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Monday, July 21, 2003
Only 15% of Catholics attend mass; restore ‘awe, reverence,’ Vidal asks
WITH fewer people hearing mass these days, Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal yesterday dedicated the first Schoenstatt Shrine in the country to individuals “who have lost their sense of holiness” and have lost interest in the liturgy.
Vidal lamented that even if the churches are filled on Sundays, the churchgoers are only a fraction of the whole Catholic population.
Citing a survey that estimated the Sunday churchgoers at only 15 percent of the total Catholic population, the cardinal said the 85 percent prefer to go to beaches, malls or movie houses instead of attending mass.
The survey period and the number of respondents, however, were not mentioned by the cardinal in his homily.
“People still search for God even if they search for him in places other than churches, but there are two reasons they are looking for him there. One is perhaps they couldn’t feel the presence of God in the church, or perhaps they do not know what they are looking for… it is for these people that we build this shrine,” he said.
He theorized that the people may have lost interest in the church because what they experience in church does not give much inspiration anymore.
So that the faithful may not lose interest in attending mass, Vidal said the clergy and religious can make changes in the way churches are built and decorated, and the way the liturgy is celebrated.
He also asked his priests and the religious sisters to be compassionate and to make themselves available to the people at all times.
“We need to reclaim the sense of the holy in our churches. We need to bring back the sense of awe and reverence that the presence of God elicits in receptive souls,” Vidal added.
Encounter
Meanwhile, the cardinal also changed the Oratio Imperata or the prayer to the Our Lady of Guadalupe recited at the end of each mass to ask for graces to be spared from the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (Sars).
Vidal said that since the Sars scare subsided, the archdiocese will start praying the Prayer to St. Michael the Archangel, which asks for protection from violence and all evils.
The Oratio Imperata was introduced to the Catholic faithful in Cebu when the Sars scare broke out last March.
“So now, we will change it back to the Prayer to St. Michael because there is no more Sars,” the cardinal told reporters.
Yesterday morning, the cardinal inaugurated the first Schoenstatt Shrine in the Philippines, which the Schoenstatt movement built in Barangay Lawaan, Talisay City.
Delegations of the movement from the United States, Germany, Australia and other provinces in the Philippines attended the blessing and thanksgiving mass.
In his homily, Vidal also asked the Schoenstatt sisters to make the shrine a place where the laity can encounter God, as he urged the faithful to take advantage of the place for them to share with that continuing encounter. LCR
(July 21, 2003 issue)
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