Flat out wrong about what? He asserts that, contrary to official spokesmen who talk about how wonderfully the new liturgy has been received, the statistics on Mass attendance in Western countries do not bear out this rosy picture.The statistics are widely avaliable, and have been for some time. I make not conjecture; he is flat out wrong … is so patently ignoring any and all other factors acting on the issue.
What free fall? In 1955, attendance at Mass within the last 7 days (reported) was at about 74%, which was the peak level, according to Gallup polls noted in CARA statistics; in 1965 it was at 67%; in 1975 it was at about 56%; in 1987 about 49%; in 1992 down to about 46%; in the Jubilee year it was recorded at 52% and in 2004 it was back down to 40%.
…All the graph shows is a gradual reduction in the number of people attedning Mass; but free fall? One would expect a sharp drop and it simply isn’t there. In addition, attendance had dropped 7% from the peak before the Mass changes were made.
…there are no polls showing a massive drop. Nor are there polls showing a precipitous drop. It is gradual over the years.
And I deny that it was a tremendous drop. It was a gradual drop that started before the Council, continues while the Council was in session (and interestingly, parallels the acceptance of the Pill), and has continued gradualy, with periodic upswings, to a leveling of in the 33 to 35% range.
I disagree with those who are particularly focused on the differences between the EF and the OF, who attempt to blame each and every problem the Church has on changes in the liturgy. They have an agenda, they are not scholars (if they were, they would or should know of other statistics), and they have a point they want to prove. Frankly, if their articles were published in scholarly journals, they would be shredded for all they are ignoring. That is, if they could even get published. Where they get published is in magazines who cater to their way of thinking.
And if their premise that there is such a drop after the liturgy change were true (and the statistics don’t show a precipitous drop), how do they explain the drop before the Mass change? From Gallup, the peak was 74% at the highest, down to 67% in 1965. That is a 7% drop in all Catholics not attending; but it is about a 9.5% drop in those actually attending in 1957-1958.
You want more statistics? Per CARA: those born before 1943 attending weekly, or once or a few times per year is 73%. Those 18 to 30 is 56%. That makes no sense if the pre Vatican 2 group is the one to be shocked and affronted with the changes in the Mass. Per CARA: weekly attendance, pre 1943 is 52%; 18 to 30 is 21%.
Pure conjecture? Or did I just use a pin to let the air out of your article? I think the latter.
And as I said, just in case you slid over it; the drop off in attendance at Mass correlates much more closely with the introduction of the Pill than it does the change in the Mass, as it starts at about the same time; in comes the Pill, and Mass attendance starts to drop, before any changes in the Mass are made.
No, otjm, I had no idea your reference was to a scholarly research article since I’m such an idiot. Thanks for clearing that up for me.I am not too computer smart or friendly, so I took your challenge.
On the first hit - I just tried Presbyterian churchs (USA) - did I say on my first hit? Yes, On my first hit, I got the following: Measuring Church Attendance: a Further Look, by John P Markum, references Hadaway, et al. (that is a shorthand note to a scholarly reserch article, jusut in case you didn’t know).
Hadaway, et al. reported 36% of the Protestant population claimed attendance at a Saturday night or Sunday worship service, while actual average attendance for all in the county during the same period was below 20%.
And that was a scholarly journal being reviewed. Uh, if I can find it, maybe someone else can find others?
Pure conjecture? No, I am not making pure conjecture. But your writer has a point he truly believes in, and went looking for information he thought would support his position. I would suggest that if he had taken a scholarly approach, he would have found an absolute raft of information that would have called his thesis into serious question.
You may choose to believe anything your read; or you may choose to believe anything you read which supports your conjecture. Just because someone writes an article doesn’t mean that they have done good research.
Oh, and while I was at it, I found some more information. Perry Chang, Recent Changes in Membership and Attendance in Mainline Protestant Denominations (he is part of Research Services for Presbyterian Church (USA).
This does not parallel attendance at services from the 60’s onward; but is to your point that the Protestant churches are not seeing much change: loss of membership by percentage, 1994 - 2004:
But they are doing just fine, while the Catholic Church is spiraling out of control.
Not.
Average attendance in the same groups, 2004:
Granted this is for only a 10 year period, however, the comment that they are not seeing much change is not reflective of the facts.
Ah, but I was only full of pure conjecture.
