So many people chase after fads to liven things up; they smile at the girls and middle aged women leaping down the aisle in their liturgical dance clothes . They think it's adorable when the priest calls all the kids up to stand around the altar during the Consecration. They get mad, on occasion glaring and cursing mad if you don't want to hold their hands during the Our Father.
Other people choose a somewhat different route. They run to the New Movements. The Neo Cats, Cursillo, Opus Dei, Focolare, Miles Jesu, and in their prime, the Legion of Christ offered people things they could not get in their parishes : certainty, a priest who unequivocally said yes or no, tight personal bonds, intense devotion, a mission in life and passion. Still other people deal with the spiritual hunger by not joining anything. They shuffle in at the very last minute, do their close to a whole hour at church and explode out of the pew as soon as Communion is over.
And then there are the folks who had to go to other Rites to find peace. They seek refuge in the beautiful liturgies of the Eastern Rite parishes such as the Maronite or Byzantine. If these are not available they look wistfully at photos and video of the Orthodox or the Anglican service. I've read a number of comments from people who are excited about the Anglican Ordinariate because now
they will be able to go an Ordinariate Mass and leave their old parish for good.
And of course there are the people who out of curiosity walked into a TLM one day and fell in love. They go when they can or they found a parish that is completely Tridentine and have finally found pure joy.
There are a lot of restless, hungry hearts in many pews across this nation.
* I originally forgot one large group of people. The folks who either had a crisis and left the Chruch altogether or the individuals who never had an argument with the Church they just drifted away and only come back for Ash Wenesday, Christmas, Easter, weddings and funerals because the Faith as presented in their parishes just wasn't enough to hold them. No priest or layperson ever showed them what Archbishop Sheen called :
...a virile Christ and a leader worth following in these terrible times; One Who will step into the breach of death, crushing sin, gloom and despair; a leader to Whom we can make totalitarian sacrifice without losing, but gaining freedom, and Whom we can love even unto death. We need a Christ today Who will make cords and drive the buyers and sellers from our new temples; Who will blast the unfruitful fig-trees; Who will talk of crosses and sacrifices and Whose voice will be like the voice of the raging sea. But He will not allow us to pick and choose among His words, discarding the hard ones, and accepting the ones that please our fancy. We need a Christ Who will restore moral indignation, Who will make us hate evil with a passionate intensity, and love goodness to a point where we can drink death like water.
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