Phoenix, Jan. 4, 2008 (CWNews.com) – Church leaders in Phoenix, Arizona, are discouraging Catholics from attending non-denominational services conducted by a suspended priest, the Arizona Republic reports.
Msgr. Dale Fushek, who has been suspended from public ministry by the Phoenix diocese, continues to lead services at the Mesa Convention Center, drawing several hundred participants, the newspaper reports. The flamboyant priest, who gained national prominence as the founder of the LifeTeen program, risks further disciplinary action by defying the terms of his suspension to preach at “Praise and Worship” services.
Well LifeTeen was never an organization much for obedience considering illicit practices such as gathering around the altar, so this is not exactly a surprise.
Now I understand you can certainly separate a group from its leader, but I have never been a fan of LifeTeen in the first place. The parish I went to with my mother as a young atheist was pretty much a perfect match for what LifeTeen would become when it was established in 1985. This parish had lots of rock music and I sang with a small ensemble in the sanctuary. Looking back I realize now that I sang more religious hymns in my public high school choir than I did at this parish. This entertainment focused parish with two cool priests who could relate to youth did nothing to make me take Catholicism seriously. I just loved to sing and would put up with going with my mother to Mass after she converted to Catholicism because the music was quite secular and there was nothing to bother my atheistic faith. I guess it was the same in some ways for the two priests since they both left the priesthood and got married. This parish also had lots of events, but none of them seemed to be ordered to Catholicism and the year and a half I sang with the parish and participated in some events I knew just as little about the Catholic Church as I did at the start. I have no doubt my mother’s R.C.I.A. was quite low on doctrine since she saw no problem with me as a proudly atheist proclaiming son receiving Communion even though the extent of my religious experience was being baptized in a Methodist church as an infant. To this day I regret all of those Communions I received unworthily.
I think there is a fundamental problem with the concept of LifeTeen in the first place. Customizing the liturgy for an age group is mostly a mistake. Now the Church does have valid Children’s Masses where parts of the liturgy are shortened, but it does not specify that Barney be used in the hymnal. If you are going to have LifeTeen, why not LifeFogey, LifeMiddleAge, etc. A case can be made as Saint Paul said that sometimes milk has to be given before solid food. But surely teenagers are quite open to truth and beauty and you don’t have to musically pander to them. If teens only go to the Mass because of the music are they going to keep going to Mass when the Mass no longer has the music they came for? If you want to train teens to appreciate the Mass, shouldn’t it be for the same Mass they will go to as they get older? When it comes to the liturgy they deserve to be treated as adults.
Now I have no problems with youth groups using secular or for example Christian rock outside of the liturgy with concerts, youth conferences, etc. I just don’t thinks power chords and Calvary are a match. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass needs reverence and we need music that promotes beauty and reverence and not just an emotional response. I don’t want to be tapping my foot as I enter the eternal sacrifice.
50 comments
When I was a teenager, I gravitated more towards the traditional stuff rather than the “Lifeteen-y” stuff. My attitude has always been, “You don’t have to try hard making Catholic worship look cool because it already is”. But then, again, perhaps I was not the norm and most likely, I would not have thought that way had my parents not done their job.
Whenever I attend a mass celebrated the way it is supposed to be celebrated, my reaction is always, “I feel so deprived and I wish more masses were like this.” I’ve felt this way especially when I attended my first TLM this year as an adult in her early 30s.
I am ambivalent on whether special masses for the youth are a good idea, but if such special masses are to be held, the only adjustment I would be in favor of is making the homily address concerns that affect young people.
I also agree that helping the youth love the mass is not all about modern music but making them understand what goes on.
Oh, and I think “Dead Theologians Society” is cool! Wish I thought of it first…
LOL. So I am not the only one who thinks, “I was robbed! How deprived am I!”
Couldn’t have said it better!
Jeff, I couldn’t of said it any better. I must say that holding this position got me kicked out of my old paris. Everytime I read things like this, makes me feel vindicated for standing up and expecting more from the teens. Great job again.
LifeTeen did some studies of some of the teens that went through their programs and into college. They found that 75% fell away from regular mass attendance and basically Catholicism took a back seat to other events in their life. The reason for this happenings was that Mass was no longer fun.
Wow! Well said. As a Youth Ministry Coordinator, the more Youth learn The Truth, the better. Youth Ministry is a tough gig! I continue to learn every day! God help us all.
Amazing.
A kind person just now sent me your article as I was blogging my own humor piece on the same subject.
As a former atheist myself, I and my family of converts suffered through some Life Team Masses coming in. Along with abuses, my pet peeve was also the lack of silence such demonstrations offer… I agree with you. My title: “The Origin of Man, or, The Ancient Seeds of Sacred Music Found Within the Life Teen Mass.”
You can find it at: http://www.fratres.wordpress.com
Peace to you and yours…
The music and fun are often better at the Fellowship Church or New Horizons or New Day or whatever. My sister took her kids to one of those. No Grandmas there but lots of rock music.
And our parish just had a retreat for what few youth we have–on peace and justice! yeah, that will keep them Catholic…NOT.
The Truth is what we all need. It has been watered down adn perverted. It is not only the youth who do not know of the Real Presence or anything of dogma or may not be able to name the commandments muchless have any idea of what is happening at Mass. We certainly do not have the Gospel preached here. Father talks about himself and we get disgusted. But we go and endure for WE know Our Lord is there. Millions will not endure fluff and stuff and they leave.
I must confess to helping introduce LifeTeen to my old parish before I moved. I did it on the word of someone I trusted that it was orthodox and uncontroversial and we needed some kind of youth program as ours was defunct. Now in fairness, LifeTeen officially tows the orthodox line and their presentations outside of mass can be edifying (I myself got to speak on Deus Caritas Est), and certainly someone paying attention can keep the silliness away, but if I had to do it over again, I would not have approved it. It’s like OCP music–once it gets in, it stays like herpes and takes on a life of its own.
