> I struggle to see any genuine worth in these events
Serious question: have you asked the Holy Spirit for help? If I am struggling to see something, then I ask God for help to see it. And I ask Him (impatiently and abruptly) for patience also because I think "usually He is pretty slow about giving me light", as I have usually forgotten t…
> I struggle to see any genuine worth in these events
Serious question: have you asked the Holy Spirit for help? If I am struggling to see something, then I ask God for help to see it. And I ask Him (impatiently and abruptly) for patience also because I think "usually He is pretty slow about giving me light", as I have usually forgotten that there were also a lot of times when He was alarmingly fast (along the lines of interrupting me mid-sentence).
As ever, I admire your suggestion of recourse to prayer - but I do not think my opinion of WYD is down to some spiritual blindness, but rather its my considered opinion based on trends.
The Church has been failing badly for decades now, especially in the West and Latin America.
WYD is part of this ongoing failure, as is ambiguous morality, poor catechesis, slop liturgy, bad music, ugly buildings, corrupt clergy and the Church neither giving people anything, nor asking anything of them in return.
I pray for the renewal of the Church every day. I find many Catholic react badly, if it is pointed out that our (The Church's) performance is lousy - and it is lousy.
We have to be clear sighted and honest about how things are going. That's all I advocate. If something is poor, its OK to say "this is poor", rather than pretend everything is going well, with a fixed smile.
If any of the attendees genuinely get something good out of WYD, then great! But we could have a WYD every year and I do not think it would help the Church in any way.
Apparently Francis has been preaching about climate action at WYD. Do you get into Heaven, if you cut your carbon footprint?
It is rocky ground all over and yet "God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham" (a contradiction that I do not understand, but have personally observed. In me.)
> I struggle to see any genuine worth in these events
Serious question: have you asked the Holy Spirit for help? If I am struggling to see something, then I ask God for help to see it. And I ask Him (impatiently and abruptly) for patience also because I think "usually He is pretty slow about giving me light", as I have usually forgotten that there were also a lot of times when He was alarmingly fast (along the lines of interrupting me mid-sentence).
As always, you have hit the nail on the head.
Hi Bridget,
As ever, I admire your suggestion of recourse to prayer - but I do not think my opinion of WYD is down to some spiritual blindness, but rather its my considered opinion based on trends.
The Church has been failing badly for decades now, especially in the West and Latin America.
WYD is part of this ongoing failure, as is ambiguous morality, poor catechesis, slop liturgy, bad music, ugly buildings, corrupt clergy and the Church neither giving people anything, nor asking anything of them in return.
I pray for the renewal of the Church every day. I find many Catholic react badly, if it is pointed out that our (The Church's) performance is lousy - and it is lousy.
We have to be clear sighted and honest about how things are going. That's all I advocate. If something is poor, its OK to say "this is poor", rather than pretend everything is going well, with a fixed smile.
If any of the attendees genuinely get something good out of WYD, then great! But we could have a WYD every year and I do not think it would help the Church in any way.
Apparently Francis has been preaching about climate action at WYD. Do you get into Heaven, if you cut your carbon footprint?
It is rocky ground all over and yet "God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham" (a contradiction that I do not understand, but have personally observed. In me.)