Pastoral Vitality

Since the beginnings of our efforts with Beacons of Light you have heard time and again the importance of keeping the “Why” of what we are doing in the forefront of our minds. If we do not remain focused on the “Why” and forget the reason behind the endeavor, our plan will fail!  As a reminder, that “Why” is specifically, “Missionary Discipleship” … bringing others to Jesus! That “Why” is about building up and not tearing down our faith communities!

With that, I have also to point out that there is a “Why” as to the difficulty of our efforts as well. Why is this so tough, sometimes heartbreaking, thankless work that none of us really has a desire for? Why do some people struggle so much with the change that needs to happen? There are many “Why’s” that contribute to this difficulty!

Having just spent late January and early February travelling throughout the Archdiocese to speak with 1,500+ parishioners, some of whom are upset, I must admit that if there is one primary takeaway, I have come to realize it is this: that many of our people are in denial. For them, everything is just fine the way it is or there is really no reason to be making these tremendous unnecessary changes! That may certainly seem so, but the landscape will continue to change and that is what we are trying to get ahead of. How can we better help them to understand this … in a few places the task is daunting.

While there are certainly other reasons beyond denial it is at the forefront (and is an expected stage in the process of grief that so often accompanies change) in coming to an acceptance of the necessary changes ahead.

Denial is scale-invariant and universal — we’ve all experienced it in some way or another in our lives and now in our efforts with Beacons of Light. By scale-invariant, I mean the individual, household, enterprise, city, state and empire and yes, even the Church all experience denial.

Denial has several signature characteristics:

1. The more profound and consequential the issue, the more stubborn our denial. When a minor cut reddens, we don’t go into denial that it’s infected, we simply treat it with greater care.

But when the unmistakable signs of heart disease appear, we find ways to deny the reality because it’s too upsetting and frightening. We want very desperately to think it will go away on its own and we’ll be fine, and nothing in our life will change.

2. The strength of our denial flows from the tacit understanding that if we let even a tiny bit of doubt break through our dam of denial, the whole foundation will give way…perhaps some of what we are seeing in our small towns and bergs where life is flowing a little slower and more protected from the outside world and where our communities parish identity is so tied up with the local town. The power of denial originates in the impermeability of the barrier blocking warning signs that all is not well.

In our metropolitan areas we have reticence in reducing Mass schedules even though our capacity utilization rates are far below what should be considered ideal for a vibrant and celebratory norm for the Sunday Eucharist. “We have a multitude of retired priests and so we continue to provide for the convenience of the people rather than realizing fewer Masses with larger numbers of faithful in attendance actually attracts more faithful to a prayer that is a more beautiful expression of our thankfulness.” One in which we can afford proper and beautiful expressions in the lavishness of our spaces, art & environment, music, preaching and so much more.

When in denial, if the diocese, parish, church building, school, relationship, etc. is no longer sustainable or viable, we must shut out all doubt and evidence because even a rivulet of doubt and evidence will quickly erode the dam of our denial and collapse our sense of security, control and predictability.

And so we hold fast to the idea that these chest pains are merely indigestion, and just because our churches are full every weekend after COVID-19 and the growing negative trend continues to exist, we are still in good shape. The church may be full at the moment but our friends are dying off, moving to warmer climes for jobs and retirement, our kids don’t come home after college all which belies an alternative reality in which everything is fine, under control, progress and growth are still positive and unstoppable and so on.

Doubling Down on Denial

When challenged, and especially as we are with Beacons of Light, we become defensive and angry, as if our security and identity are under attack. Since we’ve tied our identity and security to fixed, rigid standards, should those standards erode and decay, we deny the erosion because we feel our own security, identity and sense of control are giving way and might collapse.

To avert this disaster, we shore up our dam of denial, making sure no shred of doubt or evidence gets through to threaten us.

This strategy is terribly misguided, of course, because denying reality doesn’t make the threat go away, it magnifies the risk of collapse. Denial can be summarized as the stubborn inability to tell the truth because our fear of losing control as the foundations of our life crumble beneath us is so great that we’re compelled to cling to denial and fantasy:

In our situation the Church or Parish losing membership doesn’t matter, the parish or the archdiocese can just pretend that everything is OK or we will not cooperate with the initiative to save our communities and everything will be just fine, we like things just the way they are. “Things” just the way they are isn’t working! Reality is settling in throughout our archdiocese…yet, some are still in denial.

Reality is only a threat if we’ve forsaken flexibility, adaptability, problem-solving and the willingness to make sacrifices and accept failure — self-reliance. The appeal of denial is uniquely powerful because it offers us a means to cling to our security, identity and sense of control without having to actually do anything.

Just as we’d rather ignore our vital signs and risk expiring from a heart attack than face the sacrifices and challenges of revolutionizing our diet and fitness, we’d rather risk maintaining the status quo rather than facing the sacrifices and challenges of bringing about greater vitality to our parishes in the future!

As we now find ourselves on the journey of Lent running quickly towards the celebration of Holy Week and the Triduum,  it is a time perhaps to recall the denial of the Apostles about the inevitability of what was to come but also to recall the great joy of the Easter that followed and the new life arisen that has propelled us to this place in history.

Let us invoke the Holy Spirit on this Lenten journey that seems for us at times to go beyond the forty days, so as we enter into Easter, we may truly see the promise of new life offered in the renewal of our Archdiocese.