There is a great King of the Hill episode where Bobby goes in for the Hip-Hop Jesus fad. After much family disruption, Hank shows him a box full of stuff from the fads he was into including a picture of himself with a Member’s Only jacket. He says, “I just don’t want the Lord to end up in this box.”
And that is ultimately what pandering to youth with these various “relevant” programs does.
The worst part is that a lot of kids don’t even like LifeTeen. My daughter, who is 17, and many of her friends were unimpressed from the start. They felt like they were being treated like babies. Still, I’ve had conversations with Deacons and others connected to the program that swear up and down that they feel this is their last chance to reach the teens and so many kids are without any religious training at all. Personally, I think that means they should be putting a lot more into training the parents and the younger kids, because if a person gets to be a teenager and has no religious background, there are much bigger problems with catechesis than just the teen programs.
I’m 23 and have always hated LifeTeen. Some of the songs are fun to sing on retreat but totally out of place in a mass. When small I didn’t mind the OCP music but wondered why would didn’t use more ‘hymns’ like my favorite, “Ave Maria” by Schubert.
You know who agrees with you and many other readers of this blog about monotonous, inappropriate “worship” music? Of all people, my 14 yr old daughter! She’s a rock fan (“real” rock, she says) but also a budding musician. (Clarinet-5yrs, electric guitar-1yr)
After having shown her some of the comments on awful liturgical music, I’ve begun to invite her more often when the subject comes up; she understands better than I, and she appreciates the chance to rant a bit. As it turns out, BAD music in church is one of her pet peeves. I was surprised to learn that our popular “youth Mass”, which she must attend as part of Conf. 1, nauseates her!
It would be interesting to poll young people who are students of music and find out how many of them despise modern, simplistic music during Mass. This age group has a tendency to keep certain “unpopular” views to themselves for years, I think. But if they’re asked…
Kate quit the choir, I am told now, because she can’t even stomach the music they sing at the regular morning Masses, although she likes it when they attempt Handel during Christmas and Easter. Classical is real, “good” (complex) rock is real, some jazz is ok. The rest, to her (except for some traditional folk, esp. Celtic) is [junk]. Hmmm…
“Those with ears to hear…”
Joanne- I sympathize with that dear girl. I stay in choir solely for free music lessons, and the times we do Mozart and Bach.
Does she like Gregorian Chant? And if so, has she been able to go to a sung TLM?
As Father Z says, “Save the Liturgy, Save the World!”
Matt 21:14-6:
The blind and the lame approached him in the temple area, and he cured them.
When the chief priests and the scribes saw the wondrous things he was doing, and the children crying out in the temple area, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they were indignant and said to him, “Do you hear what they are saying?”
Jesus said to them, “Yes; and have you never read the text, ‘Out of the mouths of infants and nurslings you have brought forth praise’?”
To quote a college student, “They don’t have to dumb it down for us.’
It is sad to hear that another movement that is more flash than substance has captured the hearts, minds and souls of young people. The fact that the movements founder refuses to comply with the terms of his suspension should be enough of a red flag to deter anyone who loves the Church from participating in his services. Msgr. Fushek reminds me of the priest who recieved me into the Church some 22 years ago. I admit, I admired our former priest (R.I.P.) for his ability to meet and engage people. However, there was little being offered in terms of spiritual guidance toward an authentic relationship with Jesus Christ. Instead, the priest merely attracted attention to himself and distanced laity from Holy Mother Church. The parish was, at the time, defined by defiance and controlled by a hateful and revisionist radical feminist ideology. The truth is that many of the people I knew in that parish have long since left the Church and/or lost their faith because they were not well formed in the Faith and had fallen for a pseudoreligious doctrine. The popularity contests have to end. We either stand with the Church, or we stand against Her. In the case of Msgr. Fushek, it appears that he has made his choice. God have mercy on him. May God protect the rest of us through the intercession of Saint Michael, Archangel.
joanne,
I won’t pretend to be a music student by any means, though I’ve known many over the years & am a long-time fan of a wide variety of music (everything from American folk to the Red Army choir to Beethoven to Tuvan throat singing – which I’m slowly teaching myself). My other qualification is being relatively young, though in my early twenties I’m now out of the LifeTeen target audience.
Frankly, I am grateful not to have ever endured a LifeTeen mass (I only entered into the Church this year), and for my parish, which has a magnificent organ & an Italian opera singer for a choir director. This modern music (really, over 95% of liturgical music written post 1960) is nonsense & has no place in the liturgy, if you ask me. If I had my druthers, we’d have nothing but proper chant music & classical compositions along with those meaty old hymns like Holy God, We Praise Thy Name or The Glory of These Forty Days.
Among my friends, my view is somewhat extreme (as it always is, I’ve always been that way), but not beyond the pale by any means. There are some of those who like the modern stuff, I even heard one person say that he liked Marty Haugen. However, the majority opinion tends to be more traditional, and there is an interesting correlation (far from absolute, but significant enough to be noteworthy) between orthodox belief and preference for traditional music.
Suffice it to say that there is at the very least a large market of youth out there who are not reached by the modern music. (Incidentally, as mentioned above, this new stuff isn’t all bad, it’s just not for the mass. I find many praise & worship songs good for adoration, as one example.)
My teenagers hate anything youthy!
And there you have it. With the Haugen/Hass, or “relevant” Lifeteen praise music, the majority of adults hate it, and the kids hate it and see it with their Salinger-phony radar. If everyone dislikes it, why is it still around? Is it a cabal of lay liturgists and music directors entrenched in the system like a tick? Is it that we think it’s too subjective to put our feet down? A combination? Someone needs to start compiling the liturgical equivalent of The Anarchist’s Cookbook called The Orthodox Cookbook: A Practical Guide for Overthrowing the Liturgical Mush in Your Parish
You are throwing out the baby with the bath water here and, while I don’t doubt your experience with the way any particular program is implemented at a parish, I can tell you that at our parish Life Teen is composed of the most orthodox families in the congregation.
