Catholics are more supportive of gay and lesbian rights than the general public and other Christians? Surely this can’t be right:
• Nearly three-quarters of Catholics favor either allowing gay and lesbian people to marry (43%) or
allowing them to form civil unions (31%). Only 22% of Catholics say there should be no legal
recognition of a gay couple’s relationship.
• Nearly three-quarters (73%) of Catholics favor laws that would protect gay and lesbian people against
discrimination in the workplace; 63% of Catholics favor allowing gay and lesbian people to serve
openly in the military; and 6-in-10 (60%) Catholics favor allowing gay and lesbian couples to adopt
children.
• Less than 4-in-10 Catholics give their own church top marks (a grade of an A or a B) on its handing
of the issue of homosexuality; majorities of members of most other religious groups give their
churches high marks.
• A majority of Catholics (56%) believe that sexual relations between two adults of the same gender is
not a sin.
(Via: Echurch Blog)
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:07 pm
It could be right. Many “Catholics” I know, do not believe but consider themselves Catholic because they were raised Catholic: Catholicism as a culture not a religion. I suspect the numbers would be vastly different if they added church attendance, as a surrogate for belief, as one of the dimensions.
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:15 pm
Mike’s absolutely right: CINOs are indistinguishable from the unchurched in matters like this.
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:21 pm
[...] According to polls (H/T), Catholics are more supportive of gay rights than the general public: • Nearly three-quarters of [...]
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:24 pm
Yes, I too am convinced that there is a great deal of difference in attitudes and beliefs in the “only-in-name” Catholics and what I would call the faithful Catholics. I wish the two groups would be separated for survey purposes.
Cheers from Canada.
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:35 pm
I’m afraid it could easily be right. Non-Catholics typically have a very skewed view of actual Catholics, and what they believe. Because their view of the Catholic Church is based on what the media say, and because the media are heavily biased towards the biases of Baby Boomers, they have this strange idea that the Catholic Church is obsessed with human sexuality. The truth is very different. At the parish level, the Church’s teachings on sex and sexuality are rarely if ever presented and explained. I have a Catholic friend I used to argue with all the time about gay marriage, which he accepted. He goes to mass fairly regularly, and sees no reason at all why he should be considered a lesser Catholic because he rejects the Church’s teaching on homosexuality, or any number of things. I kept trying to point out that he is functionally a liberal Protestant, but he thinks I’m a fundamentalist. He sees no reason at all why his personal conscience should be guided by the Church’s teachings. We finally quit talking about it because there was no way to reconcile ourselves on the subject. He sees the Church’s teachings as optional, while I see them as authoritative for Catholics.
The thing I find so telling about all this is not that he rejects the Church’s teachings, but that he thinks this is the most ordinary thing in the world. He’s young, in his 30s, so has no experience of having made any sort of principled stand against the Church’s authority. He never experienced the Church as having any special authority in the first place. And where would he have done? Not in the parish, with its happy-clappy catechesis. Not from the priests who formed him, who almost certainly called his congregation to do nothing more than be nice to others. Not from his parents, who thought they were doing enough to go to mass and trust the institution to educate their children in the faith.
I’m not an Evangelical, but I admire the Evangelicals so much for being far more serious about engaging with the moral teachings of the faith than most of the rest of us. I look to prominent Catholic writers and scholars, men like Robbie George, and see in them the sharpest minds of our time. These are men and women formed by the authentic teaching and tradition of the Roman Catholic Church. Agree with them or not, they are thinking as Catholics. But there is a vast chasm between them and most American Catholics, who are hard to distinguish from Mainline Protestants, except that they are less white and have crappier music.
March 23rd, 2011 | 12:54 pm
If you slog through half the full report and come to page 11 you will discover that there is a large gap in attitudes between those who attend Mass weekly and those who do not. Among those who follow that particular precept of the Church, the percent who support redefining marriage is 26 percent. Strangely enough that breakdown did not make it into the summaries of the data.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:06 pm
In a certain sense, this is not too surprising. My co-religionists are often very confused, or uncaring, or simply dissenting.
