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The Most Endangered Species: Catholicana Americana

Joe & Eileen Spoonster

(Excerpted from 1982 June Worldwide Family Spirit magazine)

NOTE: This article was written in 1982.

The Church desperately, more than at any other time in history, needs matrimonied and sacramental couples to teach and lead in a way of life that is the imitation of Jesus. Being Catholic means living in common unity (community) in imitation of the Trinity. The most visible sign of that kind of relationship is the matrimonied couple. The basis of the sacramentality of matrimony rests in the significance of a permanent, vowed, life-giving relationship, freely entered and sustained by the self-sacrifice of each party for the benefit of the relationship. The result of a lifetime of decisions for the relationship is called unity.

Recently, we saw a news article referring to the release of the newest Official Catholic Directory. The directory stated that there were 48,000 seminarians in 1966; 11,500 now. It went on to say that in some dioceses, not one new priest would be ordained this year. Other sources in the article indicated that about half of the priests ordained this year could be expected to resign within 20 years. The most frequently quoted reason for resignation: "celibacy."

During the same period of time, since 1966, there have been some remarkable changes in what we would call a Catholic way of life. Various estimates indicate that 75 to as high as 90 percent of all Catholic married couples use artificial contraceptives to control family size. Divorce in Catholic marriages is approaching 30 percent. The size of Catholic families is rapidly decreasing to the mythical American average: boy for me, girl for you. It is not uncommon to see individuals and couples use their status as “Catholics”, to gain public media attention in support of abortion, euthanasia, and outright murder of deformed or impaired babies. It is becoming virtually impossible to distinguish the Catholic family from the average American family.

WE ARE DESTROYING THE CHURCH FROM WITHIN
It does not take an extremely intelligent or perceptive person to recognize that the lack of unity, this disharmony that exists among Catholics today, is tearing the Church apart. It is happening in the exact same fashion, and having the exact same effect on the participants, as is the phenomenon of divorce.

As individuals, and collectively as the People of God, as Church, we seem unable to appreciate or understand the ramifications of our human relationships in either enhancing or obscuring the effect of God's love for all of us. In the quest for "the good life now," we have become a "people" who are willing to forego the "Beatitudes." Rather, we are a people, a Church, who have become pragmatic, performance conscious, set on immediate gratification, concerned with short term solutions.

In short, we have lost our identity as the People of God. We do not face a matrimonial crisis, or a priest crisis, so much as we face the almost brutal understanding that we no longer belong to one another. We have lost our Catholic identity.

"No longer belonging" is not so much a decision we make at a given point in time as it is a realization. It's more like a gradual eroding, a weakening of the mutual purpose of the relationship Then, there comes a time when we ask: "Why bother; what's the use, what difference does it make?" This disillusionment, despair, divorce, whatever you may call it is infectious. A very good example of this cause-effect dimension is found in the personal dynamics involved in the "contraceptive" issue in marriage.

Why do couples use artificial birth control methods to limit family size? One prime reason is a belief that there are no viable alternatives. Besides, artificial birth control is convenient; it's relatively certain to prevent pregnancy; it's socially acceptable.

It has an unstated value, one that most of us don't recognize or talk about. Contraception has the benefit of removing the personal responsibility for deciding whether or not each act of intercourse can accomplish conception. With the "threat" of pregnancy removed, both husband and wife may indulge in intercourse as the whim occurs.

Usually, both husband and wife rationalize this away by saying that "spontaneous sex is better." Yet, we fail to admit that things occurring on the "spur of the moment" usually indicate no prior thought has been involved: he doesn't have to think about her; she doesn't have to think about him. Perhaps that is why the frequency and excitement for intercourse diminishes so rapidly in marriage?

The erosion of the relationship begins as questions, often more felt than verbally expressed, begin gnawing at us The first big question is: "why don't we feel as close, excited about one another?" At a deeper level, perhaps the wife begins to feel "forced" to use contraceptives because she really can't trust the husband to respect her desire not to be pregnant at this time. Isn't that saying, "I don't think you are willing to sacrifice your physical gratification?"

And, if she can't trust him in that regard, how can she trust him in any other? And, if she doesn't trust him, can she be sure that he really loves her above all else? And, if that's the case, what's her value in relation to him? And, if she really begins to question his love, what does her behavior and attitude say to him? And, if she's of uncertain value, and the love relationship is questionable, and neither has sufficient evidence of trust, where is the hope that inspires life? The greatest danger to the marriage comes as all these doubts accumulate, and intercourse is then seen as an act of physical gratification that could occur between any two people. As the relationship becomes a matter of toleration, less satisfying, it can become destructive, divorcing.

A society where the majority of the members are experiencing a diminished sense of belonging, a lack of trust in the motives and motivations of others, finds abortion and euthanasia increasingly popular alternatives to the birth or continued life of impaired children who in their lifetimes will require increased commitments.

Basically, abortion and euthanasia both say'. "I/we are unable (unwilling) to accept and allocate the personal resources and responsibility for what is potentially a totally demanding lifetime commitment." Because we believe we are alone, we rationalize deliberate life taking by saying: "We have to be realistic. Look at the economic burdens. After all, an 'it' kind of child won't contribute anything to society. 'It' would just use up resources that belong to us."

A marriage burdened by a doubtful sense of permanency, trust, and personal responsibility hardly provides an atmosphere in which a child learns to form open, intimate, trusting relationships. A contraceptive marriage carries the double danger of teaching children that the creation of life is a poor second choice in relation to anything else.

A couple that deliberately, or by default, teaches the value of immediate gratification, be it genital, financial, or whatever, does not create the experience of common unity, does not instill a responsible sense of love in imitation of Jesus and the Church.

