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Don_Ruggero
Guest
Really? No limit? And how many Rites of Baptism, with no limit, have you personally presided at?
Marriage and baptism are not middle-class rites of passage. We need to make them easier
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ToeInTheWater
Guest
It seems there is a basic divide in how many Catholics see the optimal future of the Church.
One is that anything that increases the number of official, baptized Catholics, who can’t ever officially leave once they are, is a good thing. Doesn’t matter if they actually believe in even core Church teachings about the Eucharist, Apostles Creed, etc. Of course, nevermind the ones about life and sex. Just be as inclusive as possible, get those numbers up as much as you can! Who cares if half the baptized babies drift away from the Church, and half the marriages end in civil divorce?
On the other hand, the Church in Germany seems to be proceeding from this philosophy…and is actually LOSING members. Though it can certainly be argued that even more would leave if they weren’t as leniently “pastoral”.
The other, of course, is to accept that many lukewarm members will drift away, but to actually teach those who are interested about what the Church believes. Interestingly, while many parishes in the Northeast are closing, the Catholic Church is actually growing in the “Bible Belt” these days.
There was recently a new Cathedral that opened in Raleigh, N.C. Not sure how “orthodox” the diocese of Raleigh is, but that is certainly a rather socially conservative state -the infamous “bathroom ban” being a case in point. And while much of the increase in Catholic population is due to immigration (both from outside the US and from other regions in the US), I’m sure there are conversions going on there too.
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phil19034
Guest
Father, please forgive me. I was not clear. I was referring to the article’s implication that baptisms for English speakers were limited to a max of 4 babies, while Spanish baptisms were not limited.
The implication that the article was making seemed to be that English baptism were limited to create the feeling of a private event, while the Spanish Baptisms were more of a parish event. Or at least that’s how I interpreted it.
I did not mean that there should not be limits based on common sense logistics for the priests & deacons.
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phil19034
Guest
From what I understand, Raleigh is a pretty orthodox diocese.
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Roseeurekacross
Guest
i cant comment on the article reggie, except to say while in the states I attended very vibrant Spanish speaking Masses. very different to Aus, culturally.
in my Diocese we have just started prepping a new group of confirmation candidates, about 100 kids. They come to Mass, are farewelled in Mass for their religious ed. Then we all have morning tea. its a community process.
Kids undergo Confirmation first, then First Communion.
The kids always go up to the Sanctury with the Priest, before dismissal. its a lovely transparent whole community activity.
no idea of the marriage process.
in my Diocese we have just started prepping a new group of confirmation candidates, about 100 kids. They come to Mass, are farewelled in Mass for their religious ed. Then we all have morning tea. its a community process.
Kids undergo Confirmation first, then First Communion.
The kids always go up to the Sanctury with the Priest, before dismissal. its a lovely transparent whole community activity.
no idea of the marriage process.
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FreeEver
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Don_Ruggero
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Frankly, the article was on a very thin edge of a sword between farce and sheer mockery…from beginning with “Marriage and baptism are not bourgeois rites of passage” through to “Afterwards we drank champagne” which certainly appears bourgeois to me.
To answer my own question, I have done many many times the Rite of Baptism – both the form for an individual child and the form for more than one child. I have had to step into do preside where there were more children involved than I would have ever chosen – which is one of the reasons I have a very strict limit on the rite when I am the one organising it.
Whatever the nationality or culture, one arrives – very quickly – to a point where the rite simply begins to suffer the more the various components of the rite take place in what comes to resemble an assembly line in the very best of circumstances.
And all of that is quite aside from the practical logistics that limits just how many family and other guests of how many infants can fit within the walls of the parish church.
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HelenRose
Guest
My, my aren’t we just so superior and condescending?
