Church and community, and a circular issue

So here’s something I was thinking about:

So as I mentioned yesterday, my oldest son plays trumpet in the teen choir at church, which meant that we waited around after mass was over for him to pack up his trumpet and music and help put away the music stands and other equipment.  And in that time we, my husband and I, that is, talked to three or four families, parents of kids our kids’ age, or people we know from CFM (Christian Family Movement – monthly small-group meetings), or Boy Scout families.

And afterwards I thought about the fact that, when we first moved into town, we knew no one, and now church, and coffee and donuts afterwards,  is full of familiar faces.  Now, to be sure, I’m not a social butterfly by any means, and, with respect to many of the people we know, they’re Scout families where my husband is better acquainted with the boys, and the parents, than I am, but it still makes a difference.

Now, part of it is a matter of the passage of time, and the fact that having kids in the parrochial school lends itself to getting to know other families, but there’s also a circularity to it:  the more you go to church and get to know people, the more “at home” you feel there, which reinforces the likelihood that you’ll go to church.

And if that “feedback loop” is lost, if church is not where you find community, and, in fact, you just don’t know anyone who goes to church, then you won’t, either.

On CNN last night, though I didn’t make it past the first couple minutes, was a show about Iceland, which was profiling the country as a place where 2/3rds of children were born to unmarried parents and, the implication seemed to be, everyone was just fine, with the narrator suggesting that marriage would disappear for the next generation of Icelanders.  And, certainly, when no one you know is getting married, it can be a powerful discouragement:  “don’t you trust your boyfriend to stay faithful to you?  No one else is getting married, after all, so why should you?”

In that context:  somehow, without my noticing, there’s developed an Easter tradition of posting pictures of one’s family, or one’s kids, dressed up for Easter, and, for a fair number, in or in front of the church itself.  Which is at least something, communicating one’s churchgoingness.

And consider young adults:  it seems to me that it’s fairly common for college students to continue attending church away from home, if they happen to land with others who do so as a group.  Of course, it requires someone taking that first step, of “hey, I’m going to mass tomorrow; who wants to come with me?” but if you do end up with such a group — and eating lunch, or breakfast, or dinner, afterwards — then you’re a lot more likely to become a regular church-goer.  And where “kids these days” flounder is often after college, when they’re missing that same social group.

The Archdiocese of Chicago is in the middle of a project called “Renew my Church,” which includes a survey that they announced at church yesterday.  What’s it all about?  A few months ago there were reports of a major reorganization plan, aimed at closing or merging large numbers of parishes, to manage the financial difficulties many parishes found themselves in, as well as to plan for a decline in the number of priests.  Is this survey just a means of getting parishoner acceptance of such a plan, or will the responses, and lay feedback in general, have a real impact on the direction of Archbishop Cupich’s plan?  I don’t know.  I’m sorry to report that when I filled out hte survey last night, I didn’t have much to say, other than “all of it’s important.” Truth be told, I am skeptical of Cupich, and I sometimes feel that Cupich’s dream is for middle-class and wealthy parishes to be the providers of outreach and, let’s face it, funds, for the poor, especially the poor parishes, rather than having needs of their own.  While it would be nice to presuppose that every such middle-class or wealthy Catholic, and Catholic parish, is already doing just fine, and already in a place where they can reach out to others, it’s simply not the case.  One thing that’s been eye-opening over the past several years in CFM discussions is how many parents have watched their kids walk away from church, and how helpless they feel.

And similarly I suspect that some would denigrate the idea of seeing friends and aquaintences at church — “church isn’t supposed to be a social club,” and “you should be focusing on God, not who’s in the next pew or who you’ll talk to at coffee & donuts afterwards.”  But it matters, and it reinforces the feeling of connectedness and belonging, and the absense of community destroys this.