The not-surprising part comes from noting that 54% of “Catholics” voted for Obama. If Catholics had done their duty, our land would not have been saddled with the curse of this empty suit’s toxic administration.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:14 pm
That’s an excellent point, Kyle. But if the only Catholics who should count as Catholic are those who actually practice their faith by fulfilling their Sunday mass obligation, the Catholic Church is a lot smaller than people think (and the Church claims). According to a 2008 study by Georgetown, one authorized by the USCCB, only 23 percent of American Catholics go to mass weekly. That means there are about 20 million Catholics, by that standard, than the 68 million in the official number.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:26 pm
If “Catholic” is defined as those who accept the spiritual authority of the Roman Catholic Church and who are familiar with and accept its official teaching as expressed in The Catechism of the Catholic Church, then surveying Catholics on their views regarding homosexuality (and contraception and abortion) would obtain dramatically different results than does surveying a group that includes those who identify themselves as “Catholic” due to their having been brought up in a cultural environment that included the exterior trappings of Catholicism, not because they accept the Church’s spiritual authority and have given their intellectual assent to its official teachings. Surveys that do not make this distinction clearly reveal that Roman Catholicism in the U.S. is a much smaller phenomenon than most people think it is.
The American Catholic Church is in a great situation: They don’t have to seek out those who might become Roman Catholics – multitudes of such people are among those attending their Church services every Sunday. Maybe the problem is that many bishops are quite content with such people being American – not Roman – Catholics.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:31 pm
I am a 56 year-old Catholic who has belonged to several parishes over the years. I cannot recall being exposed to the Church’s teaching on marriage and sexuality from the Sunday pulpit even once during that time.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:34 pm
Savoranola, in an important sense every baptized person “counts” as Catholic. My point is not that people who fail to meet what the Catechism describes as “the very necessary minimum in the spirit of prayer and moral effort” should not be counted or studied. It’s just that the headline is misleading. The real story – that practicing Catholics are far less supportive than the culture as a whole of redefining marriage while those who have less connection to their faith are more supportive than the culture as a whole – is much less newsworthy and paints a much different picture than what we’re being given in the breathless headlines.
March 23rd, 2011 | 1:37 pm
Ever since the Legion of Decency enraged Hollywood, there have been long media and activist efforts to make Catholics perceive Catholic positions on decency and public morals as things only Protestant extremists (or out-of-touch bishops) get upset about. That’s why it’s so important for ordinary lay Catholics to take a stand.
March 23rd, 2011 | 2:36 pm
Tony saids: “I wish the two groups would be separated for survey purposes.”
If only. The two groups are not two groups but a continuum, just like you would expect from a faith that calls itself universal. Adding the belief dimension, though you need a surrogate, is the only way of handling this. Kyle notes that the survey included such a surrogate, but it was not noted in the general press. So the press gives us a distorted view of the survey. What’s new?
I can imagine a Jewish continuum that was even wider, but then Judaism is a culture and a religion, whereas Catholicism has only ever been a religion. The cultural aspects that get associated with it are always local. I doubt there are many who self-identify as Evangelical purely for cultural reasons. And with, say, Unitarian-Universalists you would have the problem of identifying what their shared beliefs were.
The media, as a whole, simply do not understand religion. That is their failing, not ours.
March 23rd, 2011 | 3:22 pm
Two words: terrible catechesis.
March 23rd, 2011 | 4:01 pm
Chesterton: “The Catholic Church is the only thing that can keep a man from becoming a child of his age.” (or words to that effect). That was before “the spirit of Vatican II” impelled us to become the VANGUARD of the age!
March 23rd, 2011 | 4:23 pm
“Surely this can’t be right”
Only an Evangelical would think so.
March 23rd, 2011 | 4:25 pm
“I’m not an Evangelical, but I admire the Evangelicals so much for being far more serious about engaging with the moral teachings of the faith than most of the rest of us. ”
Only a Catholic would think so.
March 23rd, 2011 | 5:33 pm
Mind you, if this is going to be used as a way to sift “real” Catholics from CINO, be careful. Lots of American Catholics approve of preemptive war in a way that is in violation of what the Church teaches. Then there’s contraception, where 100% compliance with Church teaching is not exactly commonplace. Then there’s many aspects of Church social teaching that American Catholics love to ignore – or, if confronted, quibble to death. Et cet.
