A Civilized And Focused Discussion On Life Teen

[Ash Wednesday]

[quote name='Steve' timestamp='1307841846' post='2252565']
My point about the pop-culture is a counter point to the original post I was arguing against. It's not contradictory notice the "WERE". All caps. I don't think the Church WILL continue to decline in numbers because I have faith. But that doesn't mean that we should just go on doing what we are doing waiting for God to magically poof everything right again. We are his hands and feet.[/quote]

I don't think either side of the issue is happy with the status quo or content to do nothing, I think the disagreement lies in what should be done. Along these same lines, tying in with what you said earlier:

[quote]If forced to wear dresses, suits and bowties to mass they will NOT come to mass and in 40-50 years from now there will be no Catholic Church. [/quote]

That is not really how the Church works. The holy spirit is the driving force, the survival of the church does not hinge on something as trivial as how much she embraces pop culture or whether or not people are going to wear a tie. The church isn't going to put out some specific rubrics about clothing for people to follow, there are certainly circumstances where people will be wearing things like work clothes and whatnot, but a lot of it is just common sense.

[quote]As for dress code. I guess we can agree to disagree [b]and I'll be glad that Jesus is in charge of our church and not some of you.[/b][/quote]

I thought we were going to play nice and be civilized. Not the most charitable way of making your point.


I don't expect this thread to last much longer, they never do...but again at least I got to see Red use the word "pantaloons".

Edited June 12, 2011 by Ash Wednesday

[MissScripture]

[quote name='Ash Wednesday' timestamp='1307887596' post='2252745']

I don't expect this thread to last much longer, they never do...but again at least I got to see Red use the word "pantaloons".
[/quote]
Not to burst your bubble, but "pantaloons" is the filt[b][/b]er for pa[b][/b]nts...

[add]

[quote name='Ash Wednesday' timestamp='1307886372' post='2252742']
LOL, Red said "pantaloons"

I love that word.
[/quote]

i put my pantaloons on, one leg at a time

Edited June 12, 2011 by add

[Ash Wednesday]

[quote name='MissScripture' timestamp='1307888114' post='2252747']
Not to burst your bubble, but "pantaloons" is the filt[b][/b]er for pa[b][/b]nts...
[/quote]

they need a...philter? Like coffee?

[quote name='add' timestamp='1307888174' post='2252748']
i put my pantaloons on, one leg at a time
[/quote]

*facebook like*

Edited June 12, 2011 by Ash Wednesday

[Lil Red]

[quote name='MissScripture' timestamp='1307888114' post='2252747']
Not to burst your bubble, but "pantaloons" is the filt[b][/b]er for pa[b][/b]nts...
[/quote]
Shhh!

[Ash Wednesday]

[img]http://www.methodshop.com/video/reviews/cowbell/fever.jpg[/img]

The church just needs more cowbell.

And Christopher Walken. Unfortunately, he's a Methodist. No joke. It's just funny that such a spooky guy is a...Methodist.

[MissScripture]

[quote name='Lil Red' timestamp='1307888692' post='2252750']
Shhh!
[/quote]
Sorry.

[Ash Wednesday]

[quote name='MissScripture' timestamp='1307888824' post='2252752']
Sorry.
[/quote]

it's okay, for the rest of the day I'll just have an image in my head of a pair of pantaloons swirling with some water through a giant massive paper cone.

[MissScripture]

[quote name='Ash Wednesday' timestamp='1307889081' post='2252754']
it's okay, for the rest of the day I'll just have an image in my head of a pair of pantaloons swirling with some water through a giant massive paper cone.
[/quote]
Well, I'm glad I didn't ruin things for you entirely.

[Ash Wednesday]

[quote name='Steve' timestamp='1307841846' post='2252565']
I'm sticking with the idea that Life Teen is a great ministry. For those of you who don't like it and feel that it's not orthodox enough/isn't teaching the theology enough/ isn't teaching about the church enough, use it as a supplement to your youth ministry. The other part of youth ministry would be Catechism classes/Confirmation classes. Those do plenty of all that. Maybe Life Teen is more about building a personal relationship with God. If you ask me that's a good thing cause God knows (and I mean it when I say GOD KNOWS) that Catechism classes/Confirmation classes isn't doing a good enough job of that. We need to stop graduating kids from our church with Confirmation. Because that's what they see it as. Graduation.
[/quote]

My best friend is a LifeTeen minister, and I haven't sat in on a Life night in years -- but knowing her, she's the real deal and she probably runs a tight orthodox ship back home. I think as I said before my biggest itch to scratch on this has to do with the application to the mass moreso than specific ministries.

I absolutely agree that kids to view it as graduation, and this is sad. Much of this I blame a combination of things, a combination of both sins and weaknesses in the Church and the darkness and folly of the times in general, like how much we are bombarded with mental consumerist Lady Caca junk food in our day to day lives outside of the brief moments we spend at our parish. As the problem is caused by multiple things, the solution will probably have to involve multiple things.

I think as time goes by the Church may undergo what JP2 called a qualitative renewal rather than quantitative for the time being. But it will be interesting to see what happens, as more and more I think the world is becoming hostile and at odds with authentic Christianity.

Edited June 12, 2011 by Ash Wednesday

[TeresaBenedicta]

Lifeteen is what you (or the parish or the youth minister) make of it. Lax dress is not essential to Lifeteen anymore than heretical doctrine is. Every once in a while I go to a Lifeteen Mass at a neighboring parish on Sunday evenings when I can't make it to Mass earlier in the day. The kids are dressed nicely. The music is well done. There's a heck of a lot of unnecessary EMHCs, but what can I do?

