Thursday, September 16, 2010

"What's wrong with the Church?"

Fr. Dwight Longenecker has a good post on what we can do to serve the Church - instead of just complaining.
You know, the church has always been troubled with corruption from within and persecution from without. In different ages the corruption from within has taken different forms. There has been sexual scandal, financial corruption, heterodoxy, complacency, worldliness, liturgical abuse, bad music etc. etc. etc. in just about every age in one way or another. You only have to read the New Testament the apostles criticizing the various churches for their inconsistency, false teaching, immorality etc. Guess what? It's all part of being Catholic. It's all part of being human.

The most ordinary source of disappointment in life is having the wrong expectations to start with. If you thought it was going to be all marvelous and to your liking in the Catholic Church you had the wrong expectation in the first place. If you thought all the bishops and priests were going to be perfectly moral, upstanding, totally orthodox saints you were suffering from a major delusion. If you thought every parish would be straight down the line and have wonderful liturgy, saintly pastors, fine music, exemplary architecture and all the rest, you misunderstood. Correct your expectations and you won't be so disappointed.

So I'd say, "Stop whining and get on with it." Be positive. There's far more that's good in the modern Catholic Church than bad.

No comments: