Our Catholic Culture?

[slyboots]

A Catholic culture would inculcate a certain kind of character: one of respect, self-restraint, responsibility, humility, thrift, moderation, self-sacrifice. Courtship and marriage would be encouraged among the young. Divorce would be well-nigh non-existent. Such a culture would not valorize materialism, but understand that things of this world is not to be wholly embraced. At the heart of our culture would not be - as Jody suggests - opposition to abortion - which is, after all, negative - but rather the things that abortion is not: family, Church, community, memory, tradition, continuity of past, present and future. Culture is affirmation, not simply denial.
A culture - Catholic or otherwise - that regarded abortion as well-nigh unthinkable would be profoundly different than the one we inhabit. First, such a culture would foster a strong sense of place. This is one of the central features of Catholicism, in strong distinction to Protestantism: we are members of parishes, which are located where one lives, and not according to the choice of minister or music or fellow churchgoers.
Patrick Deneen from an article by Rod Dreher
blog.beliefnet.com/crunchycon/2009/05/what-catholic-culture.html

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to live in a Catholic Culture?

 

[gardenswithkids]

…Wouldn’t it be wonderful to live in a Catholic Culture?

I don’t know. “To whom much is given, much will be required.” I suspect it’s best for us to appreciate that God, in His wisdom, placed each of us here–at this particular time, in our particular culture–for a reason.

If I lived in a Catholic cuture, it would certainly take me less effort to raise my family, and I might fall into laziness and sloth and other subtle sins. You wrote about people who know the need for self sacrifice–raising a family in my current culture takes a great amount of self-sacrifice. Almost heroic effort at times. It wouldn’t take as much self-sacrifice from me to do what I do now if I lived in a Catholic culture.

It might be nice to visit a Catholic culture for a while. (That’s why I frequently visit CAF. ) But ultimately, I must live where God placed me.

 

[Dtmccameron]

……

Shouldn’t it be a goal of ours to make the Catholic culture *THE *culture of the world?

 

[slyboots]

The words in my post were a quote from Patrick Deneen.
patrickdeneen.blogspot.com/

More…

"American Catholics have largely assimilated into mainstream American society, and come to seek success and approval from that culture on its terms…

The abortion of children is to be expected as a consequence of THIS culture: in a culture in which I define my own future in accordance with will and desire, and in which that which is personally inconvenient to me is as disposable as most everything else I use for my convenience everyday, sex is a consumer product and abortion is the trash. Disenchantment and utility defines my relationship to ALL things, in the end."

Mr Denee speaks very succinctly about the inconvenient “disposable” life many people live. And makes a good case for believing the Catholic culture is no more.

 

[Rascalking]

I agree that a Catholic dominant culture would be ideal
.
Having said that, I would prefer that people made up there own mind and choose lives of virtue, rather than having it forced on them.

 

[rolltidefan]

I know I probably shouldn’t be commenting on this since it is “Our Catholic Culture” but I don’t think just standing up against abortion and wanting to do moral things are just Catholic. I think the Catholic church does stand for some very moral things but they are not the only ones. I know even in the election, my pastor shared MANY MANY times about forget voting because we are scared of the economy because as a nation we needed to be more worried about our souls and voting moral. He was speaking of abortion mainly. Also we participate in a program for Sanctifiy of Life. I am very proud to stand up and say that I voted with my moral conscious because of the main issue of abortion. With that being said, I read just this past week in a local newspaper that 51% of the votes for Obama were Catholic. I think if this is true, that is astonishing. I know my podiatrist, his whole office are Catholics, he has himself and approximately 6-7 employees. They ALL voted for Obama. I even asked them one day while I was in there before the election in which they were wearing Obama pins, is that not again what your church teaches morally and I got a no we have the freedom to vote how we want. Well, I understand that we as Americans have freedoms and I respect anybody and their rights to vote how they want. I have a grandfather serve in World War II. A step-dad serve in Vietnam. A brother that served Iraq. They served for my freedom to have a voice of my own. But I still have a consious also. Anyway, just my 2 cents on all this. I hope this was the point you were trying to make and hope I did overstep my point as a protestant and that we do have morals also.

