I have in my possession a tiny little book that was given to my father as his first communion present entitled 'Little Key to Heaven.' On one of the first pages in a book there is a list of the Commandments of the Church:
1. Go to Mass every Sunday and Holy Days of Obligation
2. Go to Confession at least once a year.
3. Receive Holy Communion at least once during the Easter Season.
4, Observe the prescribed days of fasting and abstinence.
5. Provide for the needs of the church and your priests.
6. do not marry within a close degree of consanguinity.
For most Catholics, assuming they are aware of these commandments or precepts (and most aren't) the fifth precept means putting a few bucks into the collection plate, and it ends there. It doesn't end there, of course. We are supposed to contribute out of our time, talent and treasure. Putting a few dollars in is the easiest, and literally the very least we can do.
I had a meeting the other night, where, briefly, the discussion grew quite heated, particularly between two of the men who were actually in complete agreement with each other. They believed Very Strongly that A Very Firm Letter on a Very Important Matter be should be written to Someone up the chain. They were in absolute agreement about that. Then came the time to decide who should write the letter. For a long pause they just stared at each other over Zoom. You could see it in both their faces. Each was thinking 'Go on, you first.' Then one of them took the bull by the horns and spoke. He said to the other one: 'Do you want to handle this?'
The other guy sighed and said sure, he'd take care of it. We are all to offer our input, and he will collate this into one letter and send it up the chain.
I am almost certain that no letter will be written.
This, I am afraid, is a typical situation in our parishes and in our Church. Many people are willing to criticize. Many are willing to point out what is wrong and even propose solutions. But few are willing to actually do it, and carry it through. Everybody wants the Church to thrive, of course, but almost no one is willing to do anything about it themselves. They think somebody- by which they almost invariably mean somebody else- ought to take care of it.
We are dying of a near terminal case of the Somebody Oughtas. Something needs to be done, of course, but it really is the duty of somebody else to handle it. Perhaps it's because they believe they have a right to whatever it is they want, and therefore it should be given to them through no effort on their part.
A friend signed me up to a forum on Facebook- against my will, I would like to add- wherein we are to discuss the state of Church music. I did that for a long time here, and felt that joining this group would be like going to down a rabbit hole, and I was right. All they do is complain, period, full stop. All they want to do is complain. One of the people on the forum asked a question of what can possibly be done to get better music into our parishes, how to improve the quality of the singing. Having some experience in this matter, I offered my expertise. The first thing to do, I said, is to go and get singing lessons, improve your voice, and lend it to the choir.
Their response? I can't do that. I don't have a good voice.
Me: Hence the lessons. Make your voice better.
Them: I don't have the time. We should get professionals.
Me: They want to be paid. You would need to put more money in the collection for that.
Them: I give enough! They should go after those other people who don't put in anything at all!
Then the subject got onto hymnals. The bishops should get together and commission better ones. I pointed out that the bishops have enough on their plate, and few are really interested in music in the first place. If you want better hymnals, you need to do it yourself.
Them: I can't do that!
Me: Sure you can. The hymns you want are all in the public domain. Gather the ones you want and take them to some self publishing vehicle on the internet. You can do it cheap.
Them: But I can't do that! I've never done that before!
Me: Alright, then, do you have access to a printer? You can print off your music and put it in a binder for the pews. Lots of churches do that. Or you can get a screen and project the lyrics onto it. It's not optimal, but it is an option.
Them: Absolutely not. I hate it when churches do that.
Me: Why?
Them: Because the music they project is always horrible. Whenever I walk into a church with a projection screen I know the music will be awful.
Me: The screen only shows the music you project onto it. If you project good music, it will show good music. Or, everybody has cell phones now (side note: I don't, but I'm out of step with the times). If you know someone who is good at programming, see if you can have them make an app called 'today's hymns' and have the choir master upload the hymns to the app so everybody can then read them off their phones.
Them: ...Are you serious?
And so it goes. They want something done, and they absolutely reject the idea that they should do it.
My own parish is struggling. There we have a bad case of the Somebody Oughtas, but we also have another problem, possibly worse. These are the Wet Blankets. Back before Covid struck, we were having Coffee Sundays, once a month. They were poorly attended. The women who ran most of the Sundays often complained to me that so few people came down to their spread. The 'spread', by the way, was an urn full of Folgers, another urn with hot water for tea, and some cookies and juice for the kids. The cookies were bought from the bargain bin at the grocery store, marked down because they were past their best before date.
Some other groups were asked if they wanted to handle it. My wife and I volunteered our groups, and then worked together for two consecutive Coffee Sundays. We decided to shake things up a bit. We made home baked cookies, along with fudge, brownies, lemon squares and possibly most popular, fresh baked bread and butter. We still had the folgers, but we also brought our espresso pots from home and made espresso, along with some hot cocoa for the kids. I got a couple of the musicians in the church to come down and provide some music. My idea was to try and turn our Coffee Sunday into a Cafe Sunday.
Afterwards I was approached by the women who usually ran it, the ones who so often complained that the attendance was so poor, and they said to me that my innovations were nice, but really, I should not have gone through all that trouble, when all that was really needed was some coffee and a few cookies. In other words, I should continue doing what never worked in the first place. They actively tried to discourage us from trying something different to make it better.
Another time I was trying to run a trivia night at a parish. I wanted to offer a good prize to draw people in. I went to my council to ask them to back the prize of $300. They almost passed out. No, that was too much, much too much. One suggested the prize need be no more than $50, and even that was balked at. A gift certificate for $25 seemed more reasonable, or perhaps $10. A ten dollar gift certificate prize seemed to be just fine to them- for a pizza and trivia night where the entrance fee was- wait for it- ten bucks. I just went around them and backed the prize myself.
But that is another problem I run into constantly- people who think we should constantly be doing less. They don't propose ideas, but they actively try to stop yours. They want to do something, of course, only not this, or not that, or not like this, or not like that. But this and the Somebody Oughtas are nothing but passive suicide. One group thinks it would be great if our churches throve, but they themselves will do nothing to help, and the other also thinks it would be great, but they will stop you from trying to do anything about it. Our churches need our support, now more than ever, but there is so much working against us from doing it. If you want to help the Church, all too often we must be prepared to do it alone.
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