Putting Catholic Men on Ritalin
SIT DOWN & SHUT UP
The lady cantor, in her polite intercom voice, intoned the dread phrase as she announced the final “song” of the Mass: “Please turn to song number 117 in your Breaking Bread hymnal. We will be using the alternate lyrics.”
Ah, yes: “Joy to the World.” Instead of “Let men their songs employ,” we have “Let us our songs employ.” The cantor had done the same with “Let There Be Peace on Earth”: from “Brothers all are we” to “We are a family.” I had to keep from laughing out loud as the voice of Barney singing those alternate lyrics resonated in my head.
This episode, and it was hardly the first, got me thinking: What exactly does the American Catholic mindset offer to its laymen?
To be blunt, it offers this: the opportunity to sit down and shut up.
Think about it. Unless your parish is unusual, the ratio skews female on Sundays and other holy days of obligation. Why is that?
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After attending various Masses and talking with parishioners, we came to the conclusion that parish success or decline depends on the homily of the pastor.
Pope Gregory’s program was really quite simple: To return to the people of Rome a sense of sin and a sense of the sacred.
The Church is the mother of Christendom. She encompasses all modes of life, from economy to culture, from politics to family relations.