The biggest issue with LT is that the program is a direct reflection of the people who respond to the Lord’s call to ministry. At our parish, the overlap is among Life Teen, Latin Choir, Homeschool and the folks who run our Diocesan Eucharistic Congress. While I agree that some of the music used in many parishes is not up to par, we use music from Catholic composers.
I am certainly biased as a CORE team member [on sabattical for a second child], but I would challenge any of the posters above to tell me what EXACTLY they have done to educate the youth of their parish. If there is a better model out there, let me hear it. But as for me and my family, I’ll take Life Teen.
Oh, and about dumbing it down for the teens, at our parish the priests often need to “smart it up” as the homilies they preach at the Life Teen Masses need more advanced catechesis than others on that same Sunday. I’d be happy to give you a reference for that.
My experience suggests that young people, like their elders, are drawn to serious, non-secular, traditional music. I am part of a men’s schola that sings the Office of Compline every Sunday night at St Mark’s (Episcopal) Cathedral in Seattle. Music consists primarily of chant and traditional polyphony — English and Latin. The Choir sings the entire service, with “active” but silent participation by the congregation. Attendance ranges between 300-500 every week, the vast majority of whom are young people under 25. For many, the service is the only “church” they attend.
I have nothing against Lifeteen, personally, because I have not experienced it, to my knowledge. I have seen great results from Steubenville East, although I know many bloggers object to the Steubenville outreach to teens.
What I found interesting was that the general consensus about what teens like is not necessarily what attracts them. We don’t OFFER them the best we have when we assume that they won’t appreciate it, just as we don’t offer brie, lobster, caviar, etc to young people, in general. (And I would NEVER offer anyone pate de foie gras because I HATE it, which could actually be more significant.)
The irony regarding music is that musical appreciation may not be related to age. My daughter’s musical “palate” is more highly developed and more sensitive than my own. I love classical music, chant, etc, dislike rap and faux rock Gospel. BUT I also like music (esp in the folk, classic rock and modern hymn categories) that HURTS Kate’s brain and stomach.
So it could well be as many of you have been insisting all along, that if we give our children the best liturgical music, they will develop an appreciation that exceeds that of the unschooled ears of their parents. In which case, who are we really playing the simple stuff for? The average parent and grandparent? The average lesser musician?
I did ask Kate about chant. I had to describe it for her. She likes it but didn’t know what it was called. Her birthday’s coming up…In the realm of chant, anyone know the best recordings?
I’m 17, I’ve never liked lifeteen. It’s always seemed to me like some attempt to dumbend down the faith for us poor ignorant teens, and thew idea of giving the mass any other attraction than the fact that it’s the unbloody sacrifice of God made man will ultimately fail. If you go to mass because they have your favorite praise and worship music, what will you do when your nearest parish only has classic hymns and other good music?Or only folk music?or gospel? You’ll leave, because you never came for the substance of the mass.We had lifeteen at my parish, but after a vote by the youth of the parish, we scrapped it. Now we have a new youth program which I’m a memeber of. We go through the catechism, the fathers of the church and study the teaching of the church. We have mock apologetical debates, and a monthly mass with classic hymns, some chant and some polyphony sung by us, and incidentally, we’ve grown since then.If you’re parish’s lifeteen group os orthodox and faithful to the magisterium, good job, I congratulate you.But in my experience, pandering to kids isn’t a good idea.I like P&w, I have on my i pod, but I don;t like it at mass. I’m and organ student,I think I know good music for the holy mass. P&w, Rock and all that just doesn’t fit the cut. Sacred music shouldn’t appear to serve any other purpose than praising God. If it sounds like something you heard in a mosh pot, then it shouldn’t be sung during mass.Period.The catholic church has timeless liturgical tradition, why replace it with pop music that’s out of style in five years?
“We had lifeteen at my parish, but after a vote by the youth of the parish, we scrapped it. Now we have a new youth program which I’m a memeber of. We go through the catechism, the fathers of the church and study the teaching of the church. We have mock apologetical debates, and a monthly mass with classic hymns, some chant and some polyphony sung by us, and incidentally, we’ve grown since then.”
Josiah, maybe you should consider a speaking tour. Or submit a Youtube video? Your youth program could inspire a positive revolution! The adults would want to audit the program for their own benefit. Many of us did not have the opportunities you have or the knowledge that we were missing awesome things. Our faith is not deficient, but our formation may have been. 🙂
I am certainly biased as a CORE team member [on sabattical for a second child], but I would challenge any of the posters above to tell me what EXACTLY they have done to educate the youth of their parish. If there is a better model out there, let me hear it.
Ok, I was religious ed director at my old parish and rebuilt the catechesis program from the ground up. Before I came, the religious ed was the usual fluff and the teens actually rebelled against it. The priest also wanted some kind of youth program to compete with the local non-Catholic Crossroads program which some of our kids were jumping ship for. Lifeteen seemed to fit the bill, so the priest allowed with my recommendation and approval to get someone trained in the Lifeteen program. Looking back on it now, my objections are primarily liturgical rather than doctrinal. Like I said, the life nites and the presentations were largely unobjectionable (except when one presenter played some truly ugly death-metal for the kids), but frankly, one did not really need to hook up to Lifeteen to do something similar. The real objection was the enormous pressure to designate a Lifeteen mass, and enormous pressure that this would be a rocked-out mass. Meaning the Praise/CCM pandering stuff. I had to fight this with all my might. I have not really checked out the parish since then, but my guess is that without me there keeping it out, it has subsequently happened.
If I could do it over again, I would retain the traditional religious ed classes (we did although it seemed like Lifeteen was intended to be a replacement), and perhaps bring on something like Dead Theologians Society (I would need to check them out in more detail.) For the social aspect, I would just form a committee to come up with stuff on our own. In other words, Lifeteen in my opinion offers little that is unique, and the only thing that can be said in its favor is that it might not blow up in your face as long as you have someone with the diplomatic skills of Otto von Bismark running the show.
