Over the last several years, as the Diocese of Rockford conducts their annual Mass counts, the numbers suggest an alarming result.  The Diocese, as a whole, is at 22% Mass attendance.  By way of comparison, Mass attendance before Vatican II (1965) was 75%.  There are many contributing factors for such a drastic change.  These factors are bearing fruit in very negative ways.  And, the prospects for the future are not encouraging.

Collectively, all these reasons contribute to a crisis of discipleship.  What do I mean by this?  There has been a systemic devolution regarding respect for God, Christ, His Church, and the Christian Faith.  The societal foundations which have normally been relied upon for direction and focus have lost the ability to pass on to the next generation a consistent ethic, a familiar morality or even a cultural common sense.  The pillars of society (religion, family, government and education) are mere shadows of a former reality.  These pillars are now cracked, crumbling and, in some ways, absent any identifiable footprint.  Government no longer represents nor serves the people and their common good.  Politics reigns, not service.  Education has become a breeding ground for the resolution of societal ills, instead of the classroom for learning it was designed to be.  Religion has abdicated its right to stand in the public square by watering down the teaching of God and Christ relegating absolute truths to a simple feeling or fleeting emotion and absent any intestinal courage.  And, family, which is the backbone of culture, has suffered such assaults in recent years as to not have the strength to stiffen its back without spasms hobbling it.

Can there be a refiguring, a fresh focus to guide us and redirect us?  Can we save what we have had, reclaiming it through fresh ways of think and acting?  Is hope truly the anchor of life?  Or, are we relegated to a future careening over a cliff, a dystopia view that sees a future without any hope?