I read that the founders of Call to Action are retiring from the organization. Both the independent Catholic biweekly and the secular paper focus on one of many aspects: CTA’s membership. From the independent Catholic biweekly:
If the organization’s purpose will persist, one wonders if the membership will, since Call to Action is experiencing a demographic reality familiar to many church organizations: It’s old and graying and the number of priests and nuns is dwindling.
But Call to Action has increased the younger segment of its membership with a Next Generation project. A third of the membership is between 18 and 44, according to a spokesperson.
Emphases for the future seem to play to the younger members, who are deeply engaged in social justice issues and not as interested as their elder counterparts, if surveys are correct, in institutional and hierarchical matters. The Daleys see a relatively new anti-racism initiative becoming more important “even if it is costly in terms of membership” because “the commitment is strong there on the part of the board and the team that’s been working on it for about four years.”
From the secular:
“It’s younger people who are going to have to put the flesh on a new way of being ‘church’ in today’s world,” Sheila Daley said in the group’s Roscoe Village offices. “And I don’t think it just means changing the institution. I think it’s how you live your life today.”
…
“What we’re seeing today with Catholics under 40 is, frankly, the reason they’re not joining groups like Call To Action is not because they agree with the bishops. It’s because they don’t care,” said Rev. Thomas Reese, senior fellow at Georgetown University’s Woodstock Theological Center.
“Younger people are simply leaving the church, rather than stay and try to reform it.”
Carl Olsen counters Fr. Reese:
And why, Father Reese, do you think that is? Is it because they—having received a meaningful and meaty catechesis, spent regular time in Eucharistic adoration, attended reverent liturgies, and been immersed in the teachings and practices of the Church—have become bored, listless, and otherwise disgusted? Or could it be that they—having been shown and told in countless ways that Church teaching is either silly or meaningless, endured banal music and liturgies, and been spoon fed endless bowls of indifferentism and relativism—finally said, “Yeah, this really is silly and meaningless. I’m outta here!”? Could it be that they don’t care about the agenda of Call to Action because that agenda is largely stuck in the Sixties and is based on a seriously flawed assumption: that making the Church more like the world will attract more people to the Church.
This makes me to return to something from the independent Catholic biweekly:
However reform occurs, the organization will continue to be an incubator of sorts, a place where new ideas can be spoken and challenged. “Part of the whole conference phenomenon,” said Sheila, referring to the annual CTA gatherings, “has been to give the opportunity to people who have been silenced or marginalized to have a place to speak.”
It’s not that everyone agrees with every speaker or with, say, every new liturgical expression. The important thing for the Daleys is that a place exists where such thinking can go on. Sheila Daley said she believes that people who attend the conferences — and the membership profile would suggest a fairly high level of education — “really value that engagement and the freedom to explore the ideas. … It’s not like we’ve got all the truth. Everybody realizes we’re all still learning and we’re all still coming to an understanding of what we mean by spirituality, by God, and by this community we’ve been in relationship with and where we’re going with it.”
Personally, I want to know what Larry D. says about all this.
UPDATE Ask and you shall receive.
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by Liz Lemon Swindle