The common thread across the ideological spectrum is that We Are Real Catholics and Those Folks Over There Are Not Really Catholics (They’re Really Protestants, Unlike Us), and the Media should only pay attention to Us.
For some reason, Mother Church is less eager to play this particular game than many of her members.
March 23rd, 2011 | 5:44 pm
Btw, for Catholics attending Mass at least weekly, the report indicates that 64% support either marriage or civil unions for gay people.
March 23rd, 2011 | 6:50 pm
“Only an Evangelical would think so.”
“Only a Catholic would think so.”
Only Stuart would say so.
What exactly is your problem? What is this contempt that spills so easily from your mouth?
You’re so proud of your knowledge of history and of how very demanding it is to be Orthodox and do all the fasts and learn all the chants, but has any of this work penetrated your soul? It’s Lent, after all. Time to come in from the dark.
I know, I know. I’ll say it so you won’t have to. “Only a Methodist would think so.”
I’ll go turn off the lights now.
March 23rd, 2011 | 8:16 pm
It should also be noted that the Church does teach against homosexuality but does not comment directly on whether we should be allowed to discriminate against homosexuals in the workplace or in the military. So there would certainly be understandable debate about this.
In addition, from a public morality standpoint there is a difference between civil unions and marriage, and there are some morally conservative Catholics who believe that civil unions could be defended in some circumstances, especially if “real” marriage occurs in the Church, not the courthouse.
March 23rd, 2011 | 9:00 pm
In, I believe, SALT OF THE EARTH, the Holy Father (then, of course, Cardinal Ratzinger) observed that when Protestants and Catholics live in proximity, Catholics become more Protestant, but Protestants do not become more Catholic.
As a convert, that’s been my observation as well. I laughed when I read it!
Recently a cradle Catholic gently admonished me when I referred to myself as a Catholic rather than more generically as a Christian. I didn’t pursue her views on abortion or marriage at that point. It’s difficult enough to live the faith.
March 23rd, 2011 | 9:09 pm
“Only Stuart would say so.”
A dirty job, but someone has to do it. Why not me?
“What exactly is your problem? What is this contempt that spills so easily from your mouth?”
What’s your problem, Michael, that you so easily take offense? Evangelicals do think Catholics walk in lock-step; Catholics do think Evangelicals take the Gospel more seriously than they do. Neither, of course, is true. The Catholics have gleefully ignored what the hierarchy teaches for centuries (make that millennia); Evangelicals give lip service to the Gospel and can probably quote scripture a lot more glibly than most Catholics, but their divorce and illegitimacy rates indicate familiarity with scripture does not equate to obeying the commandments.
Discuss, if you like.
March 23rd, 2011 | 9:11 pm
“Catholics become more Protestant, but Protestants do not become more Catholic.”
As Samuel Huntington said, American Catholics are Protestants who like Mary and go to Mass.
March 23rd, 2011 | 9:23 pm
Joe,
Here’s a link that might provide for you a better understanding of these numbers:
http://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/otc.cfm?id=789
March 23rd, 2011 | 10:48 pm
On an Orthodox website covering a current controversyin the Orthodox Church in America (my church), someone links to a very strong essay by a chaste gay Catholic living in Houston who talks about how he was deceived by the ex-priest John McNeill into thinking active homosexuality was compatible with the Church’s teaching. This part jumped out at me:
Over the years, I have attended various gay and gay-friendly church services. All of them shared one characteristic in common: a tacit agreement never to say a word from the pulpit — or from any other location for that matter — suggesting that there ought to be any restrictions on human sexual behavior. If anyone reading this is familiar with Dignity or Integrity or the Metropolitan Community churches or, for that matter, mainline Protestantism and most of post-Vatican II Catholicism, let me ask you one question: When was the last time you heard a sermon on sexual ethics? Have you ever heard a sermon on sexual ethics? I take it for granted that the answer is negative. Do our priests and pastors honestly believe that Christians in America are not in need of sermons on sexual ethics?