Nearly accusing the writer of dishonesty? No, I don’t think he intended to be dishonest. I think he intended to prove a thesis, and went about it in a way that shows he knows little or nothing about research, or how to conduct research, or how to even find out what others have found and reported on.
He believes that the change in the liturgy had a damaging and devastating effect on the Church, and that attendance fell off dramatically because of it.
I would never posit that the change in the liturgy was organic, or well done, or even well introduced.
I would posit that the Church has been affected by a number of things, many of them eminating from outside the Church, and some serious ones within the Church. I would futher posit that the dumbing down of catechesis, the breakdown of the extended family and then the nuclear family, the introduction of the Pill and the rampant sexual revolution which still has not played itself out, and the loss of respect for authority which started with the Civil Rights movement, advanced with the Viet Nam war, and was compounded by the immediate reaction to Humanae Vitae have had as much if not more to do with the loss of people attending Mass as the changes in the liturgy. Your boyo is way too simplistic in his approach, and ignores a whole host of events that have impacted the Church. In short, he has an ax to grind. …
Brennan - this is precisely what I have been talking about all along. People just do not realize what a shock the implementation of the NO was. Look, I was a teenager during this period. I can tell you that the vast majority of people were appalled by the speed in which the changes were made and aghast at the changes which accompanied the liturgical changes.See here’s the disconnect. We are talking about Mass attendance. This obviously involves liturgy, and as the CARA graph shows, Mass attendance did drop steadily from 1965 to 1975 and beyond. So it would make sense to look at what event happened in 1965 to cause such a drop (and not just a fluctuation). It wasn’t the introduction of the Pill. Although I will say sin has consequences and the Pill has had terrible consequences for society.
I doesn’t make sense if the atendence was already dropping in the forties and fifties to look at 1965 as a watershed. What it could also mean is that some of the inovations that arose after 1965 were more a a symptom than a cause, not that it couldn’t be both.See here’s the disconnect. We are talking about Mass attendance. This obviously involves liturgy, and as the CARA graph shows, Mass attendance did drop steadily from 1965 to 1975 and beyond. So it would make sense to look at what event happened in 1965 to cause such a drop (and not just a fluctuation)…
Thanks brotherholf, it’s good to hear from someone who went through the changes (I didn’t). I wonder if every Catholic had to make the decision either to stay or go. And I’d agree that probably many didn’t speak out with any protest, but stopped going, while others decided to stay.Brennan - this is precisely what I have been talking about all along. People just do not realize what a shock the implementation of the NO was. Look, I was a teenager during this period. I can tell you that the vast majority of people were appalled by the speed in which the changes were made and aghast at the changes which accompanied the liturgical changes.
There were no statistical studies done back then to my knowledge but I do believe that there were sizeable numbers of people who simply voted with their feet.
I don’t think that anyone who did not live through the change has any appreciation of the impact from going from singing “To Jesus Christ Our Sovereign King” on one Sunday to guitars and “Sons of God, Hear His Holy Word” the next. I was in high school when this happened and I didn’t like it. Can you imagine what my parents felt?
So, you had a group of people who voted with their feet and you had a group of people who submitted to the authority of HMC but always remembered how it was before. Had the Holy Father’s Motu Proprio been introduced in 1977, I really believe that the results would be far, far, different.
Hi pnewton,I doesn’t make sense if the atendence was already dropping in the forties and fifties to look at 1965 as a watershed. What it could also mean is that some of the inovations that arose after 1965 were more a a symptom than a cause, not that it couldn’t be both.
Where do you get this idea that only “physical methods” were condemned in Casti Connubii? Any method was condemned. Only virtuous continence is allowed (as the Church permits). You have invented this “physical methods” only idea.You are looking at it all with 20-20 hindsight. As a matter of fact, physical methods had been condemned; when the research on the Pill first started, it was not as a means of birth control; that came after a good deal of research.
ojtm:
- And now, Venerable Brethren, we shall explain in detail the evils opposed to each of the benefits of matrimony. First consideration is due to the offspring, which many have the boldness to call the disagreeable burden of matrimony and which they say is to be carefully avoided by married people not through virtuous continence (which Christian law permits in matrimony when both parties consent) but by frustrating the marriage act. Some justify this criminal abuse on the ground that they are weary of children and wish to gratify their desires without their consequent burden. Others say that they cannot on the one hand remain continent nor on the other can they have children because of the difficulties whether on the part of the mother or on the part of family circumstances.