When I was a younger priest, assigned part time to a Catholic High School as a chaplain, I had to write a retreat for the HS seniors. I sat down with the seniors and aksed them what they wanted (witihin reason) and what topic they needed to hear. I was surprised by the insightfulness and remember disticntly them saying, “Father, please, no cutesy stuff…no ice-breakers…no happy-clappy music…treat us like we have brains.” The retreat was centered on how to grow in one’s faith as one’s world was in a major change. It went well. They retreatants told me the appreciated being treated like aults.
Over the years I have been involved in youth ministry and vocation recruitment. I have seen both higher retention rate and response to vocations from those who are intergrated into the parish life than those who end up in the Catholic ghetto known as youth masses. I hate youth masses with all my soul…they pander…they water down…and more often than not, their leaders resent any preist trying to be ‘too old fashioned’. I can’t tell you how many youth ministers got onto me for not being ‘fun enough’. More often than not these youth ministers, who seem like 70’s relics trapped in amber, have created cults of personality that appeal to 10% of the overall youth. I have seen way too many kids who were all hot for Lifeteen and other like youth groups dissappear from the parish life. I have seen too many who will not go to anything but a lifeteen Mass. I will not even go into the incredibly poor ecclesiology and sacramental theology behind severing a section of the parish into their own little tribe with their own little mass.
As pastor, I have intergrated the youth of my parish into the day to day life of the parish…they have a sperate choir AND sing with the adult choir/ they have a rep on the parish council/ they are in the normal rotation for readers and ushers..some even serve through their high school years. Some are even organist. I would say about 80% of the youth I know about in my parish are weekly communicants who are ready to step into their adult roles in a few years. Isn’t that what youth ministry is supposed to do? Intergrate and encourage growth not split out youth into a Catholic ghetto.
I really need to proofread my entries. Mea culpa.
I really am no fan of Lifeteen myself, but this post and the preceding comments really start to get at something that I’ve been thinking about since the Motu Proprio came out, namely that some of the same questions Jeff raises about the Life Teen came up in my mind about the Mass of Pius V.
Essentially, is it really – and I struggle *mightily* to find the right words here – right to desire a different form of Mass? After all, the Mass is the Mass, and the Mass is not supposed to be about what we get out of it, but about giving worship to God.
So when we have had the Mass of Paul VI for the past few decades, how was it… again struggling for the words… a good thing for people to desire to attend the Tridentine Mass, and how was it a good thing to grant that request? The reason I ask this is because the Mass is the Mass. One missal is just as pleasing to God as any other, because the value of the Mass is the infinite value of the Eucharistic sacrifice.
The rest of it certainly *matters*. Please don’t misunderstand me. To celebrate a Mass more reverently, with more uplifting music and so forth is a good thing and ought to be strived for. I’m not saying it doesn’t matter.
But if we are going to say that it’s a bad thing to create a seperate Mass just for one group – in this case, the youth – and to fill it with the styles and music that appeals to them, then I don’t see how it’s any better to provide a seperate Mass for the fans of the Tridentine Mass and to fill it with the things that appeal to them.
This is something I have been bouncing around in my head for months. My problem is basically that the Mass is the Mass is the Mass. How we celebrate it is important for the sake of reverance, and it is important for the sake of how it affects the faithful. For example, those who say that having the more reverant (in their opinion) Tridentine Mass will influence people to behave more reverantly are correct. However, the way the Motu Proprio handled it was to make the Tridentine Mass an *option* for the sake of personal preference.
That is my problem. The Mass is about giving to God. Now if a particular missal is going to make people live more reverantly, then that missal ought to rightly be used by everyone. But now we have the Tridentine Mass as an option and the Mass of Paul VI as an option as well. The Mass is supposed to be about our giving to God, but now it is a matter of personal preference.
I apologize for really not articulating myself very well and for posting this here, but I’ve been looking for opinions on this and this made me think about it.
I really hate youthy Masses, but I just can’t see why it’s any more wrong to have them as an option for one segment of the population than to have the Tridentine Mass for another segment. The Mass is the Mass, and it seems to me it ought to be treated as such, or else we are reversing the proper orientation of the Mass, from us to God, to God to us.
You are right that the mass is the mass, and it is all about worship of God, but much youthy liturgical abuse and bad music has been allowed under the cover of, “it’s not about YOU and YOUR preferences.” And that is the difference. The youthy liturgy (which we have had several youths testify that it is, well…teh suXorz) are straight from the playbook of modern therapeutic culture. And therapy of course is all about the self. It will do no good to pit Paul VI liturgy vs. TLM because it is a case of the two good liturgies (in which there are many contentions over which is better). The warping of a Paul VI liturgy for lifeteen youth is simply not in game.
Whereas, my question here is whether we are in fact alienating much of the youth by trying to appeal to them in particular and in a way that appeals more to some of US, or would have when we were young?
If so, it isn’t all the fault of the liturgists, who must have the same problem interpreting the silent eye-roll of young people as parents do. 🙂 But it could be one of those cases where our “compassion and understanding” are misled by our assumptions about what does appeal to a certain age group vs what would lift them out of their humdrum existence. Also, there may be a certain bending to the popular which is a subservience to the very secular world we are to be “in, not of”, i.e, we may not be doing our children any favors even if we do manage to appeal to them in this manner.
Anyway, it’s a question worth asking, I think.
joanne- I accidentally ended up going to another parish’s “Youth” mass once and a sight that struck me was the middle-aged mom in front of me clapping along with the music while nudging her sullen teenaged daughter. I wondered, “Could that girl hate this music as much as I do? Would she intrigued if we chanted the ‘Salve Regina’ instead?”
I am sad Kate didn’t know more about Gregorian Chant. The younger generation should not be robbed of their rich musical heritage as Catholics. Along with chant, there are also works like Mozart’s Ave Verum Corpus, and his masses.
Here is a good site with Gregorian chant: https://www.chantcd.com/index.php
Here’s a site about Gregorian chant:
http://interletras.com/canticum/Eng/index1_Eng.html
When buying recordings of Gregorian chant, it’s always best to look for those done by actual clergy and religious. The words are sung with more depth and meaning and the unique aspects of traditional chant are preserved.