In my 13 years as a churchgoing Catholic, I never once heard a sermon on sexual ethics. In my five years as a churchgoing Orthodox, I have never once heard a sermon on sexual ethics. There is so much brokenness all around us, homosexual and heterosexual, from a vast falling-away from the liberating teaching of the Church on human sexuality. I can’t speak for Evangelical Protestants, but based on my own experience, Catholic and Orthodox parish priests think we’re all living lives of saintly chastity, and do not need to be instructed or helped on this front.
March 24th, 2011 | 1:45 am
I see it as another attempt by the atheist media to discredit religion by portraying it as just another personal preference with no real connection to thought or behavior.
March 24th, 2011 | 2:13 am
I am apparently the only Catholic on the board who can distinctly remember not only hearing a homily on sexual ethics, but I can even remember the parish, the priest (diocesan), and the year. In a complete coincidence, the priest was murdered one year later.
March 24th, 2011 | 6:34 am
I see it as another attempt by the atheist media to discredit religion by portraying it as just another personal preference with no real connection to thought or behavior.
Huh? It’s a study. Don’t blame the messenger. Besides, I think most people nowadays think of religion as a personal preference with no real connection to thought or behavior. I deplore this, but that’s the time we live in. If most people who identify as Catholics disagree with Catholic teaching, is that really the media’s fault? Come on.
March 24th, 2011 | 7:01 am
“In my 13 years as a churchgoing Catholic, I never once heard a sermon on sexual ethics.”
Alas, Rod, if only you had visited my Melkite Greek Catholic parish, Archimandrite Joseph would have given you an earful.
“In my five years as a churchgoing Orthodox, I have never once heard a sermon on sexual ethics.”
Did it occur to you, Rod, that if you want a sermon, you should go to a Protestant church. Catholic and Orthodox liturgy offers a “homily”, which is a reflection on the readings of the day. I think I know the Byzantine lectionary pretty well, so please tell me which reading you would use make sexual ethics the centerpiece on sexual morality. Even the great Chrysostom, in his homilies on Ephesians, focuses on the meaning of sacramental marriage and does not go into detail about what tab should or should not go into which slot.
Frederica Matthewes-Green, in her book “Facing East”, made a trenchant observation: modern Western Christianity is about making us feel good about ourselves, whereas Orthodoxy is about teaching us to grow up and stop acting like jerks. Part of growing up is not needing people to tell you what to do every moment of every day–and especially not to tell you to do something you ought to know is wrong in the first place.
If you think that it is necessary to harangue the faithful from the ambo, then it’s obvious most of the people at the Liturgy have not been living as Orthodox Christians in the first place. Because, if they had, then everything they did would lead them further into new life in Christ. Too often, though, being Orthodox is about being Greek, or Russian, or Ukrainian, or Rusyn, or Romanian or whatever. That’s the real problem right now.
March 24th, 2011 | 7:33 am
It seems to me that the Catholic Church in the USA (and much of the rest of the West) is functionally the same as the Episcopal Church, except that her bishops and priests publicly give lip service to Biblical norms on sexuality whereas TEC does not. There may be more gay clergy in the RCC than in TEC – I’m not sure. The laity seems to be every bit as liberal as TEC laity. There are pockets of conservatives, just as there are/were in the old mainlines. Given those facts, we should expect to see a continued loss of people over the decades just as in TEC/PCUSA/ELCA/UMC.
First Things, EWTN and Opus Dei are the exception, not the rule.
March 24th, 2011 | 9:58 am
The poll is fundamentally compromised, thanks to a gross error in defining its populations.
Tons of Americans either reject the faith of their rearing, or let it fall so far off their practical radar that it amounts to the same thing. This happens with Protestants and Catholics alike. However, only the LATTER continue to largely identify themselves with their family’s Church.
As a result, pollsters count lapsed Catholics as Catholics, but the corresponding “lapsed Protestants” are considered unchurched. Is it any wonder that the Catholic pollees are skewed in a latitudinarian direction?
March 24th, 2011 | 10:13 am
The results are from a survey and they don’t even mention sample size.