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babochka
Guest
I think it depends upon the kind of visa. I have a friend who came from the Philipines in 2001 on a fiance visa. She was required to be married within 90 days, so they had a civil wedding and continued to live separately until the requirements for a church wedding could be met. They had a church wedding within a couple of months of the civil marriage. Her parents were denied visas to attend the wedding. 16 years and 9 children later, they’re still married and the parents have been able to come spend time after almost every baby.
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Don_Ruggero
Guest
The article is astonishingly off-putting. I hope the Herald manages to sort itself out It would be sad to see them go in that direction.
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reggieM
Guest
Yes, I interpreted it that way also and it was troubling to see that. But I think another theme the author was pointing out was that some tend to view baptisms and weddings as a rite of passage " like finishing secondary school or moving into one’s first apartment’ - so that might explain the difference.
I’ve seen this many times where the English weddings in church are quite lavish and expensive affairs – and baptisms are not as extravagant but the people treat them more like a social celebration than an offering of the sacrament.
I think also, at least around here, the Spanish language community has more young couples and those couples have bigger families.
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reggieM
Guest
This was a good summary and the attitude above is very common around here. It is a well-meaning attitude to some extent, but it is sort of a fast-food, consumerist approach for getting as many warm bodies in the door as one can.
This explains (to me anyway) why young couples are often not even told about chastity in marriage and life issues. There is a fear of chasing people away with such things. But as you say, just getting parents in the door does not prevent the children (and ultimately the parents also) from drifting away later.
It’s my belief and also from personal visits to the Bible Belt from the Northeast that the growth in the south is due to a more dynamic and yes, orthodox-conservative approach which attracts people and builds family life better. That’s my opinion and I’m sure there are many people here who disagree, but it’s what I’ve seen firsthand.
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reggieM
Guest
I totally agree with what we have lost. It has caused a lot of damage.
I think what the author was getting at, and I share his point of view on this, is that what often happens with sacramental prep is that it is ultimately the first and often last religious teaching a couple or parents actually get in the parish. So, one move is to make it even more time-intensive and cumbersome - and even intense.
Normally, we might think that is good. But the critique of this is that the sacramental prep is covering up huge deficiencies in the parish life itself. A more rigorous prep program is addressing the symptom, not the disease.
As was mentioned earlier in this thread, by a woman who is a religious–ed teacher, she encounters 8th grade Catholic children who don’t know the Our Father or Hail Mary. It’s that basic. I’ve seen the same myself in another parish where I taught CCD.
So again, yes - certainly have more and better sacramental prep - but wait a minute – you have 14 yr old Catholic children who don’t know basic prayers? Where have they been all their lives? What is wrong with the parents?
So, there is something fundamentally wrong with the day-to-day lives of Catholic people.
Yes, sacramental prep is important.
But a more comprehensive solution is needed for people so they would never have children so incredibly ill-prepared in the Faith.
I have seen this problem in parishes for decades. I can’t fault the parents, teachers or even the priests and bishops. I would say, however, that a stronger critique of the various processes we use in parish life is needed, and that means we shouldn’t be afraid of saying that some things we’ve been doing have been a failure.
People can have the very best intentions and have great devotion to God but can also be mistaken about how to form family life in the parish. I’ve known and worked with wonderful Catholic people as teachers and parish leaders - who were, in my opinion, clueless about how to stop the hemorrhaging of people out of the parish from apostasy, indifference or various moral evils.
In fact, they didn’t even want to admit that it was happening.
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ToeInTheWater
Guest
Personally the author totally lost me when he actually used the wedding of Romeo and Juliet as a good example. So he’d be fine with a priest allowing a couple of young teenagers to marry after knowing each other for 1 day, knowing their parents hate each other and would be quite opposed to the marriage, and the boy is still on the rebound from a recent romantic rejection? Really?
And that’s not even mentioning what winds up happening to the pair. Or that the whole story is fictional.
That being said the example of a friend who waited 6 months to baptize his infant did seem to indicate there is some unthinking rote approach to the Sacraments going on in that particular parish. But it seems essentially letting anyone who asks for a Catholic marriage or baptism get one, no questions asked, is also an unthinking approach.