Here is a YouTube video of my favorite chant piece which shows the sheet music and text: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8C4xmB1QWYk
I hope you don’t mind me borrowing these Comments, as I’m working on a little tract against Life Teen, and do not worry I shall give credit to thse who ask, my e-mail is linked here.
But I’m glad that I’m not the only one that feels this way.
Thanks Melody. I’m copying your response to Kate so she can investigate Chant herself. She’ll like your example of the mom nudging the sullen daughter. She’ll probably think “Omigosh, that’s my mom!” 🙂
Shane, I want to thank you for your balanced comments.
I get my ire up with the sort of comments that seem to float around on blogs about “youthy” music and “clappy trappy” music and such when it comes to LifeTeen. As Shane seemed to indicate the Mass is the Mass and it can be pleasing to the Lord in various forms. We need not all celebrate it the precise exact way.
What I see missing in the comments here is an education on the need for inculteration. St Paul did it, ST Peter did it. The Church does it. Does not mean we water it down-and if you were to look at the materials from LifeTeen you will be pleasantly surprised to find that they are not “watered down”. In fact, as someone who has been in Youth Ministry for 10 years and studying catechetics, I think their stuff is some of the best, bringing the fullness of the faith in doctrine to the youth in a way that is learnable. Age and reason appropriate. To often I find the materials are Too Church (dense texts that are far beyond most people’s reading) or too fuzzy (Who is God to you? What does God feel like?)
You may have found a way to the faith that works for you-and oddly enough, this IS inculturation. You have found materials that are in English, that suite your style of reading (thick texts or stories of the saints or picture books or art or music, etc) This works for you. That is the beauty of our Church. One piece of glorious art that raises a man’s soul doesn’t always transfer over to the next person.
Realize, too, that having come through the 70’s and 80’s still many of the Youth Ministers out there were not well formed and are doing their best with the LifeTeen program. Again, the materials themselves are really really good, but sometimes the implementation could very well be lacking, as we are still a generation learning the faith, but were not formed well (I was, thankfully to my parents but most were not).
It is a hard work to bring the Gospel to a people who learn in various ways. It is a hard work to find that moment when the light goes on. It is a hard work to catechize. It’s not simply about opening a book and reading. It is opening the soul to be most fully ready to fullness of God in all his splendor and glory. As unique as we are is as unique the approach may be.
To slam LifeTeen because of Fr Fushek or your local youth minister is a goofball or it’s just simply your style is rather small. If you have not really looked into it to see it for what it is, then you can’t keep coming to blogs and knocking the snot out of it. The work they do is GOOD. The fruit can be good. PS Even those parishes where LifeTeen isn’t happening they are still leaving the Church in high numbers. Not every parish I worked in had LifeTeen-and we always had high numbers of kids leaving the Faith. The two are not necessarily connected.
It might not be your cup of tea. But find out if it might be for others.
As a long time Core member and former youth minister working mainly in the LIFE TEEN model, there are two points to be made here –
1) Msgr. Dale (or Mr Fushek if preferable, as there was an earlier story that he was seeking laicization) needs to stop this now. It saddens me that a man that impacted me greatly and that provided many points of reflection that I still hold in my faith is acting so erroneously and contrary to everything that he taught prior.
2) As for the typical LT bashing – nothing new here. I don’t know where I read this observation before, but it bears repeating – LIFE TEEN is a mirror on the parish. The model itself is sound. I challenge anyone to examine the model and indicate where on paper it’s lacking. The problems (where there are problems, I refuse to accept the premise is one problem overall) is in the implementation. At parishes where orthodoxy isn’t terribly important, of course you’re going to find LT programs that are desperately wanting. I’ve had the unfortunate circumstance at working at one of these parishes. And my kids knew it was a problem – they desperately wanted more. On the flip side, I’ve been to any number of amazingly beautiful LIFE TEEN liturgies at very orthodox parishes. Sure, you get one or two exceptions to this rule, but in general, the more orthodox a parish is, the more orthodox and compelling the LIFE TEEN program is.
I’ve seen both so I know the possibilities of both. I feel saddened for the teens that feel they have been cheated by poor catechesis – be it in LIFE TEEN, or through another program.
Shane, I want to thank you for your balanced comments.
I get my ire up with the sort of comments that seem to float around on blogs about “youthy” music and “clappy trappy” music and such when it comes to LifeTeen. As Shane seemed to indicate the Mass is the Mass and it can be pleasing to the Lord in various forms. We need not all celebrate it the precise exact way.
Im afraid you are wrong here. The phrase the mass is the mass has come to signify the monkeys-in-the-sanctuary argument. That is, the rubrics dont explicitly prohibit monkeys in the sanctuary, that means its ok if we have some. The Church allows for various rites, (Paul VI, TLM, Byzantine, etc) but allows little leeway for groups to take existing liturgies and customizing them.
What I see missing in the comments here is an education on the need for inculteration.
No. Fr BP specifically talked about how abandoning the youthy liturgy allowed him to genuinely prepare the youth to take an active role in the parish life with much success.
St Paul did it, ST Peter did it. The Church does it. Does not mean we water it down-and if you were to look at the materials from LifeTeen you will be pleasantly surprised to find that they are not “watered down”. In fact, as someone who has been in Youth Ministry for 10 years and studying catechetics, I think their stuff is some of the best, bringing the fullness of the faith in doctrine to the youth in a way that is learnable. Age and reason appropriate. To often I find the materials are Too Church (dense texts that are far beyond most people’s reading) or too fuzzy (Who is God to you? What does God feel like?)
You are confusing inculturation with doctrine here. Like I said twice now, the objection is not primarily doctrinal.
You may have found a way to the faith that works for you-and oddly enough, this IS inculturation. You have found materials that are in English, that suite your style of reading (thick texts or stories of the saints or picture books or art or music, etc) This works for you. That is the beauty of our Church. One piece of glorious art that raises a man’s soul doesn’t always transfer over to the next person.