All that I mean to say is that a good Lifeteen program can be run with or without focus on dress code. Now, obviously it'd be great if there was some focus on it. And that can easily be fit into it. Frankly... if the program is effective, it'll happen naturally. In general, the more you understand the Mass and the more you love the Eucharist, the more you'll see the importance of dressing nicely.

[tinytherese]

It seems like people have a problem with Life Teen Masses but not the curriculum of the organization.

Catholics are neither required to like or dislike Life Teen, so long as no one is a jerk to those who have a different opinion than their own.

Not everything is everyone's cup of tea.

[Ash Wednesday]

I actually found a pretty interesting video on music in the mass and they point out church documents regarding how music is meant to be used -- but would I be opening a pretty ugly can of worms if I post it? Some topics around here as we know tend to make the mods groan and roll their eyes ("not again!")

I wouldn't post it in this thread because it isn't an issue that's exclusively about LifeTeen. But it was genuinely an interesting video to me.

I guess I haven't been paying attention, is the question of liturgical music....still pretty much a..... these days?

Edited June 12, 2011 by Ash Wednesday

[Lil Red]

ash, i'd be interested.

[AudreyGrace]

i've read a lot about how life teen "doesn't catechize the youth." since nobody seems to care if one person says that they have experienced catechesis through Life Teen, I figured I'd share a general from-the-source video.

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYumBRKrG8s&feature=channel_video_title[/media]


Promoting vocations..
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fT-fB8mgCCU&feature=channel_video_title[/media]

[AudreyGrace]

This one promotes the use and importance of the Catechism, scapular, rosaries, Scriptures, etc:
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bu4XDYgBvvo&feature=channel_video_title[/media]

[Jaime]

[quote name='AudreyGrace' timestamp='1307906988' post='2252814']
This one promotes the use and importance of the Catechism, scapular, rosaries, Scriptures, etc:
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bu4XDYgBvvo&feature=channel_video_title[/media]
[/quote]

I like that

[MithLuin]

Dress code.


Certainly, people should be encouraged to dress up for mass. And there are places where it can be enforced - good luck getting into a church in Rome wearing shorts or a sleeveless shirt! Even as a tourist, you will be turned away at the door.

But in general, I don't think it's appropriate for us to play fashion police with each other. We don't know if someone was traveling, en route to work, had no clean clothes except this outfit, had to change right before mass because someone threw up on their dress clothes, etc. They made their choices...and then came to mass. They're here now. Great! For daily mass especially, I feel very strongly that it's a 'come as you are' invitation. Dressing up for Sunday mass is nice, and I make the effort to unless circumstances conspire against me. But if someone doesn't think my hair is neat enough...that's kinda sorta their problem.

If someone wants to emphasize the importance of respect at mass, including in how we dress, from the pulpit or in a religious ed class, that's fine and good. But what we come to mass for are the sacraments. As long as people understand that...they'll accept the reason for the hoopla of dressing up whether they like it or not. So, there's no need to put the cart before the horse there. Enforcing the details of reverence without encouraging the spirit of reverence in the first place would be...silly.


And it's cultural, too. I [i]dare[/i] you to wear jeans and a t-shirt to an African-American parish. You will feel like such an idiot for being underdressed. Whereas in the rural parish where I grew up? Yeah, you'll fit in just fine, especially on a Sat. afternoon. And no, we didn't have LifeTeen. We had a part-time youth minister who ran a variety of programs - some social (movie/pizza nights), some faith-sharing (the lasting friendships were formed there), and some service (workcamp in the summer, etc). Some youth participated in the mass as lectors, cantors, etc, but they weren't at particular masses.

[Steve]

[quote name='MithLuin' timestamp='1307998446' post='2253306']
Dress code.


Certainly, people should be encouraged to dress up for mass. And there are places where it can be enforced - good luck getting into a church in Rome wearing shorts or a sleeveless shirt! Even as a tourist, you will be turned away at the door.

But in general, I don't think it's appropriate for us to play fashion police with each other. We don't know if someone was traveling, en route to work, had no clean clothes except this outfit, had to change right before mass because someone threw up on their dress clothes, etc. They made their choices...and then came to mass. They're here now. Great! For daily mass especially, I feel very strongly that it's a 'come as you are' invitation. Dressing up for Sunday mass is nice, and I make the effort to unless circumstances conspire against me. But if someone doesn't think my hair is neat enough...that's kinda sorta their problem.

If someone wants to emphasize the importance of respect at mass, including in how we dress, from the pulpit or in a religious ed class, that's fine and good. But what we come to mass for are the sacraments. As long as people understand that...they'll accept the reason for the hoopla of dressing up whether they like it or not. So, there's no need to put the cart before the horse there. Enforcing the details of reverence without encouraging the spirit of reverence in the first place would be...silly.


And it's cultural, too. I [i]dare[/i] you to wear jeans and a t-shirt to an African-American parish. You will feel like such an idiot for being underdressed. Whereas in the rural parish where I grew up? Yeah, you'll fit in just fine, especially on a Sat. afternoon. And no, we didn't have LifeTeen. We had a part-time youth minister who ran a variety of programs - some social (movie/pizza nights), some faith-sharing (the lasting friendships were formed there), and some service (workcamp in the summer, etc). Some youth participated in the mass as lectors, cantors, etc, but they weren't at particular masses.
[/quote]

THANK YOU. Well said and I completely agree.

[Ash Wednesday]

I don't think anyone is advocating anyone to personally police other people other clothing (unless someone is dressed so flagrantly immodestly that it's occasion to sin or they're dressing to disrupt the mass i.e. the rainbow sash movement). In general, people learn about the importance and meaning of sacraments and it makes them respond in conduct accordingly, people also see the reverence of others and it helps them to understand the importance of the sacraments. In my opinion it all goes hand in hand.

Edited June 16, 2011 by Ash Wednesday