Great WaPo article on traditional Catholics
In advance of Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the U.S., the Washington Post profiles several D.C.-area Catholic families who buck the dominant culture, even within the Church, adhering to more traditional Catholic practices. Some excerpts:
During an era when two-thirds of young Catholics say they can be good Catholics without going to Mass and many believe in a woman's right to choose abortion and view premarital sex as morally acceptable, Karen and David Hickey might be considered renegades -- because they are so devout.The lives of the Fairfax County couple and their five young children revolve around the Catholic Church, and they stand out as devoted because so many others do not follow the teachings of their church to the letter.
Such young Catholics' strict obedience to the tenets of their faith makes them an anomaly in their generation. Only 14 percent of Catholics ages 20 to 40 attend Mass at least weekly, according to research by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University, and just one in five goes to confession once a year or more.
For conservative Catholics, that's unthinkable.
"You have to live your faith and practice, not just learn the doctrine," said Anne Francoise Guelcher, 40, the mother of six children -- ages 15 months to 14 years -- who lives with husband James in Montclair, Va.
Guelcher home-schools her children. "That way, I can really teach them about the faith," she says.
The family goes to Mass every Sunday and on Holy Days and celebrates the myriad Catholic feast days. Like other devout Catholics, they keep holy water, which has been blessed by a priest, in a small font by their front door. They say the rosary and pray to the saints daily.
"We live it every day," Guelcher said.
This isn't a phenomenon confined to just D.C, of course. The San Francisco Chronicle featured our own parish, St. Margaret Mary, in an article that appeared on Good Friday. Rod Dreher noted similar developments not only among young Catholics, but also among the Orthodox and Protestant evangelicals in his book Crunchy Cons.