March 24th, 2011 | 11:29 am
[...] in point. This piece from eChurch blog (via First Things) I reprint the whole [...]
March 24th, 2011 | 3:17 pm
Hello, Stuart Koehl, Rod Dreher,
Stuart, you wrote:
“Did it occur to you, Rod, that if you want a sermon, you should go to a Protestant church. Catholic and Orthodox liturgy offers a “homily”, which is a reflection on the readings of the day.”
In an October 9th, 1998 address to the Bishops of the Episcopal Conference of the United States, JP II stated:
“The importance that preaching has assumed in Catholic worship since the Council means that priests and deacons should be trained to make good use of the Bible. But this also involves familiarity with the whole Patristic, theological and moral tradition, as well as a penetrating knowledge of their communities and of society in general. Otherwise the impression is given of a teaching without roots and without the universal application inherent in the Gospel message. The excellent synthesis of the Church’s doctrinal wealth contained in the Catechism of the Catholic Church has yet to be more widely felt as an influence on Catholic preaching.”
According to JP II’s statement, good biblical preaching is going to include catechesis, which is what, I believe, Rod is saying is lacking.
March 24th, 2011 | 3:37 pm
In the neck of the woods from which Rod and I hail, “catechesis” takes the form of mystagogy–initiation into the Holy Mysteries. This is done almost exclusively through the Liturgy, which is the font and the touchstone of theology. What the West tends to call “catechesis” the Greeks would have called “padeia”, which is best rendered as “religious education” in English, and best defined as “faith in search of understanding”. And padeia is best addressed outside of the Liturgy–in juvenile and adult education classes, in retreats, in Bible Study groups, and so forth.
But within the Liturgy, the homily has a specific mystagogic purpose, which is to expound upon the readings, themselves a mystical manifestation of God the Word in the form of the Word of God. Too often I have heard homilies go off on tangents that have nothing to do with the readings, at which point they degenerate into sermons, which may or may not have any relevance to the liturgical cycle.
March 24th, 2011 | 3:39 pm
Correction: the citation in my previous post was from JP II’s address to “THE BISHOPS OF THE EPISCOPAL CONFERENCE OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
(WASHINGTON, OREGON, IDAHO, MONTANA AND ALASKA)” which can be read in its entirety here:
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/speeches/1998/october/documents/hf_jp-ii_spe_19981009_ad-limina-usa-2_en.html
March 24th, 2011 | 4:46 pm
Hello again, Stuart,
You wrote:
“But within the Liturgy, the homily has a specific mystagogic purpose, which is to expound upon the readings, themselves a mystical manifestation of God the Word in the form of the Word of God.”
Yes, and “God the Word” as recorded in the “Word of God” engaged in teaching on marriage and chastity. His listeners didn’t go away thinking a real marriage could be consummated by two men or by two women, or thinking homosexual fornication was not sinful. Neither should those who listen to homiletical explanations of the Word of God today. If they do, then this essential, catechical aspect of the teaching of Christ as recorded in God’s Word is lacking in homiletics.
Quite frankly, many of those who regularly attend the Sunday liturgy do not attend adult education classes, Bible Study groups, or anything else that will further their understanding of the faith. Their religious education ended before they became adults – so they do not have an adult understanding of their faith. If their religious education isn’t completed by liturgical homiletics, it will be “completed” by their being immersed in the thinking of the world the rest of the week.
JP II knew what he was talking about.
March 24th, 2011 | 6:40 pm
“Yes, and “God the Word” as recorded in the “Word of God” engaged in teaching on marriage and chastity. ”
But the celebrant can’t just decide off the top of his head that today will be the day he discusses marriage and chastity. The celebrant is bound to tie his homily to the readings of the day, and if those don’t talk about marriage and chastity, or can’t reasonably be turned to that topic, then he’s just out of luck, and must wait until the appropriate time.
On the other hand, the object of all Christian life is seeking perfection in Christ, that we might share in the divine nature. Homilies that stress this point–and almost every reading lends itself to that theme–will naturally lead the attentive listener to conclude that chastity and mastery of the passions is an important part of the faith.
Beyond that, there is little a pastor can do, because of those who have eyes but do not see, and ears but do not hear.