 

[slyboots]

None of our family voted for Obama/Biden.
And please oh please do not try to say it is because of his race because Joe Biden and I are of the same racial background. I would not have voted for him for any reason.

No to abortion
No to same sex marriage
Yes to true justice as is set out in our constitution
No to monetary redistribution

 

[rolltidefan]

None of our family voted for Obama/Biden.
And please oh please do not try to say it is because of his race because Joe Biden and I are of the same racial background. I would not have voted for him for any reason.

His race had nothing to do with why I didn’t vote for him. I voted against him for the above reasons I just stated. Never suggested that anybody that voted against him was because of his race. I would probably not doubt what that might not be the reason for why some didn’t. I personally don’t know of anybody though that this would be the case. But sure isn’t one of mine, seeing that many of my friends are African-American or alot of my friends are married to African-Americans. Also my son would not have been happy with me at all if I have voted for him. We had heard on more than one occasion that he wants gun rights taken away. I live in Alabama! Rednecks are not going to be without our guns! lol Again this is an amendment right that my family fought in wars for. So, there was other reasons, but not race.

No to abortion
No to same sex marriage
Yes to true justice as is set out in our constitution
No to monetary redistribution

AMEN to the above!

 

[Georgia]

None of our family voted for Obama/Biden.
And please oh please do not try to say it is because of his race because Joe Biden and I are of the same racial background. I would not have voted for him for any reason.

No to abortion
No to same sex marriage
Yes to true justice as is set out in our constitution
No to monetary redistribution

The same is true with my family. We could not care less what the candidate’s racial background may be, but we do care about policy matters. The first is abortion. You simply cannot accept Mr. Obama’s wide-open abortion policies and call yourself Christian. It bothers me that I will be forced to give up part of my earnings next week for taxes that will fund abortions.

I think that many Catholics voted for Mr. Obama because they saw his redistribution of income as charity. We don’t. Charity in our view is the willing gifting of things or money you own. It is not using the government to extract money from others to pay for your causes. James Madison made a point in saying that he could not find an article in the Constitution that gave the Congress the power to appropriate public money for benevolence. If the father of the Constitution could not, I wonder how others do. Yet when the government takes that power, it will fund things that are politically expedient, regardless of the morality.

 

[Jan_Bolbot]

We American Catholics live in a multi-religious society and American political culture has never and will never be dominated by one religious culture. The positives of this have long outweighed the negatives since America, despite a history of anti-Catholicism, has been a beacon of religious freedom in the world as both Holy Fathers John Paul II and Benedict XVI have recognized.

Back in the days before the “smoke of Satan” wafted in, Catholics had a Catholic culture within their parishes. While we shouldn’t idealize this, it was a very strong aid to the faith, resulted in numerous vocations, and a wide range of lay activities. Those of us who are cradle Catholics can ask a parent or grandparent what this was like. Latent anti-Catholic prejudice, ethnic solidarity (parishes were often organized along ethnic lines), and neighborhood stability helped reinforce this strong parish culture. Another critical aspect of this culture was the active presence of more than one priest in a parish and a school with religious sisters. (When those parish convents closed and the sisters retired or went away we sure lost a lot.) People prayed together and stayed together.

I don’t know if we can ever recreate that world. Clergy are fewer, have more duties, and are more stressed and often isolated from the social worlds of their parishioners. (How many of us have invited Father over for dinner lately?) People are often in their own social circles based on work or children’s extra-curricular activities. (How many of our closest friends also belong to our parish?) Still, there are lots of good activities parishes can offer to bring people back in for more than just Mass or sacraments. John Paul II was very clear that culture, not politics or economics is the driving force of human affairs. Once we abdicate building a Christian culture beyond our homes, we cede the playing field to the culture of death.

JB