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reggieM
Guest
It is disheartening.
I think also that a huge number of reasons for the decline have been proposed – from one extreme to another and a lot in between.
I have seen a number of success stories also - vocation booms, growing young families faithful to the Church - and every one of them has the same things in common.
But also as mentioned, learning and growing in knowledge about the Faith shouldn’t be reserved for sacramental prep alone - and I think that’s what happens. Some couples show up at marriage prep with almost no knowledge or even interest in the Faith at all.
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ToeInTheWater
Guest
Ok, maybe that’s the underlying message of this article, that “learning and growing in knowledge about the Faith shouldn’t be reserved for sacramental prep alone”.
But if that was the case it got pretty buried in the layers of sarcasm and condescension.
I think this is yet another example of an article that “preaches to the choir” and gets some disaffected Catholics to grin, pump their fist, maybe wink and make a thumbs up
and say “Yeah! That guy totally gets what I’m thinking, he knows what he’s talking about!”But IMHO this kind of article, does very little to actually change hearts and minds that don’t already agree with the author’s premise.
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reggieM
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I accept that you didn’t like it.But IMHO this kind of article, does very little to actually change hearts and minds that don’t already agree with the author’s premise.
I disagree with your opinion on this - I enjoyed it and I’m sure many others did also including the editor of the Herald.
Also, it might be good to consider that people who already agree need encouragement for their views, and that’s why Catholic magazines publish articles that Catholics already agree with. Not everything has to be done to try to change people’s minds.
But again, I understand that you didn’t like it and I just see it a different way.
I’ll just add - that you mentioned the theme was “buried” but not everything has to be blatantly obvious, agreed?
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ToeInTheWater
Guest
Actually, I don’t even agree with you, that this was the theme. That’s what you got out of it, and obviously you already felt that.
The theme I got is “The modern Church is wrong to make Catholics jump through a bunch of hoops to get married or baptized. We should go back to the good old days when all we needed to do was talk to the priest for an hour, if that, and get automatic permission, and even a 12 year old girl could get married right away, with no questions asked.”
I also find it hard to believe how an essay that is criticizing the Church and suggesting current practices be changed, should NOT be judged by the standard of “did this convince anyone”?
It would be different if he was just defending, say, Church teaching on Mary, abortion, etc.
ETA: It’s also possible to agree with someone’s premise and disagree with the delivery. I agree with Mark Shea’s opinion of Trump for the most part, but that doesn’t mean I agree with his tendency to aim for the jugular and attack “Trumpkins” in very nasty ways. Indeed, I don’t even read his posts anymore. Others who like that style are welcome to read him.
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gracepoole
Guest
To voice a minority view… I loved this piece.
My husband and I got zero out of our lengthy pre-Cana sessions and I’ve had to do the baptismal classes many times over. Also largely a waste of time. Sadly, what’s lacking for many is actual catechism and regular participation in and attendance at Mass. If people attended and participated as our grandparents did, priests would know us better and there’d be far fewer questions about when people are truly ready for a sacramental marriage or baptism for their children. The author didn’t devote nearly enough time to this point, unfortunately.
Our pre-Cana experience was a great case-in-point. Husband and I had to take a quiz to determine compatibility. We were “dinged” on a question to which we both answered true: “If I weren’t marrying my fiance, I probably wouldn’t ever get married.” Our priest (whom I loved) said this was a questionable response because it indicated that we were viewing love naively. On the contrary, our answers indicated that we both felt called to marriage by God because we’d met one another. Had we not, we might have felt called to other vocations. A quiz doesn’t ferret out rationale in this way. In our pre-Cana classes, there were some who legitimately frightened me in terms of their lack of preparedness for marriage. That wasn’t us. And our priest knew that but we went through the course because we were supposed to. There also wasn’t any discussion of NFP and its centrality in a Catholic marriage, why going to confession before the wedding is a great idea, etc. Please know that I don’t fault those running the course. They were a committed couple who meant to be strong examples of a strong Catholic marriage. But the approach dictated to them and to us could have been grown in much more positive ways.