To the extent that our Catholic marriages live up to their vows, become Sacrament and sacramental, the children of those marriages will believe that permanent, loving, self-sacrificing relationships are not only possible, but are the expected norm of life. This, then, is renewal . . . and, it's not happening. Why? Where is the wrongness, the bogey man? To paraphrase the words of the comic strip hero, Pogo: "We have met the enemy. He is us."

The American Catholic Church will be the Church of Jesus Christ, the apostolic church, to the extent . . and, only to the extent, that our relationships as Catholics, individually, as ordained, as vowed, as matrimonied, as family, are intimate open, loving, and self-sacrificing.

ENEMY TO THINE OWN
If, as we've described, a marriage is burdened by a doubtful sense of permanency, trust, and personal responsibility, it often ends in divorce. It is not too great a leap in logic to conclude that much the same dynamics are involved in the flight from Holy Orders and the vowed religious life.

What we are seeing is basically an individual decision to avoid or eliminate a relationship that becomes too burdensome. The public issue of celibacy is symptomatic of problems that cannot and will not ever be relieved by a married priesthood.

Who does a priest first turn to for affirmation, for intimacy, for the open, trusting quality of human relationships that we all seem to need? His bishop, his brother priests, those who share a common bond. There is little doubt that priests leave because of the lack of intimate, satisfying relationships. The same questions that occur in marriage occur in the priesthood: "lf you cannot depend on one another's company and find support, why stay?" Loneliness, the need for other companionship, arises as the priest sees other priests and his bishop rejecting him and his gifts. When a person's self image is down, diminished, they are most inclined to "walk away."

The same relational disease that causes divorce between good people has infected our priesthood. All we need to do for verification is listen to the anger, bitterness, hurt, the lack of belonging, as expressed by priests who have left Not very often do you hear about the glorious relationship with the new spouse. But how frequently do you hear how rotten the previous spouse was?

WHAT DO WE NEED TO DO?
First, we need to come to the understanding that we are not living in world full of inhumane, barbaric beings. The world is full of good people, heroic people. It is our perception of people that encourages and supports life lived to less than its highest potential. The only way society, the world, will recognize that potential is if we change . . . first . . . regardless of what the rest of the world seems to be doing. We cannot change others; we can only offer our lifestyle, hopes, and faith as an alternative way.

That leads to the obvious second need: improved communications. We refer to both quality and quantity. We need to banish once and for all, from our lives as individuals and from the Church community, this pervasive catering to mediocrity, this wishy-washy view of life that says "nothing is quite right; nothing is quite wrong," either.

We recognize from the Marriage Encounter Weekend that nothing is more destructive to communications than mere toleration. We also have learned that communication requires a commitment to personal responsibility to and for the other. We should know that unity is the result of sacrificing decisions for the relationship, regardless of personal feelings or bias. And, most important of all, we have learned that "love is a decision." The Weekend provides the opportunity for couples to discover the sacredness of Matrimony as a sign to the Church.

Yet, it is in these understanding and learnings that we also find the greatest weakness. The Weekend has not failed. The "encountered" have. In this regard, the "encounter" is as much at blame, as is the clerical, professional church. Both suffer from a lack of understanding of leadership, from a lack of appreciation of Catholicism as relationship not good deeds, and from a lack of personal willingness to stand against the trend to mediocrity and self-interest.

We need to learn again that the meaning of all the sacraments, but particularly Matrimony and Holy Orders, and ultimately the meaning of Church, is reflected in the mystery of the Eucharist. Each is a divinely initiated opportunity for men and women to live out specific relationships in examples of Christ, to give human voice to the message of Christ: of salvation, of reconciliation, and ultimately unity, oneness with God.

The best dialoguing relationship, the most ascetic spiritual life in the world is absolutely without value or meaning unless they reach out to others in a flesh and blood commitment that says "allow me to become one with you," exactly as Jesus does in the Eucharist, "so that others may also believe."

Marriage Encounter, then, is specifically called to carefully examine the role of so-called community that focuses on individual dialoguing relationships to the virtual exclusion of all else. It is equally imperative to examine and eliminate the barriers that separate the various renewal sources in the Church. Exclusivity, separateness of identity, the “encountered vs. not” . . . superiority in individual communities apart from the parish, from the diocese . . . are hardly signs of the Catholic Church.

In exactly the same vein, we must ask our priests and Bishops to make an equal examination of the prejudices and barriers which automatically exclude the matrimonied from their vital role in the Church. In terms of the "priest-to-priest to- Bishop" relationship, we certainly celebrate such efforts as the "Emmaus program." But at the same time, we recognize that the communication techniques of the Marriage Encounter Weekend are as valid in the priest-to-priest relationship as in marriage. There is no one solution to the conditions that exist today.

To the extent that the Encounter values and celebrates the priesthood, we would encourage our priests to equally value matrimony. If we are even partially correct in our assessment of the effects of contraception on the marriage relationship, we can no longer afford a temporizing, if not cowardly, approach to the issue from the pulpit.

We need to see again, that being Catholic calls for a difference. We're not looking for new or old ritual. And, contraception is certainly only one area of concern. We are looking for a specific call to a very specific form of relationship that is signified by vowed, permanent commitments.

We have seen enough good people wasted in running around doing good deeds to last a lifetime. We do not need a "Catholic" welfare structure. We do need to see our people empowered, celebrated, "anointed" in the creation of intimate, open; trusting relationships that will heal, console, lead, and serve the Church in imitation of Jesus Christ, so that we may find again the beauty of relationship, the purpose, expressed in the word: Catholic.

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