- But no reason, however grave, may be put forward by which anything intrinsically against nature may become conformable to nature and morally good. Since, therefore, the conjugal act is destined primarily by nature for the begetting of children, those who in exercising it deliberately frustrate its natural power and purpose sin against nature and commit a deed which is shameful and intrinsically vicious.
- Small wonder, therefore, if Holy Writ bears witness that the Divine Majesty regards with greatest detestation this horrible crime and at times has punished it with death. As St. Augustine notes, “Intercourse even with one’s legitimate wife is unlawful and wicked where the conception of the offspring is prevented. Onan, the son of Juda, did this and the Lord killed him for it.”[45]
And who were these people who “felt” this way?And there were many who felt that the Pill was different, because it did not act as a physical barrier, but rather acted to regulate the woman’s cycle.
I understand that…except it is irrelevant. Pope Pius XII allowed it as a medical treatment only.You need to understand that the research that has been done in the last 50 years has given scientists a bit more information than they had in the late 1950’s. Because the Pill was so different than previous means of birth control, there were a lot of questions.
“Appeared to be different” to whom? Again, who were these people who “felt” this way?You are preaching to the choir. I am well aware of the status of Moral Theology prior to the introduction of the Pill. They all addressed issues that appeared to be different.
You keep repeating this…who were they? Intelligent and well educated could mean just about anyone…who were they and how could they not understand what was clearly taught in Casti Connubii?He did not let confusion reign; your answer borders on flippant. There were many people, fairly intelligent people, fairly well educated people, who were of the opinion that the Pill was so different from other means of birth control as to make it acceptable.
Wasn’t Wojtija on the commission that studied the question?We can both agree that they were wrong, and the comments in HV were prescient to the point of being prophetic; tragically and truly prophetic. I have not bone to pick with HV, other than that I think that approaching it in a neo-scholastic fashion instead of a personalistic and phenomenological prospective left many with a feeling that what had happened is that the same “old tired arguements” had been trotted out again. I think the genius of JP2, as exhibited in the Theology of the Body, presents the issue in a way that people get it, a whole lot faster than from a scholastic approach. In fact, the Polish bishops including JP@ when he was bishop had a good bit of (name removed by moderator)ut to the formation of HV; but only some of it was used.
That can be dismissed, of course. Is that what these “intelligent and well educated” people were saying?The flippant and yet very pained response of many was “if men had babies, the men in Rome would decide this differently”.
Paul VI also managed to confuse the issue concerning the primary and secondary purposes of marriage. The leveling of these ends gave additional comfort to thosse who disagreed with HV’s conclusion on ABC.And as much as I would prefer to see the issue addressed differently that P6 did, given the status of timing and events, I am not too sure how many more would have listened. Part of the time it took to resolve the issue was done for the very reason that Rome was very concerned that a short quick answer would simply imply they had made no effort to hear out the matter, but had instead approached it as if there was obviously no question.
No…the orthodox man understood Pope Pius XI in 1931. He understood that any frustration of the marriage act was intrinsically evil and would NEVER be permitted.We now have over 40 years of experience of ignoring HV; and the things that P6 predicited have come true with a vengance. It is simple to Monday morning quaterback, with 40 years of experience, and say “Well, it was obvious all along”. It wasn’t then, to very many. And to impugn the honesty and integrity of the many who questioned it is to border on judgementalism.
NFP does not frustrated the conjugal act. It is a method of continance in certain periods.Knowlege of a woman’s cycle was nowhere near as advanced; it was not for no reason that the Rhythm method was known as Vatican roulette.
None of this was a problem with the teachings of the Church.Part of the revolt against HV was because there had been questions as to whether or not the Pill, because it was not mechanical, was different and allowable; part because the Church never acts immediately when a serious question comes up, and the issue brewed for some time; part because the majority position of the commission was leaked early; part because there was already in place a serious breakdown in acceptance of much of any authority (and that was hardly a Church issue; it had its source in the political world). There were issues in the Church, because those with an agenda - in short, the attitude that oppressive Church authority had been called to end with Vatican 2 documents (a whole 'nother issue) and many were on the verge of exercising their autonomy - particularly among many theologians. HV ended up being the trigger for a hugh rebellion within the Church to legitimate authority.
