April 19, 2008, 3:35 pm
Benedict and the Young
It happens every time the pope encounters a young crowd, and it is happening again at the papal youth rally in Yonkers: Young Catholics will turn out in droves to give Pope Benedict a warm, rock-star welcome. And many of their elders will watch and wonder: What do they see in him?
He’s the pope, of course, which still counts for something among even the most poorly catechized young Catholics. And a certain contagious enthusiasm always permeates youth gatherings. Then there is the cult-of-personality explanation favored by journalists who puzzled over Pope John Paul II’s rapport with young people for decades. But that rationale lost steam after 1 million effusive young pilgrims showed up to cheer the shy and retiring Benedict at his first World Youth Day gathering in 2005, which pundits had expected to be a flop without the charismatic John Paul.
The youthful crowds turn out for Benedict, as they did for John Paul, for the same reason that young Catholics across America are rediscovering the rosary and Eucharistic adoration, forming reading groups to study the early Church fathers and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, joining Catholic lay movements and religious orders that stress fidelity to Catholic Church teachings, launching Bible studies and chastity clubs on secular campuses, and working to bolster religious education programs at Catholic parishes.
They are hungry for God. They are seeking transcendent truth and reliable moral guidance. And a growing number of them have come to believe that they can find both in an unreserved embrace of their Catholic faith and its most demanding moral teachings.
These young Catholics do not admire Benedict in spite of his message, but because of it. While many leaders today regard the young as bundles of hormones incapable of sacrifice or self-restraint, Benedict views them as souls longing for goodness and God. He tells them that the restlessness they feel — the persistent longing that no amount of money, power, or pleasure can seem to satisfy — is not a curse. It is a reminder that they were created for more than the consumption of goods and satisfaction of appetites. You were created for love, Benedict tells them, the kind of love that originates in God and spills over into service to others.
This message is not internalized by every young Catholic who shows up at a papal rally. The new faithful are a minority in their generation, as the anemic Mass attendance rates of their peers attest.
Yet their grassroots movement toward a more orthodox, countercultural Catholic faith has become a driving force for Church renewal in America. The fact that many of these highly committed young Catholics were once disaffected Catholics themselves suggests that the radical conversions they have experienced could be shared someday by many more young adults.
After all, the new faithful are not the only young adults yearning for God. A 2004 study from the Higher Education Research Institute at U.C.L.A. found that one-fifth of American college students are “highly religious” – a term that describes students who frequently attend religious services and retreats, read sacred texts, join campus religious organizations and tend to be morally conservative. Yet the U.C.L.A. study also found that three in four college students say they pray, discuss religion or spirituality with their friends, and find religion to be personally helpful.
Benedict knows about this youthful openness to God. On Wednesday, he urged U.S. bishops to draw on the “growing thirst for holiness” among the young and the “great idealism” and “promise” of highly committed young Catholics to reach their less committed peers.
It’s a strategy that too many bishops, pastors and religious educators have overlooked in their attempts to reach the young. In the coming weeks, as swarms of young Catholics return to their parishes and schools brimming with enthusiasm after celebrating the faith with Benedict, now would be the perfect time to give it a try.