The Catholic Church has failed and failed badly

At least, that is the case in England and Wales. I cannot really comment on Austria, Australia, The Netherlands, Spain, France and so on, it is not on my agenda, I must be somewhat parochial in this context.

"But", you say (if you are of a liberal persuasion at any rate), "we have a vibrant, active faith in this country and I love my bishop, Bill, he's so sweet."

To which I respond:
"Look at what the Church should be, don't look at what it has become today."

"Bare ruined choirs..."

So how has it failed and who is responsible?

Here are some of the key areas in which we have taken our eye off the thurible.......

1. Education - most Catholic Schools fail totally in providing knowledge and in inspiring zeal for the teachings of the faith (see Caritas in Veritate for an up to the minute example). This has been going on for a long time now and at least two generations have been lost as a result.
 I suspect that, most of them are now beyond re-evangelisation.

2. Adoption - where is the Crusade of Rescue today?
It is now a rather strange sort of mix of psycho/social mechanisms offering, on the one hand, psychotherapeutic counselling in schools and, on the other, an Adoption and Aftercare service that now no longer offers adoption.
Lewis Carroll is alive and well and living in St Charles Square!
Kowtowing to the impositions of homosexual legislation has lost the Church a valuable role in essential pastoral care.

3. Homosexual "marriage" - "a weak clergy lacking in grace" was how St Thomas More described the bishops and priests in the sixteenth century and the same could be said today with regard to their lack of enthusiasm (with one or two notable exceptions) in showing positive disapproval of moves to place homosexual unions on the same level as marriage between a man and a woman.
The scandal of the Soho Masses continues despite the fact that it isolates those afflicted with homosexual tendencies and keeps them compartmentalised away from "normal" Catholic congregations.
We don't have Masses dedicated to followers of fraud or bank robbery, so why should we ring fence Masses for homosexuals?

4. Admissions procedures for seminaries: we do know, do we not, that those charged with interviewing prospective seminarians operate a policy of refusing any young man with traditional tendencies?
If you want to join a seminary, hide your Rosary, burn your LMS membership card and tell the panel that you want to be a priest because you have a social conscience and climate change is something that we, as Catholics, do not address with enough conviction.

Never, ever, say the "L" word.
The very mention of the word "Latin" is enough to have you out of the door before you can say 'Novus Ordo'.

5. Faith and Morals - these have become dirty words, almost as bad as mentioning 'sin'. There is no longer any clarity with regard to Church Doctrine, we are fed a milk sop diet that leads to statements such as "Who knows what's down the road?" (to which the answer, is of course, "Hell").

6. Ignoring the Holy Father - it did not take the Bishops very long, in the aftermath of Vatican II, to adopt a unilateral declaration of independence. UDI has meant that instead of one Pope we now have a multitude of mini Popes who pay a passing lip service to Rome but then do precisely as they wish.

7. The blinkered laity - how quickly we scrambled onto the liberal cart and tripped over our guitars in the rush to 'modernise' a faith that has proved itself capable of sensible organic progression over the course of its history. It began with parish commissariats aka parish councils, then it spread to lay readers (and even lay preachers back in the sixties) and before long we had women sashaying across the sanctuary, bare headed and mini skirted.

Extraordinary Ministers morphed into "Eucharistic Ministers" and now we have them dishing out blessings. The congregations forgot about the Real Presence in the tabernacle (it does not take long to lose one's faith compass, see how quickly we became Protestant back in Henry VIII's time), in recent years genuflections were replaced by a cursory bow and, in the 'absence' of Christ, people began to chat - at the tops of their voices. "You see", they appear to be saying - "We are on such good terms with God He has become part of the furniture, we don't need all that holy Joe stuff".

I could go on, this list is not exhaustive.

But who is to blame? And what is the point in allocating blame?

Well there is a collective blame inasmuch that many sold out at the beginning and others have since joined the slide; clergy, nuns, lay men and women.

And now I have come to the conclusion that we have two churches, two faiths and I have nothing whatsoever in common with one of them, the Nuchurch lobby. They have no loyalty to Rome and, hence no loyalty to Christ. They might espouse a loyalty but it is meaningless because they do nothing other than play the role of the Pharisee, criticizing all that is holy and devout while beating their breasts and informing on any priest brave enough to wish to celebrate the Latin Mass.

The great majority of Catholics have forgotten the basic tenets of the faith. To them, the Latin Mass is a throwback to a darker time when the parish priest was likely to challenge them if they dressed inappropriately at Mass or expressed views in direct opposition to Catholic teaching.
They do not like discipline or rules; those infringe their personal beliefs. They are guided by a conscience that no longer has the required knowledge to make an informed decision, in short, they can barely be described as 'Catholic'.

Now compare the Church in England and Wales with a commercial organisation, such as Proctor and Gamble, the detergent manufacturers, or Tescos, Sainsburys and Asda.
 If, some 40 years ago they had seen a slump in their profits and a drifting away of customers what would they have done?

Well, a number of things but the point is, they would not have sat on their hands warbling "who knows what's down the road?"

They would have taken action. They would not have allowed themselves to be left with empty shelves and no products to go on them.
They would have ensured that they recruited the right staff and given them firm support and guidance.

This is something that the Church has not done.

It allowed the grossly awful "Weaving the Web" religious education series to continue ad nauseum in the Catholic Secondary School sector, it turned a blind eye to teaching on birth control and IVF, and it debased the liturgy to such a degree that you wonder at times if you are at a Catholic Mass or a New Age beanfeast.

It has done nothing with the rich inheritance left to it by the Son of God.

And, sadly, it is still at it. turning away young men from seminaries because of their adherence to orthodoxy, persecuting good priests who wish to offer the EF Mass occasionally and refusing to infuse order and integrity into the clergy who, by and large, run their parishes as it pleases them.

It is, of course, easy to blame the bishops but the laity must also shoulder the burden. I find it strange that many parishes can be governed by parishioners rather than by the Parish Priest. All too often it is the parish council that dictates the terms for parish and spiritual activity and the priest appears powerless to intervene.

If there is to be a programme of re-evangelisation later this year, as stipulated by the Holy Father, it should have the parishioners as the prime focus, not those who have "drifted", they should be the second wave.

Bring back genuflecting, dress codes, reception by mouth. Keep the churches open by day.

Dispense with Extraordinary Ministers, lay readers and the kiss of peace and demand silence before and after Mass.

That would be a start. In fact it would be a brilliant start.

But who will stand up to be counted?