"We live in more enlightened times, we were told, where people actually understand what they believe instead of just reciting rote dogma. The fact they couldn’t even recite dogma anymore, let alone say explain their faith was outside of mushy platitudes, was lost on them."
This struck a chord in me. I grew up in evangelical churches, and they did bring up this point-- that we were freed from the tyranny of rote dogma, but there was so little substance to the teaching that if you stripped out the Bible verses, you could mistake a sermon for a self help seminar
You described the "Moralistic Therapeutic Deism" that passes for Christianity quite well. I have noticed how the females, effeminate male, immigrant, LBGTQ++++ types are welcomed with open arms and slide gently into the pews, increasing the headcount for the parish. If a young male firebrand converts, he is immediately counseled to "tone it down", or stop being so legalistic. We had a study after Church and it was like 9 women and myself. I quit going after awhile, it was depressing.
A quote i remember, "The Catholic Church is a women's club, with a few male officers". Vatican 2 kind of pushed the increases feminization of the church with the butterflies and balloons masses. I read Tolkien would not attend a mass in English.
The quote is from one of Leon Podles books. I read several, including "The Church Impotent: The Feminization of Christianity", "Sacrilege" and a few others. He is a faithful Catholic, as well as a federal investigator. Highly recommend his work to learn more about this pressing issue.
There's a great quote from Cardinal Heenan during the Second Vatican Council: "The New Mass would reduce congregations to mostly women and children."
Tolkien did attend the English Mass--grudgingly--but only said the responses, loudly and proudly, in Latin. He even brought a bell of his own to ring during the Consecration. For that alone, I believe we should forward his name for canonization, haha!
Most people don't realize VII did not call for a total restructuring of the mass, but mostly reasonable updates like the readings in the vernacular and other minor tweaks. The changes were implemented by a small cadre of revolutionaries.
At my campus Church, I brought up the fact that the Muslim Student Association had built a prayer room in the building that was open 24/7, while the campus chapel had been locked down since covid started. Before I could even suggest that we try to get the campus chapel reopened, it was shut down. They love losing and hate winning
I attended a Catholic Church, and the campus chapel was a Protestant one. All of the denominations on campus have their own buildings off campus, but it used to be that the small groups could book the Campus chapel.
"Anyone who has worked with a religious superior knows that most of them will preach the usual platitudes about listening to the sheep and meeting people where they are, then will pen edicts written with the wrath of a medieval Inquisitor to crush factions he dislikes. He won’t even see the contradiction."
Man, why does that seem so familiar? Wasshisname, just in the news this year? F....Frank...something...?
For all the ills the internet is unleashing on to the world, one glimmer of hope is that it is making it harder and harder for the curious faithful to accept their decline. In the before times, we just had to take the word of our elders and clergy that the Latin Mass was a dying medieval relic, the Inquisition was an embarrassment (fully co-opting the Protestant Black Legend, ironically), and that Vatican II was the great leap forward. Now that every Tom, Dick, and Harry (and a growing cohort of Harriets) has access to council documents, historical records, memoirs of the parties involved, and film of the Tridentine Mass itself, the scales are falling away and we are seeing how bunk everything we were told is. And now we are not so geographically isolated from each other, forming communities first online and then growing into the real world.
I'm fully convinced the Church only survived the first decades after Vatican II through the sheer charisma of John Paul II. If they had elected a more middle-of-road, custodial manager type in 1978, Catholics would be the boat as Episcopalians now. Benedict opened the gates for this quiet renewal of tradition with Summorum Pontificum. And no matter how much Francis tried with his clumsy crackdown, Traditiones Custodes, there was no putting this genie fully back into the bottle.
"As our superiors have seceded their responsibility to the blob of Western Liberalism, the catalysts of the new age will be the low of the low, the outcasts, the dreamers, the ones who will make the old new again."
This is the best article I’ve read on Substack for a while. You describe what many of us loose canons are coping with at the moment. Our podcast Irreverend has been an attempt to circumnavigate the religious middle managers. It’s had huge success. Still I want to do more
If a based “new” arrival is a bit too much for these middle religio-managers, what in the world will they do when one of them shows up and becomes truly transformed, reborn a new man?
Ha! It makes me chuckle to think of the hand wringing and pants shitting that would accompany the efforts to control a truly reborn, fearless, fiery servant of Hope. His very freedom would shame the managerial clowns into feeling the unpleasantness of their own slavery.
What is the problem with the Latin Mass? I'm not catholic, so the idea of Mass in English seems reasonable, if a little disrespectful. But why try to get rid of the traditional Mass completely?
The official reason stated is it's only attended by old people who have trouble accepting Vatican II, all of which is false. The real reason is because TLM Churches act as a buffer against the radicalism some in the Vatican want to introduce.
