'm back in 30. Seconds, not minutes. The joys of Disqus!
April 30, 2014 at 1:22 am
Matt, keep the faith. I counted at least 153 of us worldwide. It's a start.
April 30, 2014 at 1:54 am
They didn't fight for the same reasons they are not fighting now and then some. We were told that this was the "New Springtime" and that things would be SO much better even when they were good now. Back then, we OBEYED. That was it. There was no going against the Vatican, no going against the Priest. In today, the here and now, people can't understand what being a Catholic was like. If your Priest said jump, you said how high. If Sister told you to spin in circles, you did it. Question the Vatican, you were a heretic.
The Priest scandal changed many things. People are smart enough to question when things look strange. Now you just have fellow Catholics, who either didn't live through it, or are protecting their position, shaming those who question anything. Now the bloggers call you a heretic while proudly comparing your questions to "ecclesiastical porn".
April 30, 2014 at 2:24 am
Please don't desert us. That's only a tiny bit.
April 30, 2014 at 2:42 am
Perhaps I will be deleted and banned for posting this. But here goes. A reading from the Gospel according to Matthew:
——————————
"And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but by this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them. And early in the morning he came walking toward them on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, “It is a ghost!” And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, 'Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.'
Peter answered him, 'Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.'
He said, 'Come.'
So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, 'Lord, save me!'
Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, 'You of little faith, why did you doubt?' When they got into the boat, the wind ceased."
————-
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
When I left for college I watched a number of my peers get sucked into secularism and atheism. And I wasn't the best Catholic myself. But the Lord led me into a good youth ministry program that forced me to be honest. Now I teach high schoolers – fighting back against the tide that swept out my generation.
When I see things I don't like, my response is to renew my hope, not despair, and to work harder. Many people look for greener pastures, but the point is not how green the pastures are – but whose pastures they are. So rather than curse every weed I find, I shall grab a rake. I I shall do my part in my corner of the world, and trust that Jesus is present in His Church.
The banner for this blog reads, "We laugh because we believe." I see very little joviality these days on this blog.
Do we still believe?
April 30, 2014 at 3:04 am
There it is the c-word. Clericalism.
And how there wasnt a golden age for the church? Try 1963. Thats when you can look at published indicators that show it was then (see Kennedys key of Catholic indicators).
And yes, all of the problems since then can actually be blamed on tje synthesis of all heresies. Modernism
April 30, 2014 at 3:31 am
ABOVE
ALL
SHADOWS
The shadows are dark
They meld into one
But “above all shadows
Rides the sun”.
The shadows are cold
The warmth they shun
But “above all shadows
Rides the sun”.
Purity preferred
The shadows want none
But “above all shadows
Rides the sun”.
And the abandoned priests
Who won’t be out done
Bravely elevate…
Where “above all shadows rides the sun”.
April 30, 2014 at 4:39 am
I've heard this nonsense so many times from Vatican II apologists. It's a bunch of horse hockey. How the heck did people know if the Latin was rushed and inaccurate if it's being whispered?
Ignoring mass for the rosary? That can't even be possible. The Latin mass was witnessed with silent contemplation by many simple folks who loved Christ. Those who were praying the rosary during mass knew exactly what they were witnessing and were offering up the rosary as they knelt at the foot of the cross, as the un-bloody sacrifice of the Lord was being offered. Just how the heck did your grandpa and grandma know what was in the minds and hearts of those attending? Clairvoyant were they? I think most people trumpeting this BS history read it somewhere because I hear the same old accusations hurled against a generation long gone and no longer here to defend itself.
As far as how the Church was able to fall so hard so fast, look to the shepherds. They led the sheep to the edge of a cliff and docile, trusting Catholics followed their shepherds as they had been taught to by their parents and their grandparents. They were in a Catch-22 – they were faithful and obedient and docile – and they were betrayed, that's what happened. Why didn't they fight? Because unlike today's ACT gay squads and "we don't agree with Father" chanceries, they were taught that good Catholics were not supposed to fight their priests and bishops. And they were betrayed.
So spare us the revisionist crap. I'm tired of it. The Church wasn't perfect in 1950, but they damn well didn't divorce, didn't murder their unborn children, didn't contracept themselves out of existence, didn't support sodomy masquerading as marriage, and they subjected themselves to the obedience of their shepherds, which is all more than I can say about the 'Spirit of Vatican II' crowd.
April 30, 2014 at 8:35 am
As Netmilsmom so correctly noted, these changes, such as to the liturgy, weren't enacted by outsiders but the Vatican itself. What were priests and laymen supposed to do, refuse to celebrate the New Mass which was promulgated by Pope Paul VI?
And the collapse of Catholic life after Vatican II does not indicate vocations or Catholic life were "weak" prior to Vatican II. Rather, it indicates how important small "t" traditions, such as liturgy, art, architecture, and music are to the Faith.
Catholicism is not an abstract, merely doctrinal faith, it depends on small "t" traditions to embody that faith incarnationally. When that is stripped away it's no wonder the Church itself will undergo a crisis like night following day.
I liken it to a basketball coach who has a championship team. The next year instead of running drills and practicing every day he decides his team is going to play hopscotch and skip across the gym instead, for "pastoral" reasons. Well, he's the coach, he can do that, but let's not stand around wondering why his team all of a sudden is losing its games and becoming more irrelevant in the league, even with the same players.
April 30, 2014 at 10:48 am
'people ignoring mass for the rosary '
Actually, I've been seriously considering saying a devout rosary through Mass at my local parish as a refuge from the insipid, and often times damaging, spectacle that is our regular Sunday Mass.
Due to a false notion of 'active participation', I never understood the whole saying-a-rosary-at-mass thing. I knew it was 'pre VII', and viewed the few old ladies who still fingered their rosary beads through Mass as interesting historical oddities. But I get it now.
There is, often-times, very little spiritual benifit from 'participating' in the Mass in manner expected in our local church. In this non-ideal situation I think saying a devout rosary while mediating on the Mass would be far more useful.