Priest and people

n The Second Vatican Council was primarily a council about the Church. It attempted to complete what had been left undone by Vatican I in 1870. Two of its three "constitutions" were about the Church.

Yes, there was a decree on the priesthood, Presbyterorum Ordinis, but I think it is correct to say that there was much more emphasis on the role of bishops in the Church than there was on priests. Also, there was a certain fascination with the re-introduction of deacons as regular ordained ministers, and especially the permission for them to be married.

The crucial role of the priest was not ignored, but it was not given the importance it really has in the Church. Pope and bishops can write as many documents as they wish, they can mandate programs by the dozen, but if the local pastor does not support them nothing happens. For example, some pastors simply refuse to take up a collection for the Campaign for Human Development. When Fr. Charles Curran was at Catholic U., one pastor told me he gave most of the collection for the university to the poor and sent in a pittance to fulfill the diocesan requirement.

In the thirty years since the Council, the Church has tried to provide more guidance and direction for priests. Of the nine Roman Synods of Bishops since 1971 two have focused on the priesthood-1971 and 1990. Based on the latter, we have the excellent document from Pope John Paul II, Pastores Dabo Vobis.

Since the Council, however, there has been an ongoing crisis in the priesthood. Tens of thousands of priests have abandoned their commitment and embraced the married state. It would be an illogical "post hoc ergo propter hoc" argument to blame the Council for the massive defection, but there surely must be some connection. That crisis has been accompanied by an alarming decline in vocations to the priesthood in the affluent countries of Europe and North America. In the past few years there has been a slight increase in the number of priests worldwide, but there is continuing decline in the West.

The decline in priests has also been accompanied by a radical fall in the percentage of Catholics who are active church-goers. In thirty years the decline in the U.S. is from about 70% to 30%. One should not attribute that exclusively to the Council, since most lay Catholics know very little about it.

The reason for the decline, in my opinion, is the invasion of secular, worldly ideas and values into the Catholic Church. The culture in which we live is materialistic, atheistic in practice though claiming to believe in God, almost entirely this-worldly, and therefore basically opposed to the supernatural. Most of our contemporaries admire Mother Teresa for her dedication to the poor, but they do not understand her supernatural motivation.

The invasion of secular ideas and values into the Church is especially noticeable among the bishops. Their semi-annual meetings have little to do with God, Jesus, faith, holiness, prayer-and a lot to do with social, political and economic fussy benevolence. One St. John Neumann among them would do more good for the Church here than the whole USCC/NCCB bureaucracy.

Our Lord Jesus Christ suffered, died and rose from the dead to lead all men back to God. He established the one, true Catholic Church to carry on his work of eternal salvation by preaching the Word and administering his seven Sacraments. He did not found the Church to be the prayer wing for the U.S. Congress or the U.N. When the Church in this country returns to working for the Kingdom of God rather than for the kingdom of man, there will be no shortage of priests and lay people will be able to see clearly that the Church is the Body of Christ and not just another human welfare agency.

Kenneth Baker, S.J., Editor