As someone who remembers the old Latin Mass (I've got my missal as proof!), I think many Latin Mass people feel they are superior Catholics compared to the hoi polloi. They are not. But they are snobs, with their code words and acronyms.
Meanwhile my friend, an Eastern Rite Catholic Abbot, is getting a flood of inquirers. Literally running out of room behind the cloister gate.
John Paul II said the Eastern Rite was the other lung of the Church. It is going strong.
TLM Catholics aren’t snobs for wanting fellow Catholics to embrace the Church’s liturgical and cultural traditions. Also it’s not fair to tar Latin Mass Catholics with the same brush.
I got to read this by the seat of my pants. I had the unrefreshed tab that still had the full content. It describes my experience perfectly in conservative Presbyterian churches.
In 2018, I rocked the boat in a PCA church by being strongly conservative on pretty normie issues like abortion forming a rift, that culminated in the church staging an ambush to get me divorced from my wife.
In 2025, I got struggle-sessioned from an OPC church for becoming race-realist and recognizing the dangers that white people face from blacks - the same views held by heroes of the faith including the founder of the denomination, J Gresham Machen. Ultimately, I resigned membership. I watched as one pastor had extra-judicial means employed to strip him of his ministerial credentials for being anti-feminist and holding a Christian position on Jews. Meanwhile, a "company man" of the denomination had 20 years of grooming and sexually harassing underage girls and only lost his office when a liberal group did an exposé - resulting in him getting 11 months of $10k+/mo severance from the <100 member church.
One of my friends said that the pastoral office is a guild and that the number one loyalty of the guild is to the guild. Your statement that it is middle-management is a fascinating and illuminating observation.
"Christians talk a good game about 'spirit', yet that abstract term is uniformly applied to everything in the non-corporeal world, and they neither believe in nor acknowledge most of the incorporeal world. Like Harry Potter fans, they are not sure whether or not they believe in magic outside of their storybook because they have never seen anyone with rays shooting out of his fingers or a dude walking on water."
"The leaders of churches are supposed to be . . . spiritual. They are religious, for sure, but not spiritual. Most of these guys are worshipping Mammon and whatever leagues of lesser comfort demons he commands. These are the ostensible experts of Christianity, the men and women who get paid money (taxpayer and congregation provided) to play shepherd to a human flock. When I was a kid and sat through my own local church’s service every Sunday along with occasional visits to my friend’s churches, I was struck by how empty those services always felt. If religion is supposed to be the opiate of the masses, where is the feeling during the services? How is any given church more than a glorified social club?"
"Ignorant pastors, priests, and reverends cannot provide those experiences because they are the blind leading the blind. They have no connection to the Divine because they have never suffered. They have lived beige lives where lawns are mowed and Costco paper towels never run out. They have far less spiritual knowledge than the crystal/tarot card lady at the Renaissance fair, and their main claim to spiritual expertise is to quote Bible verses like board game trivia. Pastor Artur Pawlowski and Carlo Viganò aside, preachers have no substance. They are cowards with no inner fire. They have never battled the demons within and are Elmer Milquetoasts made good with a cozy pension. The only internal conflict they have ever faced was their own homosexual desire to pound another male’s ass."
All of these are quotes from my latest essay called Life After Christianity. I won't post a link to it because it is paywalled and I do not want to frustrate anyone. Here is a link to what I consider as one of my better essays on Christianity where I make the connection between corporate America, multi-level marketing schemes, and Mormons/LDS: https://kimberlysteele.substack.com/p/the-lds-mlms-and-npcs
Many of these Pastors sound like Wormtongue, exhorting Theoden to stay home.
This is why I have little faith that the current Churches can be recovered. They will need to be cleansed root and branch before they can really take off in the inevitable second religiousness.
One thing about the second religiousness is though that it usually is a surprisingly tolerant syncretic mix of various traditions, which is why I expect Western Christianity to take on it's more Gothic Germanic-Catholic aspects as we move forward rather than the cold intolerant conceptualism of the post reformation branches.
If history plays out like it usually does in the decline phase, we could have a church where Jesus, Odin and Santa Muerte are all worshiped.
The purpose of a system is what it does. The Protestant systems celebrated the personalities, while Roman authorities tried to shut them up. If you want a movement that allows great men to flourish, you need a different system.
Excellent analysis. Pick up the Crown. Guard the Deposit of Faith. Join the new Fellowship of the Ring. Be a wise Templar in modest but bold ways, intellectually and morally. Build new farms, cillages, and establish alternative economies that are anti-fragile, semi self-sufficient, cohesive and like Benedictine monasteries that attract traditional minded youth. Youth who are smart, pious, humble, witty and not woke.