Since Ive already said it is not how doctrines are presented, its a little early to start exercising the subjectivist nuclear option here.
Realize, too, that having come through the 70’s and 80’s still many of the Youth Ministers out there were not well formed and are doing their best with the LifeTeen program. Again, the materials themselves are really really good, but sometimes the implementation could very well be lacking, as we are still a generation learning the faith, but were not formed well (I was, thankfully to my parents but most were not).
It is a hard work to bring the Gospel to a people who learn in various ways. It is a hard work to find that moment when the light goes on. It is a hard work to catechize. It’s not simply about opening a book and reading. It is opening the soul to be most fully ready to fullness of God in all his splendor and glory. As unique as we are is as unique the approach may be.
Answered as above. Orthodox doctrine (at least as far as officially towing the line) is not the issue.
To slam LifeTeen because of Fr Fushek or your local youth minister is a goofball or it’s just simply your style is rather small
I did a quick scan of all the posts and I dont see an example of this. Even Jeffs original started out by saying, Now I understand you can certainly separate a group from its leader. So you are countering an objection no one has really made.
If you have not really looked into it to see it for what it is, then you can’t keep coming to blogs and knocking the snot out of it.
Weve had many testimonies from both youth and adults directly involved in it, or having some experience with it.
The work they do is GOOD. The fruit can be good. PS Even those parishes where LifeTeen isn’t happening they are still leaving the Church in high numbers. Not every parish I worked in had LifeTeen-and we always had high numbers of kids leaving the Faith. The two are not necessarily connected.
Fair enough. One stat was bandied about, but I agree we dont have enough to establish causation.
It might not be your cup of tea. But find out if it might be for others.
Since your objections seemed primarily directed at establishing that LifeTeen does not officially teach heterodox things, it is a case of largely missing the point.
We chose not to do the LifeTeen thing at our church for our youth ministry because we felt it pandered to the church-on-the-go mentality. And that’s only because the Churches where we have seen it were shallow parishes.
Our youth masses had liturgically accurate, modern praise songs that were focused on the scriptures and on the Mass.
I really am tired of all of these debates about what music is appropriate for Mass. We know what the Church says. We know what the focus of the music should be: to lead others in prayer in order to bring a closer understanding of God and his presence in the Eucharist.
If you don’t like guitars, drums, saxophones and modern instruments like them, go to a church where they have the kind of music you like. If the music at your church is bad, improve it.
It’s the same Eucharist, so why argue about it?
As a long time Core member and former youth minister working mainly in the LIFE TEEN model, there are two points to be made here –
1) Msgr. Dale (or Mr Fushek if preferable, as there was an earlier story that he was seeking laicization) needs to stop this now. It saddens me that a man that impacted me greatly and that provided many points of reflection that I still hold in my faith is acting so erroneously and contrary to everything that he taught prior.
I agree.
2) As for the typical LT bashing – nothing new here.
I think most people here have raised valid objections, so I object to the bashing of that.
I don’t know where I read this observation before, but it bears repeating – LIFE TEEN is a mirror on the parish. The model itself is sound. I challenge anyone to examine the model and indicate where on paper it’s lacking. The problems (where there are problems, I refuse to accept the premise is one problem overall) is in the implementation. At parishes where orthodoxy isn’t terribly important, of course you’re going to find LT programs that are desperately wanting. I’ve had the unfortunate circumstance at working at one of these parishes. And my kids knew it was a problem – they desperately wanted more. On the flip side, I’ve been to any number of amazingly beautiful LIFE TEEN liturgies at very orthodox parishes. Sure, you get one or two exceptions to this rule, but in general, the more orthodox a parish is, the more orthodox and compelling the LIFE TEEN program is.
As I have said in so many words, Lifeteen checks out doctrinally on paper. In practice however, there is an overwhelming pressure to get a Lifeteen liturgy, and that this liturgy is to introduce what is supposedly relevant and accessible to youth. And as I testified, the only reason it didnt happen in my largely orthodox parish is because I fought it off hard (and in the end before I moved was losing). Almost every one of the Lifeteen defenders I’ve discussed with made some appeal to subjectivism and the monkeys-in-the-sanctuary argument with regards to introducing novelties and bad culture to the liturgy, so I don’t believe for a second it is an anomaly. Its like the annexation of the Sudetenland. Offer any kind of resistance and they will back off, but make no mistakes, they are constantly testing the defenses looking for an in.
I’ve seen both so I know the possibilities of both. I feel saddened for the teens that feel they have been cheated by poor catechesis – be it in LIFE TEEN, or through another program.
Ill end on a good note and agree with that.
As I have said in so many words, Lifeteen checks out doctrinally on paper. In practice however, there is an overwhelming pressure to get a Lifeteen liturgy, and that this liturgy is to introduce what is supposedly relevant and accessible to youth.
I’m not sure where the overwhelming pressure you found came from, but at the core, priority #1 for LIFE TEEN, no matter what you see, is getting them to the Eucharist. It has been the driving underpinning of the movement from day 1. If that is through a quality, orthodox LT-style liturgy, the great. More teens turn out for a TLM? Rock on, go for it. The priority is never style, the priority is always getting them to the Eucharist.
We can have valid disagreements over what better effects that goal, but there can be no arguing the goal.
Almost every one of the Lifeteen defenders I’ve discussed with made some appeal to subjectivism and the monkeys-in-the-sanctuary argument with regards to introducing novelties and bad culture to the liturgy, so I don’t believe for a second it is an anomaly. Its like the annexation of the Sudetenland. Offer any kind of resistance and they will back off, but make no mistakes, they are constantly testing the defenses looking for an in.
Then, frankly, your discussions have been with people that, while well-intentioned, didn’t have the proper arguments at hand. Your “monkeys in the sanctuary” suggestion, while cute, is really a straw-man argument – any such behavior which is contrary to the liturgy, regardless of what “style” should be removed. Some of those are obvious (my aforementioned parish that I had issues with, most definitely, had animals in the sanctuary during Mass. I’m not joking). Anyone who doesn’t get that isn’t really doing a proper job with the model.
