THE TRUTH OF THE

CATHOLIC FAITH

Apathy in the Catholic Church in America

The Catholic Church in America is experiencing a crisis of apathy. We are part of the only institution in human history that was established by our Lord Jesus Christ and we don’t seem to care. Many Catholics are so afraid of appearing pompous, arrogant, self-righteous, or judgmental that we seldom proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ. The rest of us are just plain indifferent. Most of us hate to admit that by God’s grace we have received the Truth, since this admission would call us to action.

Unfortunately, many of us cannot even come up with sound reasons to be Catholic except, "I grew up in the church." Most of us stop taking Catholic education classes after confirmation in the ninth or tenth grade, so we are woefully unsure of our own beliefs and utterly incapable of sharing them with a friend. Furthermore, most of our Catechism classes do a poor job of passing on the wisdom of the Church. I personally taught a high school catechism class of twelve students, many of whom attended Catholic schools growing up, and was astounded when not even one fifteen year old Catholic could tell me what the four Gospels are or convincingly explain to me why they confessed to a Priest. The reason for this ignorance is that we rarely impart distinctively Catholic doctrine to our children. Today, most "catechism" classes are actually not much more than classes in secular humanism. We must ask ourselves how young people will share our powerful faith if they don’t even know it. And how will they stand up to the challenges thrown at them by secular society or anti-Catholic cults that offer slick sales-pitches to lead people away from Christ’s Church? And I guarantee they will be challenged, especially if they go on to study at a modern university.

Even worse than not being able to share Jesus Christ with others due to our own lack of knowledge is the fact that if we do not have reasons to be Catholic, or understand the beautiful logic behind the Church’s teachings, we will someday lose faith. A landmark 1997 study by Christian Smith titled "American Evangelism: Embattled and Thriving," shows that 10% of baptized Catholics now leave for another religion, and another 15% become non-religious altogether. At the same time, Evangelical denominations gain at least two people for every one they lose-and almost no Evangelicals leave Christianity and become non-religious altogether! Perhaps we have something to learn from our Evangelical friends. As there are sixty million baptized Catholics currently living in America, the implications of these statistics are clear. If, over the course of the next generation or two (25-50 years), we continue to drown ourselves in lukewarm sentiment, 6,000,000 American Catholics will leave the Church and another 9,000,000 will lose faith in Christ altogether! In addition, less than 30% of American Catholics now attend weekly Mass whereas 80% attended every week forty years ago. If you don’t believe the statistics maybe the testimony of the fifteen-year-old students in my Catechism class will convince you. The following are actual written statements they made when I asked them why they were Catholic: "I have been raised as such . . . however, I don’t really believe. I doubt almost everything about Catholicism;" "Being Catholic to me, means nothing. ‘Catholicism’ is just a label for a person or group of people that believe in God."

Losing faith is a threat to our eternal salvation, it is not just some minor change in philosophy. Simply put, good beliefs lead to good consequences and bad beliefs lead to bad consequences. But HAVE FAITH, because the Truth can stand up to any test. Let me urge you to seek answers, TODAY, to your most pressing questions on the Catholic faith. Sublime answers await you, I promise.

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Every baptized Catholic is, by definition, a missionary. So why don’t we take Christ serious when He says, "go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit" (Mt 28:19; see also Mk 16:15). Why do so many of us ignore Pope John Paul II when he speaks of the, "permanent mission of bringing the Gospel to the multitudes-the millions and millions of men and women-who as yet do not know Christ the Redeemer of humanity" (Christifedelis Laici, 35)? And why have most of the Catholic layity failed to heed the National Catholic Bishop’s Conference plea to "Evangelize!" (Go and Make Disciples: A National Plan and Strategy for Catholic Evangelization in the United States). We simply must respond to God’s call, and we don’t have to be arrogant to evangelize either-but we do have to take a stand.

Unfortunately, most of us ignore our differences with others because if we admit no differences we can rationalize for ourselves why we do not evangelize. When people ask, "what is truth?" Our inaction loudly proclaims, "whatever you want my friends!" (Louis Bouyer, The Decomposition of Catholicism, pp. 15-16). And to avoid confrontation-justified confrontation that springs from a loving heart-we pretend to agree with others’ beliefs as if these people would be hurt by reflecting on their own beliefs and hearing the truth of Christ. Our inaction sends the clear message that we either don’t really believe what we claim to believe or that we don’t care about others enough to share our faith with them.

We mistakingly think that if we claim to know the Truth we are really saying that we are better than our non-Catholic friends. We forget that our faith is a gift from God and that we simply must share it! I know a man who converted to Catholicism from another religion and who fills a major leadership position within his Catholic parish. He once argued that being Catholic was no better or worse that being a member of any other faith-it is just different. But what sort of a man would change something as important as his religion if he didn’t think he was leaving for a better faith? Who could trust such a man who changes loyalties without reason? Really, I think this man was just pandering to his audience (a Catholic audience no less!) that didn’t want to boast about being a part of something as special as the Roman Catholic Church. This sentiment is praiseworthy at some level, for we should never boast, but it neglects the fact that whether we like it or not, the Catholic Church offers a far superior way to salvation than any other religion on earth. Why else would Christ have established the Church?