March 24th, 2011 | 9:06 pm
“But the celebrant can’t just decide off the top of his head that today will be the day he discusses marriage and chastity.”
Homilies have plenty of leeway to include sermon stuff. The celebrant can decide at any time to talk about the budget, the parking lot, natural disasters, football, war and peace, his mother’s cooking, or people sneaking out after Communion, so I’m fairly sure he can talk about marriage and chastity.
Of course, his parishioners will probably throw a fit about it not being a fit subject for children’s ears or for a celibate to talk about. That’s the real reason we don’t hear more homilies about marriage and chastity.
March 25th, 2011 | 4:28 am
“Homilies have plenty of leeway to include sermon stuff. The celebrant can decide at any time to talk about the budget, the parking lot, natural disasters, football, war and peace, his mother’s cooking, or people sneaking out after Communion, so I’m fairly sure he can talk about marriage and chastity.”
Well, bad homilists can. Good homilists don’t. Bad liturgy is everywhere, which is one of the main problems.
March 25th, 2011 | 8:27 am
Stuart, I agree with the commenters who say that a homilist can find a way to relate the Church’s teaching on sexuality to many readings of the day. I heard a pro-gay priest in my parish in Fort Lauderdale (seriously, this old guy gave several sermons about the “sin of homophobia”) give a sermon about the dignity of labor and why we ought to be supporting the demands of local strikers. I didn’t like this priest, but his homily that day was excellent, and built credibly on the message implicit in that day’s readings, as well as Church teaching, to apply to a real-world situation in our community. I stopped him after mass and thanked him for challenging my conscience — and I meant it.
I don’t want priests to give homilies unsuitable for young ears, but there are ways to speak about these things that will be understood by mature ears. If priests aren’t talking about these things (hetero or homo) from the pulpit, they shouldn’t be surprised when polls show that their congregations hold opinions congruent with the American mainstream, but counter to Christian truth. The only place many Americans are ever going to hear a message counter to the libertine one transmitted by the media is Sunday morning. A homilist can hardly hope to compete with the media, but he has to try, and hope to at least plant seeds of doubt and contemplation in the consciences of those in his congregation with ears to hear. I think most of them are just scared to do this. They might be surprised, though, how much support they would get from their most faithful parishioners.
Anyway, Stuart, I have held back on posting because I do not intend to have an exchange with you if you cannot carry it out with mutual respect. I’ve noticed that you have a habit of insulting your interlocutors, and when called on it, take the position that you are just fearlessly speaking the truth. I would guess that you and I agree on most things, but when we disagree, I expect that you will challenge me with the same respect you have a right to expect from me.
March 25th, 2011 | 1:10 pm
Rod,
I really never gave much of a hoot what people think about me. If there is an argument to be made, lay it out straight. I’m a big boy, and can take it, and I assume most of my interlocutors are, too. Besides, I am a paragon of politeness as compared to someone like Cyril of Alexandria (not my favorite saint by any means). On the other hand, I will never, ever be “crunchy”. Sorry.
Now, it strikes me that you are far too pessimistic about our society, but then, I’m an historian who takes the opening lines of Peter Pan seriously: “This has happened before and it will all happen again”. I don’t pine for the golden age, because there never was one, and people tend to be just about as sinful in any given age. But there is a built in audience for “O tempora, O mores” lamentations, and people milk it for all they have.
One kind of tactic I abhor is the elevation of outliers to the norm: what you see on “Jersey Shore” does not reflect the way most people live, and the bed-hopping of “I am Charlotte Simmons” does not reflect the lives of most college students (to be honest, I think there was a lot more promiscuity in my days at Georgetown University than there is today).
A second is the invidious comparison–that is, comparing the pristine ideal of something against the grubby reality of something else, whether it is a particular time, or culture or Church. Just saying.
My own preference in homiletics is to hew closely to the texts, and to stress the message of living and growing in holiness, of which sexual morality is but one aspect. We are whole persons, not aggregations of our parts. Besides, it tends to distort the meaning and purpose of the texts if we subvert them to our own interests.
