At the beginning of every year, the Washington Post publishes “The List.” The List is a pop culture guide to what is “in” and what is “out” in the new year. To get the most benefit from The List, it helps to have some degree of cultural “wokeness.” I wondered what a such a list for Catholic culture might look like. This is what I came up with.
OUT | IN |
Redpilling | Gaslighting |
Rome | Abu Dhabi |
Multiplication of Loaves & Fishes | Sharing of Loaves & Fishes |
The Ten Commandments | The 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals |
Mortal Sin | Accompanyment |
New Evangelization | New Humanism |
Altar Girls | Deaconesses |
The Blessed Mother | Mother Earth |
The Catholic Church | The Catholic Party |
Peoria | Rochester |
The Catholic Church in China | Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association |
Kissing the Fisherman’s Ring | Photo Ops with the Fisherman |
Continuity | New Paths |
The Holy Spirit | The Zeitgeist |
A Man for All Seasons | Pope Francis: A Man of His Word |
The Hypostatic Union | Intermittent Divinity |
Abortion | Seamless Garment |
The Tiber | The Amazon |
Damnation of Souls | Annihilation of Souls |
Papal Charities | Papal Investments |
Body and Blood | Bread and Wine |
Jesus Christ | Abraham |
Assisi | Richmond |
Clerical Sex Abuse | Clerical Sex Abuse |
Should we even be talking about “Catholic culture”? Does not Catholicism, with its beliefs and moral requirements, exist outside of, and exert an influence on, all worldly cultures, without itself being just another culture? The reality is, however, that those presently in control of the institutional Catholic Church have lost sight of, or deliberately blurred, this distinction. The evidence for this argument is all around. The above list is only some of it.