"Culture Leaves the Community Out"
by Brian M. Kane
Viewpoint published in
(official newspaper of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia)
Thursday, July 27, 2000
Recent research suggests that a change may be occurring in the way many young Catholics perceive the importance of getting married in the Church. It appears many are getting married in a civil ceremony.
Two important influences have helped create this new attitude: Protestantism and the experiences of Gen-X Catholics.
In Western culture, Protestantism contributed to redefining marriage. Reformers like Martin Luther and John Calvin insisted that marriage, while a very good thing, was not sacramental. Those parts of Europe, like Switzerland, that became Reformed signaled their new status through passing marriage laws that separated the celebration of marriage from religious institutions.
Nonetheless, the Reformers did not view marriage as fundamentally individual. The community still had a significant role to play in marriage.
Today's trend may be seen as one of the final points in this continuum. As our culture has moved toward greater individualism, our view of marriage has come to minimize the role of community. It has been replaced by a personal interpretation of marriage.
For most of the last 400 years, Catholicism was not affected by this transition. But today's Gen-X Catholics have a different set of assumptions about the Church and the world than their parents. They are mobile and apt to see the Church as a system of options rather than a set of "givens."
Gen Xers tend to establish strong relationships with each other, but not with local communities. Marriage may be their first step toward making more permanent ties in this regard, but then again it may not.
Also, Gen X's perception of institutions and structures is fluid. They assess things in terms of utility. If it doesn't work for them, you either change it or leave it.
Last, Gen Xers are spiritual on a very individual level. Building a relationship with God means discovering it for oneself. Self-identity and prayerfulness are learned through "trying on" different experiences, not through conforming to one way.
All these elements converge in this recent phenomenon. Words and traditions aren't enough. This generation must experience the sacramentality of marriage for it to be real. They must feel the "communion of saints" in order to want to explore further the meaning of a Catholic marriage. Ultimately, participation in liturgy will only come because their experiences of the Church meet them where they are.
This offers both a challenge and a gift to the Church.
The challenge is to carefully examine the core of what it means to be Catholic for ourselves as well as how we approach anyone meeting us for the first time, whether it is the stranger from outside the Church or from within. The new generation will not accept a theology or a faith community that isn't sure what it is or what it treasures.
The gift is at the heart of Catholicism and the very thing these people seek, a community reaching out with love and truth because it is founded upon the real and lasting presence of Christ.
It's up to us to accept the challenge and make that gift real to them.