As for subjectivism, you’re sorely mistaken if you believe that Mass attendance among teens isn’t purely subjective in the first place. If for no other reason, they learn that at home, in both directions – “go to this mass because it’ll be 45 minutes and done,” “go here because it’s super reverent and all chant,” etc. We can argue left and right if this is how it should be, but it’s sticking heads in the sand to pretend it’s not.
Will some teens prefer a Mass that is done with reverent contemporary music (and yes, such things exist – I always challenge anyone to go listen to Matt Maher and tell me most of his stuff cannot work in the liturgy)? No doubt. Will some teens prefer a TLM? No doubt. Will some teens prefer Haugen and Haas? Sadly, no doubt. Will some teens prefer “I’m OK, you’re OK” happy-clappy? No doubt.
The stats are sad – pretty much regardless of the program offered, kids are leaving the Church. Some efforts do better jobs than others at stemming that tide, but nobody has been able to find it completely. I’ll absolutely advocate an orthodox implementation of LIFE TEEN any day.
Catholic Whiteboy-
As Father Z says, “Save the Liturgy, Save the World.” Lifeteen promotes a kind of liturgy that is irreverent and all too worldly and commonplace. Irreverence severely injures the ability of people to grasp the central event of mass, the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. It’s also important to note that most other programs have copied the Lifeteen model.
Another saying is “As the Church prays, so the Church believes.” Irreverent liturgy cannot be justified by the orthodoxy of outside programs. Mass is the central part of our worship and communion with God.
LifeTeen is a very well intentioned program.
I was part of the first Life Teen program in Canada in a small parish in Ontario. Though the music was a little “showy” in retrospect, the catechesis and formation were well done. I’m a stickler for music so if it’s not traditional, it has to be done very cautiously. I DO think however, that it’s possible to have reverent contemporary music during the crucial parts of the Mass while having more upbeat hymns at the processional/recessional. The contrast, I’ve found, can actually help engage during the Eucharistic prayer/meditation in ways more traditional music can’t.
Here’s a good litmus test (an imperfect one though): If you run a Life Teen program, would you ever invite your Bishop to be celebrant at it?
My program DID have our Bishop celebrate at one of our Life Teen Masses. (Even better, he was the speaker at the Life nite following it.) He made a few corrections to how we celebrated the Liturgy. He EXPLAINED them, and then we moved on. No hard feelings. He has since been promoted to Archbishop of Edmonton and he’s one of the most orthodox bishops in Canada.
LifeTeen helped me turn my life around. Sure, there were other factors in my life that helped, but LifeTeen was undoubtably the catalyst.
I will not be an ardent promoter of Life Teen, because we have already discussed that for any youth program to work, it depends largely on the parish backbone of competent priests and youth ministers. Life Teen may be the last thing that one parish needs while another parish may flourish with it.
Essentially, there’s nothing inherently wrong with Life Teen as some of you have implied. But if it’s going to be done, it has to be done right.
Yes, we should be using this forum to keep programs like Life Teen in check, but deriding them is a waste of time and not looking deeply at the challenges of youth ministry.
Melody wrote:
LIFE TEEN promotes a kind of liturgy that is irreverent and all too worldly and commonplace. Irreverence severely injures the ability of people to grasp the central event of mass, the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist.
_____
I have been in youth ministry for over a decade now and I will say that LIFE TEEN has put more teens in front of the Blessed Sacrament via Adoration as part of their teaching structure more often than any other model I have had the pleasure of being involved with.
Two other points:
1) The original blog entry was about Dale Fushek. If we are going to critique LIFE TEEN because of one of it’s founding members, perhaps we need to critique our faith because of Judas!
2) Instead of attacking LIFE TEEN, perhaps we should be more generic and attack any Mass that strays from the basic Novus Ordo as the main complaints above are in regards to the Mass — not the educational model of LIFE TEEN.
From a recent LIFE night topic:
“Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own eye?” Matthew 7:3
God bless!
Lifeteen promotes a kind of liturgy that is irreverent and all too worldly and commonplace. Irreverence severely injures the ability of people to grasp the central event of mass, the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. It’s also important to note that most other programs have copied the Lifeteen model.
I’m sorry, but this is a fundamentally false statement. There is nothing built-in, inherently “irreverent” about a LIFE TEEN liturgy. Is it possible to do an irreverent LT liturgy? Absolutely. At the same time, it’s possible to to an incredibly reverent, move-you-to-tears LT liturgy.
In other words – IT’S THE SAME AS EVERY OTHER LITURGY out there. At any given time, at any given parish, it’s possible to show up to a Mass that runs the spectrum. There’s nothing built into LT from the start that pushes it in one direction or the other.
The assistant pastor at my church put it this way:
These high school students are earning good marks in chemistry, calculus, advanced English classes, and biology. Why do these Youth Ministers think that teens are dumb? They are not!
He did not say it quite that way because he is from Uganda, but that is the gist of it.
It is soooooooo true. I mean the youth leader of our church knows nothing about her religion. At one meeting, a girl said that she would like to teach us a new “blessing” for our food. It went something like:
Jesus you’re a dude,
Thanks for our food…
That is all I can remember. My sisters and I went and told the youth minister woman that speaking of God, as a dude was very irreverent. Therefore, the next week she let us introduce the normal one and then said, “If anyone else finds a blessing they like they can share it with us.”
I don’t know. I mean this wishy-washy stuff just makes me so angry!
(As a side note about the prayer before meals, whenever we visit our Mormon relatives they always ask us to lead because our prayer is “short, good and to the point.”)
Another reason I hate the Life Teen thing is that now whenever we correct the leader she says that she is right because she is just doing what the Life Teen thing said to do.
I mean every week there is a stupid skit where the teen helpers act out a lesson that Life Teen has prepared for that day. Allot of times the lesson is forgotten in the stupidity of the skit and the contradictory statements within.
