tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30490922.post647810531639883280..comments2024-03-26T12:56:54.350+00:00Comments on LMS Chairman: The Eastern Churches: 'it's a guy thing'Latin Mass Societyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17951084157414901564noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30490922.post-18796465281527956152015-02-07T16:11:16.062+00:002015-02-07T16:11:16.062+00:00I've seen such madly varying results in Orthod...I've seen such madly varying results in Orthodoxy (some churches speak no English, some speak it exclusively, the congregation is balanced, the congregation is men, the congregation is women) that it's hard to come up with a general consensus except that they seem on the whole to be about evenly split between men and women.<br /><br />Eastern Catholic Churches in my experience tend to have much more active males than in Latin mass churches. The church needs to be cleaned? No little committee of ladies comes to clean it. Instead eight men jump up from their coffee at the church hall and get to work while the women watch the children. I wouldn't want it any other way.Ecclesial Vigilantehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17070187926547373245noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30490922.post-69680241777356144692015-02-04T16:07:37.182+00:002015-02-04T16:07:37.182+00:00Thanks for your reply, and also for delving so wel...Thanks for your reply, and also for delving so well into Facing East. I nearly converted to EO about nine years ago, and the experience mentioned in the book was completely what I went through. I loved it, and my wife, well, did not. I fought and haggled and begged and argued with her but in the end, she was not having it. The night before I was supposed to be chrismated, I had to call the priest and tell him that I couldn't go through with it. I was newly married and didn't want to strain my marriage so soon after. Frederica Mathews-Greene also mentions that women raised in "softer, evangelical" churches often struggle the most; this was totally my wife, raised in an Assemblies of God (Pentecostal) church in our hometown in Colorado. <br /><br />Your points about solid pastoral leadership being the difference maker is totally salient. My hometown Diocese of Pueblo, Colorado has had lukewarm bishops for years, and it shows when we go back home. Altar girls have virtually crowded males out completely (they have at Pueblo's cathedral, and the priest there is a rather effeminate 70's-era fellow himself) and there isn't a Latin Mass to be had anywhere in the diocese, which just so happens to span the bottom half of the state, from Utah to Kansas, an area probably larger than at least Wales. Around the time of Summorum Pontificum, the Irish priest at the church down the street from our home there tried to introduce a Low Mass. It quickly went the way of the dinosaur. The masses there are banal in the extreme, so much so that I cringe going to Mass, after having lived in Lincoln. So yes, you are totally right.Dan T.https://www.blogger.com/profile/06165833121607406676noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30490922.post-53975362479394716262015-02-04T10:54:53.667+00:002015-02-04T10:54:53.667+00:00A key component of the success of the Diocese of L...A key component of the success of the Diocese of Lincoln, Nebraska, is the absence of altar girls, in which it is (I think) now unique in the USA, and I suspect the developed world.<br /><br />I certainly don't deny that when consistent steps against emasculation, of which this is an outstanding example, are taken in the context of the Ordinary Form, this makes a huge difference. Congratulations to the good bishops of Lincoln is certainly due. They have paid a high price in terms of their reputations in liberal circles, and reaped a rich reward for their people. We could do with a few more bishops like them.<br /><br />I don't think this invalidates my general points about the EF and OF; on the contrary it underlines how big a pastoral impact the subtle differences I have been discussing can have.Joseph Shawhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06587987442560784792noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30490922.post-89273553255301509432015-02-04T05:28:13.512+00:002015-02-04T05:28:13.512+00:00Thanks for the interesting article Dr Shaw. I woul...Thanks for the interesting article Dr Shaw. I would just like to say that while I deeply favor the Traditional Rite, I have seen Ordinary Form parishes busting at the seams, and with men, too. I live in the Diocese of Lincoln, Nebraska, and it is thriving and is flush with vocations. In a diocese of 90000 Catholics, there are more vocations per capita here than anywhere in the country. There are two seminaries, both built since 1999, and one of them is the FSSP seminary for English speaking seminarians. Every parish in Lincoln proper is bursting at the seams at Mass, often with standing room only being the only seating choice, and young priests serve each parish. The Newman Center at the University of Nebraska is building what has to be the most impressive (and gorgeous Romanesque) student chapel anywhere in the United States, complete with handcrafted stained glass windows made in Germany. As a transplant to Lincoln, and a convert to Catholicism, I can offer only this as the secret to healthy churches and robust attendance by ALL Catholics in a diocese: robust episcopal leadership. Glennon Flavin, Fabian Bruskewitz, and James Conley are the most recent three bishops here, and all have been extremely steady and orthodox Catholic bishops, willing to play hardball with secular culture and not compromising one inch on doctrine and dogma. If all bishops would behave this way, and encourage the same in their priests, Catholicism in the rest of the Western world would be booming, exactly as it is here. Dan T.https://www.blogger.com/profile/06165833121607406676noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30490922.post-71360259530488817802015-02-01T20:25:51.286+00:002015-02-01T20:25:51.286+00:00I think the left are more than aware of the male a...I think the left are more than aware of the male attraction to the Latin Mass and the East, even if it goes unspoken. Many don't want a male church. They want liturgies presided over by both sexes (but preferably women) and ultimately female clergy. Less men equals less priests equals less male control and less Masses. This in turn necessitates more female lay-led 'communion services', more female control in the church, and eventually women priests and bishops.beadhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14769156558523270637noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30490922.post-54053040296251228412015-02-01T18:46:08.822+00:002015-02-01T18:46:08.822+00:00Whenever I have attended Orthodox liturgy (admitte...Whenever I have attended Orthodox liturgy (admittedly not often) there have been far more women present than men, and mostly elderly women.<br />Something that appeals to men and women in more or less equal numbers is contemplative prayer, prayer of quiet and stillness - one might ponder why this is so.Savonarolahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12547523172291007631noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30490922.post-52967650712353036352015-02-01T15:33:28.136+00:002015-02-01T15:33:28.136+00:00You might find this post interesting on the subjec...You might find <a href="http://journeytoorthodoxy.com/2010/10/28/why-orthodox-men-love-church/" rel="nofollow">this post</a> interesting on the subject of men and the appeal that Eastern Orthodoxy has had for them.Alhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01920767090954250373noreply@blogger.com