A priest writes to Captain’s Quarters in response to Fr. Hummer’s support of John Kerry.
I’m sorry to report that Fr. Hummer would not be the only priest in Ohio to welcome John Kerry with his cheerleader’s pom-poms. There are all too many of my colleagues who have not moved out the ‘60’s or the knee-jerk pacifism or union-worshipping that goes with it. The problems are many and need not detain us here. There is, however, good news coming. I teach at the Catholic seminary in St. Louis (Kenrick Seminary) occasionally and the new guys coming in are outstanding for the most part (you could see this in the incident in St. Louis after the debate there where the seminarians held a prayer vigil at the Kerry rally afterward-those were my students). These men will be bishops sooner rather than later.
As has been said, “Help is on the way.”
All the anecdotal information I have seen verifies this viewpoint as does this post from The Meandering Mind of a Seminarian. It was no surprise that Fr. Greeley took a break from writing his usual soft porn to write a column about young fogeys to decry this trend.
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“For more than three decades now, as a sociologist and a priest, I have been tracking the evolution of the beliefs and practices of the Catholic clergy and laity in the United States. My most recent analysis, based on survey data that I and others have gathered periodically since Vatican II, reveals a striking trend: a generation of conservative young priests is on the rise in the U.S. Church. These are newly ordained men who seem in many ways intent on restoring the pre-Vatican II Church, and who, reversing the classic generational roles, define themselves in direct opposition to the liberal priests who came of age in the 1960s and 1970s.”
Young fogeys, ay? Count me in. (well, except for being newly ordained. OR a man. I’m a young female fogey.)
I’m a fellow young fogey, although on (God willing) the lay teaching path. I have noticed the trend towards younger Catholics (and those from other christian groups) being more conservative than the older generation. Colleen Carroll has written an excellent book called “The New Faithful: Why Young Adults Are Embracing Orthodoxy” that talks about some of the trends.
Let’s also not forget the converts who are reminding us how Protestantized much of the liberalism of the church is, too.
Pacificism and union-worshipping don’t naturally go together. When I was a child, about thirty-five to forty years ago, a union member was likely to be pretty conservative about social issues and the military. I try to picture my high-school classmates’ fathers – truck drivers, firemen, electricians, bricklayers and the like – supporting abortion and same-sex marriage, and the mind boggles.