In an age of aggressive individualism and the isolation it breeds, the new ecclesial movements offer two absolutely priceless gifts: community and purpose

Holy Impatience

Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap

Tens of thousands of young Catholic men and women do take their faith seriously. They do try to live it vigorously. More than seventeen million American Catholics worship at Sunday Mass every week. Double that number attend Mass at least once a month. Millions support the Church financially. And many are active in their parishes and in other ministries outside Sunday worship. These are good facts to build on. In the United States, the faith is not just a memory. It’s still alive. But there’s no way we can go back to the “glory days” of the past as a model for the future.

Catholic life needs to be reignited. American culture is a new kind of mission territory. It’s a cocoon of marketing, entertainment, and manufactured appetites; a narcotic of noise, distraction, and relentless propaganda for self-absorption and confused sexuality. 

Being in the United States in the weeks before Christmas is an education in what the culture really worships. It worships commerce.

...........

Read more: www.firstthings.com