One time the skit showed a mom, dad, and teen. The mom said “Let’s go to church (not mass). The dad said, “If the game is over I will join you.” The teen said, “Sorry, but my friends are coming over.” The mom said something to the effect of “Well God did say to love you neighbor and having your friends over is doing what God said so you can stay home. Moreover, your dad has worked so hard all week I am sure God wouldn’t care if he were at church or not. I mean he did do what God said about providing for family. Besides, it would be work for your dad to get all dressed up and drive there. You know I had better stay home to cook dinner. Oh, well.” That is not exactly what they said, but that is what came across. We went to the youth minister and told her that was a horrible message. She replied, “You missed the whole point that we were trying to show that you can serve God in every aspect of your life. We were just reading the script that was given to us by Life Teen.”
We no longer go to that youth group we tried for two years to help, but every time we were just pushed, aside or they would take what we said and twist it into something horrible. The other problem was that out of the hour and a half that we spent with the group only about half an hour was spent on “religious” stuff. The other time was eating and talking about what was going on at the local “Catholic” high school that is known as one of the two worst schools in Las Vegas for drugs, sex, and that type of stuff. The other school is a private Lutheran school. Both cost about $10,000 per year and not a single vocation has come out of the “Catholic” one since it started in 1954. I will stop releasing my anger on you all because I know you all see the same way I do.
Mary – I don’t see it at all the way you do. I dislike using the term “liar” so I will just assume that you are misinformed. I’m not personally affiliated with the school you mention, but I take umbrage at your defamatory comments.
There have been a number of graduates of southern Nevada’s only Catholic high school – Bishop Gorman HS – who have gone on to religious vocations. Bishop Alex Sample of Marquette, Michigan, for example [http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2006/Jan-04-Wed-2006/news/5063424.html] who at the time of his ordination was the youngest bishop in the US. And there’s Viatorian Fr. Dan Nolan. And even Fr. Kinney over at Christ the King who considers himself a Gael despite leaving after the 11th grade – so that he could take 4th year Latin which wasn’t offered at Gorman at the time. Easily could be more, but those are the first to come to mind.
As to your second claim, that Gorman rates as the second worst HS in town for “drugs, sex and that sort of stuff” where, pray tell, do you get your statistic? So long as there are teenagers there will be “drugs, sex and that sort of stuff” but Gorman has a comprehensive program to help kids who have troubles. Perhaps it’s this very positive willingness to acknowledge the problem that leads you to your erroneous claim that the problem is greater. Or perhaps it’s a misconception that “rich” kids are the problem. But there is nothing I’ve seen to indicate that it is a situation unique to Gorman.
If your approach to Life Teen intructors is in a similar format, I’m not surprised that you receive a less than warm reception.
About “the mass is the mass” => that may well be, but what is the Mass?
In other words – IT’S THE SAME AS EVERY OTHER LITURGY out there. At any given time, at any given parish, it’s possible to show up to a Mass that runs the spectrum. There’s nothing built into LT from the start that pushes it in one direction or the other.
I invite anyone to go to Life Teen’s website and download their sample Liturgical Planning Guide (it’s a pdf and you have to a free registration) and see for themselves. In addition to suggesting having the youth come up during the homily with placards, take a look at the song suggetions. There is one, count ’em, ONE genuinely traditional hymnn recommended in a list of about 25 of the usual pop-praise goop. So while one can duck under the cover that LT does not make you do those things, let’s not pretend that their suggestions don’t push in one direction.
I just read the posts on the court jester blog from earlier this month.
I have just come back from only my second ever life teen mass. I missed my usual morning mass.
I can not stand life teen Masses.
I was noticing that maybe these masses are more for the adults than they are the teens. The adults and elderly were swaying to the music and singing, while the teens looked like slumps who didn’t want to be at Mass in the first place. I also didn’t notice any more teens at this mass than at any other. Not much, anyway. There were more adults. Seemed like one time hippie adults to me.
The music was too loud and a few of the tunes were from popular rock Christian bands. I’m guessing that these teens don’t listen to Christian music outside of the lifeteen mass.
There’s definitely a disconnect between the attempts of the lifeteen mass, and the teens.
A girl, at least 16 years old, a couple of pews in front of me, was chewing bubble gum throughout the whole Mass!
My observation leads me to my guesstimation that the adults enjoy the teen mass because they are more firm in their faith and know what the Mass is about, so they can merge the songs with the Mass as to their faith.
The teens seem to look as if they don’t think the Mass is any “cooler” with rock music, and Christian rock music to boot, which in the pervasive secular world, isn’t “cool” anyway.
What needs to be done is better Catechisis (sp?), starting in the home, to educate and elevate our youth to understanding the power of the faith. With true faith there is no need for hollow entertainment. We need to drag our parents to Catechism class never mind just their kids.
I prefer to go to the Tridentine Mass when I’m able, and the children and teens that attend that mass look like scholars, compared to the kids and even the adults in the common Mass.
Are we not supposed to go to Mass to receive Our Lord? Aren’t we supposed to listen to God through the Liturgy and introspective prayer during the Eucharist?
How can these kids learn to listen to God, when in our society there is non stop noise with i-pods, and cds’ with loud music and partying, when we present them with the same mind dwarfing nonsense in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass? The Church is supposed to be the place of solace, to get away from the world and it’s unruly offerings so that we can truly find God in adoration and reverence.
We’re blocking God out with noise, not letting him in.
Sorry — the CURT Jester!
Just a quick comment. I was searching for music to use for my wedding. Maybe I was exposed to an awesome life teen group with very holy priests but I think life teen is great! To me it encompasses the passion and excitement I have for my faith. I started attending when I was in highschool and now that I’m graduated and working I find it refreshing to see young people loving to go to Mass. It doesn’t take away from the mass it allows people to put their whole being into it!
What does “Holy Mother Church” say about the music for the “Holy Sacrifice of the Mass”, that it should be, are we listening?
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