What do you think?

Discussion in 'Positive Critique' started by miker, Apr 30, 2021.

  1. miker

    miker Powers

    I wanted to share this link from Fr Steve- a very wonderful priest we know at our local Marian Shrine. He is truly a good shepherd- like many priests he sees what is happening to our Church- especially young people. But, he also is a man of action. He has kept the Shrine open throughout the pandemic. Mass and Confession available every day. The holy grounds open to walk and pray. I’ve been encouraged and strengthened as more come back. But Fr. Steve is right. Much has been lost this past year. So besides being a man of action- he here provides ideas and recommendations. I’d like to see how you all think about it? I’d love to hear more ideas if this can be brought to our parish’s. I can no longer sit idle and watch what is happening to our holy Church.

    https://us6.campaign-archive.com/?u=b14273f7cb5ccfb2fa368f53d&id=f6cd9557b0
     
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  2. Jo M

    Jo M Powers

    I agree with Fr. Steve, religious education is dismal at our parish. Everything he said is spot on. We do need to get parents involved, and bring them back to the Mass as a family. The majority of children pass through these classes with no true understanding of their faith. The text books are so watered down they are useless. Whatever happened to our catechism, where did it go? I think we need to reintroduce the catechism not only to the children, but to their parents. Many of the teachers who are good enough to volunteer their time, are also in need of religious education to properly instruct the children.
     
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  3. AED

    AED Powers

    Good post!
     
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  4. PurpleFlower

    PurpleFlower Powers

    I'm all for better religious education. But, my husband and I were just talking about this yesterday... I homeschool and up till now have been using the "Faith and Life" curriculum as part of my son's religion. This is used in many religious ed programs across the country. It's not bad, but pretty basic, which hasn't been a problem because I always go off on tangents and can talk about the Faith for hours, from any starting point. But due to our switch to the TLM this year, I decided to find a pre-Vatican II curriculum so he would see and hear the Mass described as the TLM.

    When it arrived, I spent a while skimming through it. And you know, as with most other Catholic books written many decades/centuries ago, there is a certain richness and depth to it, as if the author herself loves the Catholic faith and Christ with a sweet, heartfelt conviction that pours out between the lines of the lesson. The modern catechism lacks this...earnestness, richness, loving innocence. It's basic, straightforward, logical. I told my husband it's like one catechism was written by a saint and one by a scholar.

    You know what I think the real difference is in everything? Prayer. Truly loving, earnest devotion and prayer. I think what we need is big time prayer programs to launch in every parish. Bring out the relics, the rosaries and chaplets, large pictures of the Sacred Heart, Holy Face, Immaculate Heart of Mary and Chaste Heart of St. Joseph, the statue of Our Lady of Fatima... Host parish-wide classes to come learn devotions that have fallen by the wayside. Do it before Jesus in the monstrance. Hold overnight Eucharistic prayer vigils and lead Eucharistic processions through the streets. Have each parish officially dedicated to some miraculous title of Christ, Mary, or St. Joseph. We need the priests and bishops to lead in this. I guarantee you THIS is what would bring grace flooding back into parishes and draw Catholics into a zealous love for their Faith.
     
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  5. miker

    miker Powers

    Agree. It’s been a a few years since I volunteered as a CCD teacher. But when I did , my instinct ( Holy Spirit) said don’t use the book they gave me. I read scriptures to kids, taught them the Rosary abs Divine Mercy ( after getting them rosary beads). I would bring them into the Church, teach them to genuflect in front of the tabernacle abs explain why- tell them Who was there! And I will say they were receptive. I don’t know if this was what parish wanted or if it helped these kids, but it was what I thought made sense.
     
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  6. Mario

    Mario Powers

    Yes!

    The Church in the United States from 1900-1970 was basically an immigrant Church, or at least the grandchildren of immigrants. For instance, I was schooled at Our Lady of Lourdes on the south side of Syracuse in the 1960s. It was led by Msgr. James Watley, a marvelous Irishman, who ruled with an iron hand and a heart of gold. My parents occasionally had him over for dinner. There were 8 grades and we were taught by the nuns. My graduating class had 100 students! But all the Catholic schools were like that. School during the week (with school Holy Masses at least 2 of the 5 days) and then the Sunday Masses. Generally speaking, the families befriended one another and the Catholic culture was reinforced! But we were Irish families as much as Catholic families, and generally insulated from the decadence in the culture-at-large. Not perfect, but the mores generally held firm, only slow erosion.

    Interestingly, that culture fell apart in the 1970s. From a practical viewpoint, the collapse of the teaching orders of nuns (very devilish) wiped out the ability for low tuition, and Catholics migrated to the public schools. Simultaneously, contraception, innovations in the Mass following Vatican II, the the loss of Marian piety, and the dearth of priestly vocations, all combined to accelerate the collapse of Catholic culture. It was a whirlwind in which everything went downhill at once. Things were so challenging that by 1996, Geralyn and I made the choice to homeschool our children which we did over the next 21 years. That was a novel position for young Catholic families back then.

    What you suggest is wonderful. The catch is that in our diocese, the vast majority of priests are 60 and older, and set in their ways. Practically speaking, your generation of fervent Catholic families are forming the bridge, before the positive wave you speak of suceeds. There is a way to speed it up: you must join my generation in becoming martyrs. The blood of the martyrs will be the catapult for growth. Scary, but true, I believe.