Take, for example, the periscope on the Samaritan Woman. Here is a woman who says she has no husband, and Christ says, “You are right–you have had five, and the man with whom you are living now is not your husband”. No doubt, a homilist could turn this into a discussion of the indissoluability of marriage and the evils of adultery and fornication. But is that really what the passage is about? Or is it rather about the woman’s encounter with Christ, her recognition of Him as the Messiah, and the metanoia that she and the people of her village undergo as a result of this epiphany?
Metropolitan Kallistos like to tell a story about the eminent British historian Macauley, who disliked the long sermons the vicar would give. He came home one Sunday to complain to his aged mother, saying, “If I had my way, my only sermon would be, ‘Good people, you know what you are supposed to do. Now do it’”.
Basically, that’s the position we are in today. The people in the pews (assuming we’re not standing) know full well that fornication, adultery and sodomy are wrong. They aren’t going to change their behavior because the priest harangues them about it. This doesn’t work–and it has never worked, unless you think that promiscuity, fornication and adultery were less common in the past than they are today.
The principal difference between today and the past is the Revolt of the Elites (to steal the title of Christopher Lasch’s excellent book). In the past, society’s leaders may have had the morals of stoats, but they understood that maintaining social order necessitated a certain degree of discretion and hypocrisy, lest the lower classes develop degenerate habits. So, yes, they slept around, they winked at the homosexuality of their peers, but they maintained appearances. Today, our elites worship the idol of “authenticity”, so they flaunt their transgressions, which are taken up by those who look to the elites to lead and set trends.
If you want to see an example of how much influence leadership at the top can have, look at how Victoria and Albert reformed the (outward) behavior of the British aristocracy by their control of patronage and access to court–though even then, Victorian London had upwards of 50,000 prostitutes, and more brothels than churches.
If you want an area where Church leadership can make a difference, this is it. Bishops who permit prominent political, social and artistic leaders to receive communion despite open and unrepentant violation of Church teachings. This action sends a far more effective message than all the homilies about the evils of abortion, adultery, or fornication ever could, because it says in the most explicit way possible, “pay no attention to what we say; actions have no consequences”.
A handful of bishops have taken the bull by the horns and announced that certain persons guilty of certain actions or holding certain erroneous beliefs will not be admitted to the Chalice, but most are too afraid of being “controversial” or being seen as “partisan”, or just fear not being invited to the best parties to exercise the charism of stewardship over their flock (I include both Catholic and Orthodox bishops in this condemnation). But I assure you, if there was a consistent and united front, a few salutary examples would make more of an impression than a year’s worth of homilies.
March 25th, 2011 | 1:12 pm
Btw, for Catholics attending Mass at least weekly, the report indicates that 64% support either marriage or civil unions for gay people.
IMO there is a huge difference between recognizing a gay couple as a couple vs. the crossing-over act of pretending their union is the same in kind as a real marriage.
It’s the difference between calling a hot air balloon “transportation” vs. insisting it be called an “automobile”.
March 25th, 2011 | 4:29 pm
Hello, Stuart Koehl,
You wrote:
“If you want an area where Church leadership can make a difference, this is it. Bishops who permit prominent political, social and artistic leaders to receive communion despite open and unrepentant violation of Church teachings. This action sends a far more effective message than all the homilies about the evils of abortion, adultery, or fornication ever could, because it says in the most explicit way possible, ‘pay no attention to what we say; actions have no consequences’.”
On the scandalous nature of giving such people communion we are in violent agreement. ;o)
Attitudes towards homosexual fornication and same-sex “marriage” have changed dramatically, especially among those whose only religious education since becoming adults is whatever they get through the Sunday homily. There are very many such people. For many of them homosexual fornication and same-sex “marriage” now have a legitimacy that they didn’t have before.
In those cases where the personal views of such people haven’t changed, it can still be that they have become reluctant to express disapproval of such things to others. The views of some of these “others” it is their personal responsibility to form, as in their own children. It would be much easier for them to do that correctly if they could at least remind their teenagers of their parish priest’s crystal clear condemnation of such things from the pulpit. Had that happened, the parents’ job might have been only one of reinforcing what the child had already heard at Church, not one of convincing the child, based entirely on their credibility with the child, that such behavior was indeed a matter of grave immorality. This is the situation Dad or Mom is in if Father has never explicitly mentioned the topic. As we all know, parents can become the most completely out-of-touch-with-what-is-cool people the child knows during his or her teenage years. The teenager is left thinking, “If these things were as bad as Mom and Dad say they are, Father would have at least mentioned it.”
