The Church in the US puts virtually no effort in keeping Catholics Catholic and less than no effort in making converts. If we removed converts due to marriage, how low would the percentage be? Battles within the Church often overlook the fact that the Church Militant is in very sad shape indeed. We are living off of the capital of faith amassed by generations of Catholics past, and that capital is almost completely spent.
PopeWatch: Spent Capital
- Donald R. McClarey
Donald R. McClarey
Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three, one in Heaven, and happily married for 43 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.
“We are living off of the capital of faith amassed by generations of Catholics past, and that capital is almost completely spent.” DM
Oh but through the grace of God the Church continues on and like the multiplication of the loafs and fish, the miracle to come, the warning, will usher in baskets and baskets of souls.
Many ministers of Holy Catholic Church have failed to inflame their flock and build vibrant faith communities where folks who thirst for Truth will drive up to 75 miles to belong to that community.
How did they build it?
The brought Jesus out of the tabernacle and adored him 24/7 that’s how.
Risk.
In the beginning many of the Holy hours were being filled by the same parishioners but in time the lukewarm became on fire for Christ and the parish changed.
You see, it’s Jesus who converts.
We help but He does the work.
If there isn’t any possibility of having the numbers to start perpetual Eurchrist Adoration in a given parish then frequent, regularly scheduled hours of exposition is a good substitute until the proper number is reached to dive in for perpetual.
The warning?
Who knows for certain?
No one. If ever there was a time for natural events to stir into flame a fear of the Lord, we are there, culturally through the lack of morals and abundance of perversity which are celebrated. Noah probably witnessed this “pride” from folks of his time.
Once your parish catches the flame from the Sacred Heart of Jesus your converts will come. Archbishop Fulton Sheen knew what he was talking about when he promulgated Perpetual Eurchrist Adoration as a means to reviving a parish.
I’m living it.
btw….Jesus has helped me bring in five converts to the Catholic Church.
Not my work…HIS work.
Trust in HIM and bring him out.
Well it started with 12 (eleven if you ignore Judas) and it looks like it’s trying hard to repeat that number. Converts? Who really is about to change their life completely for another replica of a secular social justice agency.
It won’t change until we start seeing martyr’s blood being shed and the silence from the shepherds is deafening.
Don L.
They come because they want Jesus. Plain and simple.
[ please excuse my typos this am. ]
Please never think that any Judas’ can trump the mercy, forgiveness of sins and love of God. To hell with any bad pastors if they wish not to repent. The grace lives on despite the folly of the near do wells wearing white collars.
The sacraments live on despite their sins.
The sacraments trump the distributer.
Before the virus, my parish was always growing (and yup, we have Adoration days, processions, et cetera). It’s breaking my heart to see attendance levels now. Everyone within my immediate circle is back to Mass attendance. I talk about Mass with all my coworkers whenever “what did you do over the weekend?” comes up. I guess maybe Christmas will jolt some Catholics back into Mass attendance, but we’re going on two years. And that’s not even talking about conversions, just getting back to where we were.
This is vocations week. Pray.
My diocese, and you can see this in their newspaper, is only interested in:
1. Those who can afford the $14K per year per student “catholic” high school, and..
2. Recent immigrants.
Barring miracles, and there are many, it’s unsustainable.
That’s because they’re too busy enabling illegal aliens and cold blooded killers!
Here’s some unity and friendship via da’ Vatican. Talk about being rigid;
https://spiritdaily.org/blog/news/rome-diocese-bans-traditional-mass-for-easter-triduum
Sulphur at the new Sodom for Christmas … how nice.
Not sure if the new Sodom will be standing come Easter.
“Proselytism is such solemn nonsense…” —Oct 1, 2013, FrankenPope
Fruits of the thorn bush.
Catholics are between one in four and one in five of all Americans. Of course we’re going to have a very tiny percent of that being converts, even if “cultural Catholic” wasn’t a huge issue. 7% of 50 million is a lot more than 7% of 16 million.
(Southern Baptist, the largest Protestant group in the US.)
That pointed out– of course this is a huge problem.
I can tell you that part of the reason Catholic baptisms have dropped is because it’s so hard to get them set up– between Godparents often not being close enough to quickly visit, especially if you take the job of picking someone to be a second set of parents in the faith seriously, and the sometimes nonsensical paperwork requirements… people aren’t going to get it done automatically anymore.
(It took us several years to find a parish that realized that hey, military members are probably not living next to their children’s godparents, and no they’re not going to do six months worth of classes FOR EVERY SINGLE KID.)
For other measures, same problems, and add in teachers who confuse their prudential judgement with binding teachings, even when it conflicts with binding teachings…. things get ugly.
In a different way of saying it:
:design everything around people having maybe one child under 5, a 9-5 job, and having grown up in the area, complete with REQUIRING things that are sometimes useful:
“Gosh, why don’t we have more nice, big, Catholic families making use of our programs? Why aren’t young people more involved in our volunteer events, which are designed around the assumption that you are retired? Why aren’t kids joining the programs that run through every single opportunity to visit family and schedule things as if there is absolutely no other obligation in their lives?”
Catholic Americans are the least priority for American bishops. The illegals, LFBQT, death row inmates are all at the top of the list.
Converts and conversions? Don’t make me laugh.
To make converts you have to preach the gospel. I’m not sure our bishops even know what that is.
The logistical problems Foxfier points out are large and serious, and almost completely caused by the massive bureaucracy the USCCB has become at both national and diocesan levels. The same kinds of issues plague RCIA, which in my personal experience both as a candidate in 2004-5 and a catechist for 13 years after that, has become primarily a factory for “getting my sacraments” either for purposes of marriage or punching the Confirmation ticket. Most of the catechumens and candidates are never seen again after a few months. The success of RCIA in producing faithful and practicing converts is there, but only for a single digit percentage of people who go through the process, and only where the “faith formation director” is himself or herself a faithful and practicing Catholic who actually believes and teaches what the Church is supposed to be teaching. Given the outright apostasy of so many US bishops and the miserable example being set by the Holy See for the past, oh, eight and a half years or so, it’s a wonder anyone shows up at all.