Toward the end [of my talk] , I reflected on the next generation of Catholic leaders. Most empirical data has pegged this cohort of young priests, religious and lay activists as more “conservative,” and there’s a good deal of truth to that claim. In general, they’re more attracted to traditional modes of devotion and prayer, less resistant to ecclesiastical authority, and less inclined to challenge church teaching and discipline.
Yet, I argued, slapping the label “conservative” on all this is potentially misleading, because it assumes an ideological frame of reference, as if younger Catholics are picking one side or the other in the church’s version of the culture wars. My sense is that these young people are not so much reacting to (or against) anything in the church, but rather secular culture. In a nutshell, they’re seeking identity and stability in a world that seems to offer neither.
Proof of the point comes when you drill with these young Catholics. You’ll find they often hold views on a wide variety of issues — such as the environment, war and peace, the defense of the poor and of immigrants, and the death penalty — which don’t really fit the ideological stereotype.
These observations are hardly unique to me, of course, but I included them because I wanted to issue a plea to Catholics my age and older.
This new generation seems ideally positioned to address the lamentable tendency in American Catholic life to drive a wedge between the church’s pro-life message and its peace-and-justice commitments. More generally, they can help us find the sane middle between two extremes: What George Weigel correctly calls “Catholicism lite,” meaning a form of the faith sold out to secularism; and what I’ve termed “Taliban Catholicism,” meaning an angry expression of Catholicism that knows only how to excoriate and condemn. Both are real dangers, and the next generation seems well-equipped to steer a middle course, embracing a robust sense of Catholic identity without carrying a chip on their shoulder.
Read it all.