Even if it wasn’t always true, it is true today that homiletics must include catechesis.
March 25th, 2011 | 4:40 pm
Stuart,
“I really never gave much of a hoot what people think about me. If there is an argument to be made, lay it out straight.”
You are self-deceived. When you mock, distort, and disrespect your interlocutor, you fail to lay out the argument straight. You distort it. There’s a recognizable type of person who claims he’s just honest and telling it like it is when in fact he’s pushing the conversation in front of a fun-house mirror.
And in fact, you do care deeply about what others think about you. You want to parade your knowledge and your wit. The problem is that you don’t think about others. You aren’t interested in them in and for themselves. It’s a failure of moral imagination. You can be strong minded without being belligerent, but doing so requires that you believe in your heart that the person you’re talking to is as interesting and valuable as you are. And you don’t. Not really. Or at least not yet.
“If you want an area where Church leadership can make a difference, this is it. Bishops who permit prominent political, social and artistic leaders to receive communion despite open and unrepentant violation of Church teachings. This action sends a far more effective message than all the homilies about the evils of abortion, adultery, or fornication ever could, because it says in the most explicit way possible, “pay no attention to what we say; actions have no consequences”.”
If the church had broad power, this might work, but bishops who refuse communion have come off as judgmental and out of touch. Mike Huckabee’s denunciation of Natalie Portman came off as a political ploy, which it was. When the church has faced declining membership before, it’s been revivals that have reinvigorated the day —whether it’s St. Francis or John Wesley or one of our Great Awakenings. Revivals can’t be manufactured, but they can be prepared for.
“but most are too afraid of being “controversial” or being seen as “partisan”, or just fear not being invited to the best parties to exercise the charism of stewardship over their flock”
And that’s the scandalous truth, though, as for that, there’s never been a golden age when bishops weren’t afraid of being controversial, partisan, or losing their seat at the political table.
March 25th, 2011 | 4:57 pm
“It’s the difference between calling a hot air balloon “transportation” vs. insisting it be called an “automobile”.”
But we live in the age when the Chevy Volt is called both transportation and an automobile, when it is manifestly neither.
March 26th, 2011 | 4:28 am
[...] and with a clergy that fought the instrumentation of Catholics by the Left at every turn. All to no avail. When the show-down finally came between Rome and the Kennedys over the latter’s abortion [...]
March 26th, 2011 | 7:03 am
“And that’s the scandalous truth, though, as for that, there’s never been a golden age when bishops weren’t afraid of being controversial, partisan, or losing their seat at the political table.”
There never was a golden age, true, for bishops are men, and men are sinners. Nonetheless, we have the examples of St. Ambrose staring down the Emperor Theodosius the Great; of St. John Chrysostom chastising the Emperor Honorius to his face, before the multitude assembled in Hagia Sophia (and was sent into exile as a result); of St. Filip of Moscow who refused communion to Ivan the Terrible (and was tortured to death for his trouble), and many others over many centuries who bore witness to the faith and took their duties as overseers and guardians of the Chalice seriously.
Perhaps I have just been spoiled by my exposure to Orthodox bishops, who think nothing of turning away people from communion for a host of reasons, many of which might seem trivial to outsiders. This has caused me to consider partaking of the Eucharist as a unique privilege and not as some inherent right.
March 29th, 2011 | 1:40 pm
You have a long way to travel, Stuart. Much introspection lies ahead.
In the meantime, I take the point on your examples, though I wouldn’t have added Ambrose’s shameful defense of the destruction of synagogues as a moment of brave leadership.
March 29th, 2011 | 9:39 pm
Cut poor Ambrose some slack. He wasn’t a Methodist, you know. Indeed, few of us have what it takes to be the very model of modern Methodist–fewer and fewer each year, in fact.
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