Regarding class, the author is correct that middle class folks often tend to have the option to attend weekend retreats or multiple classes spread out over several weeks. Often, not always. It’s certainly my experience in my current parish, which is middle to upper class.
(Now I’ll duck for cover for expressing an unpopular opinion… Only so much time left when I can do so on this version of CAF!
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My husband and I got zero out of our lengthy pre-Cana sessions and I’ve had to do the baptismal classes many times over. Also largely a waste of time. Sadly, what’s lacking for many is actual catechism and regular participation in and attendance at Mass. If people attended and participated as our grandparents did, priests would know us better and there’d be far fewer questions about when people are truly ready for a sacramental marriage or baptism for their children. The author didn’t devote nearly enough time to this point, unfortunately.
Our pre-Cana experience was a great case-in-point. Husband and I had to take a quiz to determine compatibility. We were “dinged” on a question to which we both answered true: “If I weren’t marrying my fiance, I probably wouldn’t ever get married.” Our priest (whom I loved) said this was a questionable response because it indicated that we were viewing love naively. On the contrary, our answers indicated that we both felt called to marriage by God because we’d met one another. Had we not, we might have felt called to other vocations. A quiz doesn’t ferret out rationale in this way. In our pre-Cana classes, there were some who legitimately frightened me in terms of their lack of preparedness for marriage. That wasn’t us. And our priest knew that but we went through the course because we were supposed to. There also wasn’t any discussion of NFP and its centrality in a Catholic marriage, why going to confession before the wedding is a great idea, etc. Please know that I don’t fault those running the course. They were a committed couple who meant to be strong examples of a strong Catholic marriage. But the approach dictated to them and to us could have been grown in much more positive ways.
Regarding class, the author is correct that middle class folks often tend to have the option to attend weekend retreats or multiple classes spread out over several weeks. Often, not always. It’s certainly my experience in my current parish, which is middle to upper class.
(Now I’ll duck for cover for expressing an unpopular opinion… Only so much time left when I can do so on this version of CAF!
)
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ToeInTheWater
Guest
As I don’t have much (actually, any) experience with this myself: I do think there are instances where a “one size fits all” approach to catechesis, marriage prep, etc. is not the best way to go about it.
Same for the conversion process. A High Church “Anglo-Catholic” is certainly not at the same place along the conversion path as a Baptist, and the Baptist is not at the same place a Muslim would be, and the Muslim is not at the same place as an atheist raised by parents who constantly disparaged the concept of religion.
Yet, it seems in many parishes, all of these potential converts would be herded into one RCIA class.
However if that’s what the author was getting at, then I find it ironic it is posted in the Traditionalist forum. For the general impression I have of Traditionalists is they think “everyone should go back to the good old days of Pre-Vat II and the Tridentine Mass, and repudiate the Norvus Ordo”. Maybe not all believe that, but that seems to be the underlying belief for many who claim to be Traditionalist Catholics.
Same for the conversion process. A High Church “Anglo-Catholic” is certainly not at the same place along the conversion path as a Baptist, and the Baptist is not at the same place a Muslim would be, and the Muslim is not at the same place as an atheist raised by parents who constantly disparaged the concept of religion.
Yet, it seems in many parishes, all of these potential converts would be herded into one RCIA class.
However if that’s what the author was getting at, then I find it ironic it is posted in the Traditionalist forum. For the general impression I have of Traditionalists is they think “everyone should go back to the good old days of Pre-Vat II and the Tridentine Mass, and repudiate the Norvus Ordo”. Maybe not all believe that, but that seems to be the underlying belief for many who claim to be Traditionalist Catholics.
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