Convenient targets. . .

Rome seems to enjoy lining up the usual suspects to complain about.  On the one hand are those who advocate a thoroughgoing embrace of culture and society, including radical visions of individual autonomy and freedom, in the name of Vatican II.  They find the convenient target of the Latin Mass folk as the real problem with Rome.  If only the windows of Rome could be opened to the fresh air of music with a beat, conversational words, feelings, and fun, it would all be better.  On the other hand are those who hold their nose every time Vatican II is mentioned -- presuming that the good pope John and the bishops assembled were the ruination of Rome.  

Of course, the problem here is that both are wrong.  While Paul VI might have more blame in the aftermath of things, there was much that was commendable in the writings of Vatican II.  While no Lutheran can heartily agree to everything, there is much any thinking Lutheran would find good and salutary -- including much of what the Council actually said about Scripture.  The problem is that the lefties in Rome really have not read or paid all that much attention to what they did read of Vatican II and the righties are in the same boat.  They blame things on Vatican II that might rightfully be laid at the feet of Paul VI and those who either did his bidding or conned him into theirs (depending upon your opinion).  There is little of the modern day conundrum of worship wars in Rome which the Council addressed in detail.  Neither are the troubles of Rome in general the direct result of Vatican II.

All of that is easy for me to say.  I am not Roman Catholic.  But there is an application for Lutherans as well.  Some Lutherans love to lay our problems at the feet of the liturgical movement and the liturgical renewal that resulted in LBW/LW.  There are plenty of folks who say that if we had not deviated from p. 15 in TLH or the one year lectionary, Missouri would have continued its spectacular growth from the 1940s through the 1960s.  Balderdash.  Missouri's problems are deeper and were there long before the late 1960s and early 1970s.  Before anyone rushes to blame liturgical renewal for the confusion on Sunday mornings in Missouri, one might consider the advent of the photocopier, personal computer, desktop publishing, and a host of cultural changes that entered the fray at the same time.  Furthermore, Missouri had its own theological, cultural, and worship wars before 1960 -- due in part to a rural church becoming urban and suburban, the growth in numbers, encouragement to study outside of our own universities and seminaries, and the difficulty in maintaining any kind of unity as other aspects of our life together became more diverse.

Others lay the blame at the liturgical movement and liturgical renewal for another reason.  It did not go far enough.  These anti-liturgical types were not looking for different vestments but for none, not for a different liturgy but for none, not for new hymnody but for radically new music, and not for unity but for radical diversity and the focus on the local.  They claim that if Missouri had ditched every hymnal we might have kept our numbers and even increased as we became a church more in tune with its people and the tenor of the times.  Of course, the problem with that is there are plenty of churches who did just that and they are no better off than we are and more likely worse off that we will ever be.  Worship and music are convenient targets for problems that have many causes converging on the same period in time.  

I wonder if our problems (perhaps even Rome's problems) were elsewhere.  We ended up not having babies but that did not happen overnight.  Family size began to diminish slowly and without notice until we looked around and saw all the gray hair.  We did not formally address such things as birth control but it became the norm for our folks like the rest of society along with the legalization of abortion.  We began to treat divorce as something normal or routine and so it became such.  Marriage became as optional to our youth as it was becoming for the rest of society.  The educational ministries of the church declined along with the teaching of the faith in the home until our kids did not know the difference between what others believed and we Lutherans confess.  A mobile society took kids away from where they grew up and their support systems of home and church.  Choices multiplied and church became one of many things competing for our time and attention.  Our world had its own agenda with everything from the liberation of women, gays, trans, etc., to a consuming passion for pleasure and entertainment.  We watched the new theology of media intent upon promoting causes as well as getting our money and we bought into things before we realized the media had cause.  A bunch of things happened to cause the decline in churches which we all lament.  Convenient targets, like the usual suspects, give us quick but generally unrealistic and unreliable reasons and prevent us from doing what needs to be done to stop the decline.  Worship got wrapped up in it all but it was hardly the agent causing the decline.  I wish we would awaken to this reality and address the real problems.  Sure, there are worship problems that need to be addressed but even if we fixed them all we would still have much left to repair.