A question of the will...

There are any number of components that make for a vibrant local parish but one of the most significant is simply the human will that it be so. Parishes can thrive in hard ground or wither in the midst of plenty if the people so choose.

And therein lies the rub. How can the vital importance of the local parish be explained to people to the end that they choose to place their precious time and energy into it as opposed to other things that vie for their attention? It's not an easy thing and its particularly difficult in the United States.

We are an instant culture accustomed to having both needs and wants met within an easy time span. A parish, unlike a local shopping mall, is not always, or even usually, a place for instant gratification. We deal in eternal things and the often slow progress of the sanctification of humans and their cultures. In the shouting world out there where effort or money put in often has an immediate return the parish may seem like some antique, a relic of a bygone era and charming in the way people look at the old cars as they speed past down the freeway.

Often what a parish means is only felt in its absence. When a parish closes people will often gather and recall all the blessings and cry for its passing without thinking for a moment the apathy of those mourning was the reason for their parish's passing into history in the first place. Sometimes we see what the parish means only in the long term social consequence. A good case can be made that the rudeness, consumerism, immorality, and decay of our culture has followed a path almost in lock step with the increasing push of religious belief and institutions to the periphery of American culture. Christians are often shocked, just shocked, at the state of things and shake their heads in wonder even as they themselves see what they believe and the structures of their faith as a mere convenience to the larger pursuit of happiness. If the faithful aren't why should we expect the pagans to be anything else?

And again the power of the will rises. People must choose to make their faith, their parish, and the larger Church a vital thing. They have to be able to see why it matters and the consequence of what would happen if it is gone. It can't be forced or finessed. It must come from within even if that means that sometimes it won't and the doors will be forever closed. The longer I serve the more I understand that planning, and fate, and circumstances, play a part in making parishes vital but at the core are hearts that choose to seek the Kingdom of God first and then have all the rest added.

Without this nothing else matters. With this everything is possible.