It was an issue that had been brewing for decades; from the chaos of the late 1800s and the early 1900s, the Vatican had taken on the appearance to many (and not without some reason) as isolated, embattled, embittered, autocratic, authoritarian; the list goes on. In a legitimate attempt to deal with Modernism and the remnants of what many saw as a tremendous loss of authority within the world after the French revolution onward, good, solid legitimate theologians were silenced, and reputations were destroyed. Some of those silenced theologians were later rehabilitated, but the whole process left many theologians more than a little wary of the power that had been wielded. Because of the Church’s own over-reaching and over-reacting to problems, the stage was set for a revolt. We will suffer from the whiplash.
My response is one that looks at the known teaching of the Church at the time. Only modernists and those with liberal tendencies could think that the position of the Church might change on something that was taught as intrinsically evil.So, I don’t question in the least the decision of HV. I wa a young adult when that hit; and I have seen the fallout ever since. But it is all too easy to give a simplistic response to the issue, and fail to understand anything of what was going on at the time.
Seriously? What about that three year, seventy person commission? I don’t know what your definition of “orthodox” is, but I assume the Pope didn’t appoint anyone who was not. Even if you deny that the majority of the commission thought that NFP was not the only moral form of birth control, the mere fact that two Popes thought they needed a commission of theologians to study the idea makes it hard to believe it was firmly rooted.You have provided no evidence that there was any serious discussion among orthodox theologians at the time that some artifical method of birth control might be less than intrinsically evil.
TMC,Seriously? What about that three year, seventy person commission? I don’t know what your definition of “orthodox” is, but I assume the Pope didn’t appoint anyone who was not. Even if you deny that the majority of the commission thought that NFP was not the only moral form of birth control, the mere fact that two Popes thought they needed a commission of theologians to study the idea makes it hard to believe it was firmly rooted.
What strikes me the most:Thanks brotherholf, it’s good to hear from someone who went through the changes (I didn’t). I wonder if every Catholic had to make the decision either to stay or go. And I’d agree that probably many didn’t speak out with any protest, but stopped going, while others decided to stay.
I don’t think the workings of the commission were ever released. All we have is the word of the participants that HV was not what they recommended. There are any number of theological arguments on both sides of the issue; there are a couple lively threads on the topic right now.TMC,
I am asking this…what were these “theological arguments” and who was making them? Quote them and let us see if there was any serious arguments of if they were just the wishful thinking of a group of liberals and modernists.
Quote them. Let’s see the arguments.
SFD
Good question.What strikes me the most:
All these Catholics who just stopped going to mass after the Vatican II changes, I’m wondering what the general justification was.
I presume we’re talking about the more traditional, by-the-book Catholics of the day, right? The ones who just stopped attending, did they also stop believing that missing mass on Sundays was a mortal sin? It seems contradictory if they did. I was raised in the 80’s and 90’s and always knew that it was a mortal sin to miss mass. (I joke sometimes, I don’t miss mass unless I’m dead. But it’s not only a joke…) Was it that some of them fell into the error of SSPX, ie: the Church left us…
Any thoughts on what was going on here?
Ottaviani points out that for this reason the larger part of canon law is unchangeable:"… Billot well says in De Ecclesia Christi, Rome, 1927, p. 526, illustrating the comparison between the characteristics of the constitutional law of the Church and the forms of civil régimes: ‘If in the Church there is from God not only power in general, but also a form and constitution of rule in detail, it follows finally that no place remains there for those changes, so many and so great, which elsewhere take place according to the variations of times, events, or whatever human circumstances. But because the Church herself is intended by Christ to endure to the end, she will also infallibly retain to the end the same constitution and hierarchy which she received from her founder.’
Since our specific area of study relates to the offices of the Church, this testimony is particularly valuable, showing as it does that the nature and constitution of Holy Church are matters of divine law.“Therefore, public law precedes private law in order and in excellence; the more so, that the former is for the most part divine, while the latter was, in greater part, established by human authority. Consequently, public law is, in its chief part, immutable, constant, lasting to the end of the world, because the Church will stand until that time, in the form in which she was founded by Christ …”
SFD"Jesus Christ, the divine founder of the Church, could indeed have left many things to the decision of men in regard to the social organisation of the Church: nevertheless, in fact He did not so leave them, but He Himself willed to establish all things which regard the fundamental constitution and organisation of the Church in so far as it is a perfect society. Consequently the principal part of the public law is divine, containing the immutable and permanent laws concerning the nature of the church, her authority and teaching office … Examples of divine public law are: the statutes by which the Church is granted full and independent legislative, judicial, and coercive power in affairs which in any manner pertain to her end; also, the statutes which pertain to the primacy of jurisdiction of the Roman Pontiff over the whole Church, and the constitution of the sacred hierarchy; similarly, those by which the Church is granted the faculty, free and independent from any power, of acquiring, keeping and administering temporal goods in order to achieve ends proper to herself. Examples of human public law are: norms relative to the institution and rights of patriarchal sees; certain rights contained in concordats; certain norms concerning the government of the Church during the vacancy of the Apostolic See and the election of the Roman Pontiff."