    Of course, this reality can be drastically transformed by the Triumph of Our Lady. Until then, keep creating the new reality you speak of, for it is not God's intent that we sit back and simply wait for Him.
     
    Last edited: Apr 30, 2021
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  7. PurpleFlower

    PurpleFlower Powers

    Thank you for this post...so much food for thought. My grandmother was born in 1947 in a very Catholic community in Alabama. She and my grandfather (Italian Catholic) both went to Catholic schools, saw many of their friends enter the seminary, and my grandfather did for a bit too, before they married. Both were devoted, daily Mass and rosary-praying Catholics, with a house of wall-to-wall holy pictures and sacramentals. As they raised my mother (born in 1964) they watched the culture fall apart around them. My grammy went to jail multiple times for blocking the doors to abortion clinics during the Operation Rescue days. My mother did go to public school, and when she had me, she put me in public school as well. It was my grammy that began begging her to pull me out and homeschool me, which she finally did in 1993, when I was 8. I am so grateful to my grammy for her influencing that decision. And yes, homeschooling wasn't popular yet, and we were careful not to go out in public during school hours and tried to avoid advertising what we were doing, due to some hostile thought at the time. But my siblings and I homeschooled using the Seton curriculum and it was an outstandingly solid Catholic education.

    It's crazy that society and the Church fell apart so quickly. Was it the drugs and sexual revolution? Or was that caused first by something failing in the Church? Why was everything suddenly watered down in the faith?

    Funnily enough, I always thought as a child that I'd be a martyr one day. But now that I have small children, what I hope is that maybe my little family can weather the storm and make it to the other side. I've had dreams since my early teens of a coming chastisement and great battle between God and the devil. In one, I watched my parents and siblings fall one by one, as we made our way across a scorched and desolate world, to a place where the few remaining people were gathering. I fell just as I came within sight of it, and lay my face down in the hot sand...but a voice called to me and I looked up to see a beautiful young man holding out his hand to me. He led me into the tower-like building and told me we were there to learn how to fight in the great battle that was coming. It was spiritual learning, training in prayer, for a great spiritual fight, till one day the man came and said, "Are you ready? It's time." He led us to a set of heavy doors, and began to pull them open, and I felt the strongest force of evil I've ever felt in my life, seething and ready to rush in... Then I woke up. I've had countless dreams like that--of evil approaching and trying to get in, signs in the sky, darkness falling in the middle of the day, a great army of evil spirits and a great army of angels, faithful, and children I understood to be those aborted coming down to help in the fight. In the dreams, it never fails, when I begin to pray, evil retreats and is defeated. I usually wake up saying the Hail Mary or Our Father aloud.

    Prayer is so powerful. It's our weapon. Talk, complaining, political fighting... none of that is going to change the world, but all of us on our knees can.
     
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  8. PurpleFlower

    PurpleFlower Powers

    That's wonderful. I wish all catechism teachers would do this!
     
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  9. AED

    AED Powers

    I did much the same thing miker. The texts we were given were useless pretty much.
     
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  10. HeavenlyHosts

    HeavenlyHosts Powers

    The prophecy given to Pope Leo XIII talks about a period of time to equal close to 100 years where the devil was granted power to destroy the Church. Our Lady at Fatima said that if her requests weren't heeded, Russia's errors would spread throughout the world. That is essentially the background you are talking about. I am one year younger than your grandmother.
    I went to public school. Prayer and Bible reading were removed by the Supreme Court around 1963 through the efforts of atheist Madalyn Murray O'Hare. Girls wore skirts to school. In 1966, I went to a state college and we had to wear dresses to class and dinner. We could only wear pants in the dorm. After a year or two, the dress code completely changed and pants became the norm. It was societal as well as related to the Church. The early 60's was the Ecumenical Council, Vatican II. There were prayer cards in every pew and we all recited a Prayer for the Success of the Ecumenical Council at every Mass. If we had only known.
    Prayer is the weapon, specifically the Rosary and all of the traditional Catholic prayers and Adoration and Benediction.
    Good post.
     
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  11. RoryRory

    RoryRory Perseverance

    Yes useless and I had my knuckles rappers so to say for telling or reading the story of Fatima.
     
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  12. HeavenlyHosts

    HeavenlyHosts Powers

    all of the above, sad.
     
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  13. PurpleFlower

    PurpleFlower Powers

    It's just so interesting and sad how the culture and Church changed dramatically at the same time, which always led me to wonder which caused the other. I guess it could be neither, but that the devil was allowed to simultaneously attack the world and the Church with extra power granted him at that time. I think I will start a new thread on this, because I have so many questions I'd love to hear y'all' s thoughts and perspectives on, since so many of you lived through that time.
     
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  14. AED

    AED Powers

    Yes!. Sadly some of those in charge of religious ed. Have absolutely no interest in Fatima. They are very "modern" in their training. Its an uphill battle.
     
  15. AED

    AED Powers

    Yes. Good idea.
     
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  16. AED

    AED Powers

    Yes. My memories too.
     
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  17. Shae

    Shae Powers

    I taught Catechism for 5 years. Each year I played an animated video of the Fatima story to my grade 3 class. Because it was animated, it was enjoyable for that age group. Although it was not in the curriculum, I felt it was very important to teach the children about Fatima as it was very likely they would never hear of it otherwise. Those kids are young adults now. I hope it stayed with them.
     
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  18. AED

    AED Powers

    Good for you!
     

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