CrossCurrents A Catholic Reflects on Faith in Our Times

Bernard F. Swain, Ph.D. www.CrossCurrents.us

Crisis? What Crisis?

Last week the conversation group I belong to discuss the topic “Crisis in the Church.” Ironically, while we all agreed instantly that there is a crisis in the church, we had little agreement about what that crisis is, what (or who) caused it, or what (if anything) to do about it.

The only thing we did agree on was this: the crisis means that the legacy of Vatican II is now in jeopardy.

This made me sit back and reflect on my experience of the drift of church life since the council – 40 years of changing Catholicism.

In 1966, I was just graduating from high school. We began praying for the Council’s success my first freshman day and celebrated its conclusion in December of my senior year. Each year I had worked on a “Model Ecumenical Council” (much as public school kids worked on model UNs), and I had already acquired new parish roles like lector and commentator. It was a moment for wondering, in two senses: wonderment at the Church’s unexpected ability to renew itself (indeed to change it all), and also wondering where it would all lead.

By 1976 I was working in my second parish as a full-time Director of Religious Education. Most Vatican II reforms were in place, and they were producing vast changes in parish life. Inevitably, parish life was somewhat polarized by such change, yet mainly we sensed it was a moment of forward momentum.

By 1986, the moment for reshaping renewal had arrived. A new generation was coming of age, laypeople were filling the gap left by a dwindling corps of clergy, so the old “drill-team” style of clergy leadership was giving way to a new “ball-club” style of clergy-lay collaboration. Renewal itself had become routine, but now faced the challenge of sustaining its vitality.

By 1996 the legacy of Vatican II was already hanging in the balance. It was now clear that the previous agents of renewal – clergy, women religious, and lay people of the Vatican II generations – could no longer shoulder the burden for sustaining renewal by themselves. But the graying populations of many parishes, along with declining Mass attendance and contributions, raised the prospect that renewal’s torch would be dropped, not passed on.

It was a moment of great challenge which brought new attempts at creative leadership: religious communities invited lay people to share their mission; neighboring parishes discussed consolidation and sharing pastors; dioceses revamped parish councils, stewardship, and youth programs; strategic planning became a priority for leaders who realized that routine operation—even a renewed routine—could not ensure a vital future.

By 2006, the threat to renewal has exploded into full view. Scandal has damaged public confidence, demolished priestly morale, provoked financial crisis, and handed the next generation a convenient alibi for indifference about the Church. Declines in attendance and giving have provoked hundreds of parish closings and raised the specter of diocesan bankruptcies.

More and more, I find myself working with church groups comprised of my peers – as if the older generation is dying out and the younger generation (that is, under 50) is simply not interested.

This is not the universal condition of U.S. Catholicism, I know, but it is common enough to raise fears that the momentum from Vatican II is exhausted, that the torch of renewal has fallen at the feet of a “lost generation.” It is a moment of reeling in two ways: reeling from the blows of scandal, bankruptcy, and general decline, as well as “reeling in” the long line of renewal to find only an empty hook. The “big one,” we fear, has gotten away.

But in fact not everyone is unhappy about the current situation. Many movements on the Catholic right are now seizing this moment, moving into the “renewal vacuum” to promote a Restoration that makes Catholic life suspiciously similar to life before Vatican II. Is it really possible that the “Resistance” to renewal is winning out? And if so, why? The answer is complex, and has many parts.

First, the “Resistance” is not new. Before Vatican Council II began in 1962, most of John XXIII’s Vatican advisers opposed it. During the council, they and their allies worked hard to ensure the council would change nothing. These “defenders of the status quo” lost the battle at Vatican II, but they did not give up the war. In many forms and in many levels, they have been undermining renewal since it began. After 40 years the damage is substantial.

Second, Vatican II was never supposed to guarantee renewal by itself. John XXIII saw the council as one part of a three-pronged initiative. Prong two was the reform of Canon Law. Prong three was the reform of the Roman Curia (which was, from the start, the main base of resistance to renewal). But the 1983 re-write of Canon Law made mostly minor revisions, and the Curia, despite some cosmetic shuffling and name changing, remains un-reformed.

Third, John-Paul II’s long papacy (1978-2005) had the ironic effect of distracting Catholics from renewal. His charismatic presence made him the central focus for a whole new generation of Catholics. For them, JP-II was their Vatican II. By overshadowing everything else around him, this man (probably unintentionally) encouraged the notion that the council’s work was done; the unfinished business of Vatican II often got shelved, and new pastoral routines got built on the sand of a half-renewed church.

Fourth, those resisting renewal have been tough and patient. They have refused to abandon Catholicism, they have marshaled their forces in movements, seminaries, societies and publications, and they have learned to speak “Vatican II-speak,” so they can sound like champions of renewal even while thwarting it.

The “Resistors” have shown great spine while swimming upstream for 40 years. My guess: as they rush now to fill the crisis vacuum, they’re betting that “Renewalists” lack the spine to hang on once the tide has turned.

Fifth, renewal’s momentum was probably hobbled almost from the start by Catholicism’s Achilles heel: sex. Paul VI yanked contraception off Vatican II’s agenda, appointed a papal commission, then overruled it, then issued Humanae Vitae in 1968. Since then, progressive Catholics’ enthusiasms for renewal has been dampened by misgivings about the hierarchy’s inability to comprehend the modern world’s Copernican shift in understanding human sexuality. The hierarchy’s insistence that sex revolves around reproduction (just as it once insisted the sun revolves around the earth) forced the stubborn standard that the only good sex is sacramental sex.

It took more than 30 years for the rot to surface: a long-standing corruption among priests and Bishops about their own sexual behavior, and the widespread rejection by Catholics (especially those born since 1965) of the hierarchy’s credibility on sex.

Thus, renewal’s crisis has come in at least partly because Catholicism produce no effective response to the sexual revolution. So we witness simultaneously a hierarchy sunk in sexual scandal, and a new generation making up its own standards as it goes along. As long as that generation remains convinced of the hierarchy’s hypocrisy, it is not likely to join the battle for renewal.

In hindsight, perhaps the crisis is no great surprise. But surprising or not, it begs the most urgent question: will “Renewalists” have as much spine as the “Resistors,” or will they abandon ship?

Speaking for myself: having invested 35 years of my professional life in renewing Catholicism, I’m not about to walk the plank. In my view, the time has come for us “Renewalists” to circle the wagons, marshal our own forces, and dig in with a “long haul” strategy to ensure the final success of Vatican II.

© Bernard F. Swain PhD 2006

Send Your Comments and Questions to bfswain@juno.com

Dr. Swain’s opinions do not represent the views of this parish or any other official body.

Bernie Swain has devoted more than 30 years to adult spiritual formation in dioceses in the US, Canada, and France. Since 1991 he has maintained a private practice as trainer, teacher, and consultant to leaders in parishes and other religious organizations. He holds degrees in theology and political science from Holy Cross, Harvard, The University of Paris, and The University of Chicago.

His writings include Liberating Leadership (Harper & Row, 1986) and more than 200 articles in periodicals such as The National Catholic Reporter, Commonweal, The Miami Herald, The Catholic Free Press, The Pilot, Harvard Theological Review, and Liturgy.

A lifelong layperson, he lives in Boston with his wife and three children. Visit his website at:

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