Well, what are these arguments and where can one actually find them? I have heard this many times and no one has ever produced them.I don’t think the workings of the commission were ever released. All we have is the word of the participants that HV was not what they recommended. There are any number of theological arguments on both sides of the issue; there are a couple lively threads on the topic right now.
I can’t speak for anyone but myself. Yes, the idea of missing Mass as a mortal sin weighed heavily on my mind. I didn’t have a problem when I was in the Navy because there was no singing in the NO Mass. When I was discharged, I knew of a parish in New Orleans which had a 25 minute NO without singing. When I went to grad school in Baton Rouge, I found that the Cathedral Parish was traditional - it may have been NO but the Asperges and Vidi Aquam were still sung.What strikes me the most:
All these Catholics who just stopped going to mass after the Vatican II changes, I’m wondering what the general justification was.
I presume we’re talking about the more traditional, by-the-book Catholics of the day, right? The ones who just stopped attending, did they also stop believing that missing mass on Sundays was a mortal sin? It seems contradictory if they did. I was raised in the 80’s and 90’s and always knew that it was a mortal sin to miss mass. (I joke sometimes, I don’t miss mass unless I’m dead. But it’s not only a joke…) Was it that some of them fell into the error of SSPX, ie: the Church left us…
Any thoughts on what was going on here?
We know that the baby boomer hippies are the ones that drastically stopped going to Mass in the 60’s and 70’s. The pre Vatican II crowd continued attending Mass at a high level. SO, if we blame the change to a more “liberal” vernacular liturgy then shouldn’t the traditional folks have left and not the hippies??? This makes no sense. The hippies didn’t leave the Church because they were yearning for the traditional latin Mass.What strikes me the most:
All these Catholics who just stopped going to mass after the Vatican II changes, I’m wondering what the general justification was.
I presume we’re talking about the more traditional, by-the-book Catholics of the day, right? The ones who just stopped attending, did they also stop believing that missing mass on Sundays was a mortal sin? It seems contradictory if they did. I was raised in the 80’s and 90’s and always knew that it was a mortal sin to miss mass. (I joke sometimes, I don’t miss mass unless I’m dead. But it’s not only a joke…) Was it that some of them fell into the error of SSPX, ie: the Church left us…
Any thoughts on what was going on here?
I don’t know that we can characterize everyone who left as “hippies.” I certainly think the more devoted traditional Catholics would have stayed regardless because they believed in the Real Presence and would realize that changes to the liturgy are no excuse to leave no matter what they thought of them.We know that the baby boomer hippies are the ones that drastically stopped going to Mass in the 60’s and 70’s. The pre Vatican II crowd continued attending Mass at a high level. SO, if we blame the change to a more “liberal” vernacular liturgy then shouldn’t the traditional folks have left and not the hippies??? This makes no sense. The hippies didn’t leave the Church because they were yearning for the traditional latin Mass.
Thanks for the answer.In other words, if you radically alter what previously had been considered the Church’s greatest treasure (the liturgy), it is not surprising that many Catholics will erroneously conclude that dogma is up for grabs as well (and can be changed or minimized).
Well, the reason I asked was because several people have brought up the traditional, old-school Catholics who stopped going to mass out of frustration with the VII changes. That suprised me, and I was curious how these people might have reconciled the whole missing mass = mortal sin thing.We know that the baby boomer hippies are the ones that drastically stopped going to Mass in the 60’s and 70’s. The pre Vatican II crowd continued attending Mass at a high level. SO, if we blame the change to a more “liberal” vernacular liturgy then shouldn’t the traditional folks have left and not the hippies??? This makes no sense. The hippies didn’t leave the Church because they were yearning for the traditional latin Mass.