I see. But since most Catholics don’t exactly scurry to read the latest motu proprio, Apostolic Exhortation, etc., and since most of them don’t have a huge impact on most Catholics’ lives, then why was this document so monumentally distressing?
OK, for starters Vatican II was a
big deal. It was covered extensively in the press and was discussed by almost everyone.
Humanae Vitae was big enough news for Time Magazine (when it was still relevant) to make it a cover story. The encyclical has been so wide known that major media gave it prominent coverage on its anniversaries (10th and 25th).
Now when the theory is proposed that it was the encyclical that caused the steep decline in Mass attendance its not proposed as a 1-to-1 theory but rather that the encyclical was the “straw that broke the camel’s back.”
When people lament how much better educated the laity were in regards to the faith prior to Vatican II they are partially incorrect. Yes, people had memorized the Baltimore Catechism but the nuances of the faith were not well known. In the centuries since Trent in the consciousness of Catholics there had been a blending of doctrine and discipline, Church tradition and Sacred Tradition. Those concepts were kind of merged into one in the minds of many. What made Vatican II so radical in many people’s minds was that almost everything the Church did was seen as unchangeable. To generations of Catholics raised with the specter of eternal hell fire if meat was eaten on a Friday, the idea that one could now eat meat on a Friday was mind boggling. And the same with Latin, the idea that Latin had to be used in Mass was engrained in people’s minds, how could the Mass possibly be in English?
People simply were not educated as to the difference between tradition and Sacred Tradition. The laity, and even many clergy, came to see
everything in the Church as a free for all. However, people enjoyed many of the changes so there wasn’t a huge problem. Mass attendance did not dip dramatically until 1968. Even despite the many changes that Council was enacting/declaring Mass attendance did not fluctuate wildly but did experience a slow trend downwards until 1968 when it plummeted. For some reason in 1968 and onwards we see dramatic drops in Mass attendance rates. In an era where most people thought everything was changeable and most liked the changes, what would their reaction be when they didn’t like something?
Apparently it was they felt that the Church had obviously been wrong in the past about many things, some of which they said would send us to hell and this was just one more thing they say will send us to hell so who knows if they’re right or not.
Things got even worse when it leaked out that that commission Pope Paul VI set up to review the birth control issue had actually recommended to him that the teaching be changed. National Episcopal Conferences in many parts of the world appeared to revolt by telling people to simply follow their conscience on the issue. The failure of Church leadership to properly explain the changes and nonchanges cannot be overstated.
In the minds of many the Church had lost the credibility to declare what sent people to hell. Many people thought there was nothing wrong with artificial birth control and that meant the Church must be wrong on a lot of things, including the importance of Mass attendance.
So the theory concludes that much of an entire generation lost trust in the Church’s moral authority due to Humanae Vitae and passed on to their children the idea that most things the Church says send us to hell really don’t. These children (who are young adults today) aren’t caught up in rebellion over the encyclical but have inherited their parent’s attitudes towards the Church’s teaching authority on issues that include Mass attendance.
OK, hopefully that’s not overly convoluted. I’m not saying I necessarily buy into this theory 110% but I think its a larger piece to the puzzle than most people are willing to admit. Its sometimes hard to follow the line of logic in a cramped internet post, so obviously we’ll continue to discuss this for a bunch more posts.