I know another Catholic who also serves in a major leadership position in her parish. She told me that she did not believe in Hell. Eventually, she said, everyone would make it to Heaven (this dangerous theory is known as Apokatastasis and it was the reason why the church condemned Origen in the third century). All religions, she said, are essentially the same. Well, let me ask you why anyone such as this would choose to be a leader in a Church which, despite acknowledging that many people who do not call themselves Roman Catholic will be saved, has always claimed that it is the true church. Isn’t she living a lie? And if our only reason for being Catholic is because "the Catholic Church is simply most familiar to me," how can we blame a Hitler youth who grew up comfortable with the idea that it was fine to exterminate millions of Jews in the holocaust of World War II? Fortunately, unsurpassed reasons do exist for us to be Roman Catholics. Perhaps when we learn these reasons, and commit them to memory, we will serve ourselves, our world, and our God much better.

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Catholics currently do an excellent job of feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless, clothing the poor, and aiding the sick. In fact, no one does more to these ends than the Catholic Church. But this does not excuse us from evangelizing-actually telling people about Christ and having them baptized into the Church. We are so caught up in other people’s "rights" to believe whatever they want to believe, even if it obviously leads to destructive ends, that we philosophize ourselves into inaction . . . and thereby serve as an accomplice to their actions. Let’s listen to Pope John Paul II’s thoughts on these subjects as expressed in his encyclical Redemptoris Missio: "Nowadays the call to conversion which missionaries address to non-Christians is put into question or passed over in silence. It is seen as an act of ‘proselytizing;’ it is claimed that it is enough to help people become more human or more faithful to their own religion, that it is enough to build communities capable of working for justice, freedom, peace, and solidarity. What is overlooked is that every person has the right to hear the "Good News" of the God who reveals himself in Christ, so that each one can live out in its fullness his or her proper calling" (p. 79).

But for decades, now, Catholics have retreated from the world of ideas and satisfied themselves with their isolated parish enclaves, minor successes, and low expectations. The prevalent apathetic and timid attitude among many Catholics has led to the practical belief, even if we don’t admit to it, that "the church no longer has to convert the world, but to become converted to it" (The Decomposition of Catholicism, 16). The French theologian Louis Bouyer wrote those words in 1968, and they ring true today more than ever. Certainly, the church layity needs to be challenged to evangelize more by their Priests and Bishops. As the Pope declares, "the Synod of Bishops . . . should among the concerns of general importance, pay special attention to missionary activity, the greatest and holiest duty of the church (Ad Gentes, 38). Likewise, the clergy must be given more loyalty since they are the justly appointed successors to the Apostles.

Many of us are averse to evangelizing because we associate it with arrogance or religious fanaticism. But if we believe-I mean really believe-that God exists, that Christ loves everyone, and that He established a church that is so strong "the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it" (Mt 16:18), why do we so often rob the world by locking this knowledge away in our parish communities so we can "fit in" with mainstream society? Why do we hide the fact that the Church is the "pillar and foundation of truth?" (1 Tim 3:15).

At present most of us are so scared of appearing judgmental that we do not work against sin. The unhappy result is that Americans now kill over 1,500,000 innocent babies every year with abortion. In addition, a 1992 CBS/NY Times Poll indicates that 62% of Catholics support using tax dollars to help women pay for an abortion if they cannot afford it (only 42% of non-Catholics support this). It is depressing to think that so many Catholics not only ignore, but are willing to work against, the teaching of Christ’s Church; Illegitimate pregnancies-the number one indicator of adolescent poverty-are also at unprecedented levels because people no longer adhere to the Church’s teachings against premarital sex; "Dead beat dads" leave and neglect their families-85%of youths in prison come from families without fathers-because we no longer emphasize the fact that marriage is a life-long commitment; We tolerate a multi-billion dollar pornography industry that exploits women and children because we want to defend everyone’s right to do as they please; We have started ourselves down the slippery slope of tolerating doctor assisted suicides. Who will we decide deserves "our help" to die next? I’m sure you can think of many things to add to this list. We are not being overly judgmental in working against these sins. It is God and the Church He established, not you and me, who determines these sins. Every one of them.

In response to the present crisis, and because the Pope proclaims, "the church always stands in need of radical and total self-giving, of new and bold endeavors" (Redemptoris Missio, p. 113), we founded The Rock of Inspiration. It is fellowship of Roman Catholics dedicated to answering the Lord’s "Great Commission." Our mission is to give Catholics the courage and tools they need to carry out their duty to evangelize, to give non-practicing Catholics the knowledge and faith to "come home," and to humbly present Jesus Christ to everyone and invite them to join the Catholic community. All of our religious and inspiration materials are free and they may be copied by anyone. We are totally dependent on the generosity of our supporters. Please join us by writing to us here at The Rock. Also, get involved with your local Catholic Church (please ask about the RCIA program if you are not a Catholic). The point is, please get heavily involved somehow.

Hopefully, you are part of an energized Catholic parish that spreads the good news far and wide. But generally speaking, the Catholic Church in America really is suffering from a crisis due to apathy. Thankfully, it doesn’t have to be that way.

God Bless You Always,

Bret J. Cillessen, President The Rock of Inspiration

The Rock
of inspiration