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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, DECEMBER 30, 1983
PAGE 11
48% believe in any concept of God, the lowest figure in Western
Europe, compared with 80% of Swedes who believed in 1947•...
What seems to be lacking in the old European churches is the
passion for God· and his truth that characterized the original
Lutherans. Instead, much of Protestantism has come to represent
individualism, doctrinal confusion and a proliferation of
separate churches; some outsiders like Father Daniel Olivier of
Paris' Catholic Institute contend that in contemporary terms,
"Luther was not a Protestant."
But whether Protestant or
Catholic, Luther retains the potential to shake people out of
religious complacency: given Christianity's need,� all sides,
for E: good jolt, muses Oberman, nI wonder if the time of Luther
isn't ahead of us."
While at the same time Roman Catholics and Lutherans are searching avenues
of unity, the rift between the Vatican and the Catholic Church in the United
States is widening into a gulf. Here are excerpts from an article entitled
"Going Their Own Way" written for the NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE (October 10,
1981) by the popular (and quite liberal) American priest, Andrew M.
Greeley.
Shortly after the beginning. of the Second Vatican Council, 20
years ago..., Pope John XXIII told a visitor that he intended to
open the window and permit fresh air to blow through the Roman
Catholic Church. In the United States, the papal breeze turned
into E: tornado.
Evidence of the devastating effects of the turbulence can be seen
in the rubble strewn around the once sedate and stable American
Catholic Church:
Weekly church attendance rates among the 53
million members declined almost immediately from around 70 per
cent to approximately 50 percent. Massive numbers of Catholics
dissent from official teaching on divorce and birth�ontrol and
act accordingly. As many as a fifth of the priests in the country
have left the active ministry and a higher proportion of nuns
have withdrawn from religious life, while the number of young men
enrolled in seminaries is less than a third of what it was in the
early 1960s.
Bishops can no longer count on pastors to obey them. Pastors
cannot assume any more that their religious associates will do
what they are told. And many parish priests have learned that
they must consult with, not command, the laity about what needs
doing. Only Pope John Paul II seems to think that issuing edicts
is an effective governmental style. � while the Pope may be
personally popular, few American Catholics� attentive to what
he says••.•
In direct defiance of Rome, many parish priests permit women to
act as acolytes at mass.
l"If the Pope comes to our parish, we
won't use them that day," says one pastor.) .•• "Do-it-yourself"
liturgies, sometimes tasteful but often not (Ry Krisp and whisky
instead of bread and wine at communion) , are taken for granted in
many places••..•