"We live in more enlightened times, we were told, where people actually understand what they believe instead of just reciting rote dogma. The fact they couldn’t even recite dogma anymore, let alone say explain their faith was outside of mushy platitudes, was lost on them."
This struck a chord in me. I grew up in evangelical churches, and they did bring up this point-- that we were freed from the tyranny of rote dogma, but there was so little substance to the teaching that if you stripped out the Bible verses, you could mistake a sermon for a self help seminar
Yeah. It felt like therapeutic deism. Not exactly stuff to die for.
Wonderful article.
You described the "Moralistic Therapeutic Deism" that passes for Christianity quite well. I have noticed how the females, effeminate male, immigrant, LBGTQ++++ types are welcomed with open arms and slide gently into the pews, increasing the headcount for the parish. If a young male firebrand converts, he is immediately counseled to "tone it down", or stop being so legalistic. We had a study after Church and it was like 9 women and myself. I quit going after awhile, it was depressing.
A quote i remember, "The Catholic Church is a women's club, with a few male officers". Vatican 2 kind of pushed the increases feminization of the church with the butterflies and balloons masses. I read Tolkien would not attend a mass in English.
The quote is from one of Leon Podles books. I read several, including "The Church Impotent: The Feminization of Christianity", "Sacrilege" and a few others. He is a faithful Catholic, as well as a federal investigator. Highly recommend his work to learn more about this pressing issue.
There's a great quote from Cardinal Heenan during the Second Vatican Council: "The New Mass would reduce congregations to mostly women and children."
Tolkien did attend the English Mass--grudgingly--but only said the responses, loudly and proudly, in Latin. He even brought a bell of his own to ring during the Consecration. For that alone, I believe we should forward his name for canonization, haha!
Most people don't realize VII did not call for a total restructuring of the mass, but mostly reasonable updates like the readings in the vernacular and other minor tweaks. The changes were implemented by a small cadre of revolutionaries.
At my campus Church, I brought up the fact that the Muslim Student Association had built a prayer room in the building that was open 24/7, while the campus chapel had been locked down since covid started. Before I could even suggest that we try to get the campus chapel reopened, it was shut down. They love losing and hate winning
What Christian denomination? Where do you folks have your Sunday Mass or Sunday services? Crazy that the chapel has been closed for so long!
I attended a Catholic Church, and the campus chapel was a Protestant one. All of the denominations on campus have their own buildings off campus, but it used to be that the small groups could book the Campus chapel.
"Anyone who has worked with a religious superior knows that most of them will preach the usual platitudes about listening to the sheep and meeting people where they are, then will pen edicts written with the wrath of a medieval Inquisitor to crush factions he dislikes. He won’t even see the contradiction."
Man, why does that seem so familiar? Wasshisname, just in the news this year? F....Frank...something...?
For all the ills the internet is unleashing on to the world, one glimmer of hope is that it is making it harder and harder for the curious faithful to accept their decline. In the before times, we just had to take the word of our elders and clergy that the Latin Mass was a dying medieval relic, the Inquisition was an embarrassment (fully co-opting the Protestant Black Legend, ironically), and that Vatican II was the great leap forward. Now that every Tom, Dick, and Harry (and a growing cohort of Harriets) has access to council documents, historical records, memoirs of the parties involved, and film of the Tridentine Mass itself, the scales are falling away and we are seeing how bunk everything we were told is. And now we are not so geographically isolated from each other, forming communities first online and then growing into the real world.
I'm fully convinced the Church only survived the first decades after Vatican II through the sheer charisma of John Paul II. If they had elected a more middle-of-road, custodial manager type in 1978, Catholics would be the boat as Episcopalians now. Benedict opened the gates for this quiet renewal of tradition with Summorum Pontificum. And no matter how much Francis tried with his clumsy crackdown, Traditiones Custodes, there was no putting this genie fully back into the bottle.
"As our superiors have seceded their responsibility to the blob of Western Liberalism, the catalysts of the new age will be the low of the low, the outcasts, the dreamers, the ones who will make the old new again."
Amen!
He came in thinking he could destroy the TLM, give approval to gay marriages, and create a Synod to change any church teaching on a whim.
He did a lot of damage, but it could have been far, far worse.
I pray for him, because I think he needs it....
This is the best article I’ve read on Substack for a while. You describe what many of us loose canons are coping with at the moment. Our podcast Irreverend has been an attempt to circumnavigate the religious middle managers. It’s had huge success. Still I want to do more
Daniel, I should tell you that Irreverend is making a real difference.
It was one of the things that convinced me the C of E is not completely woke, and got me attending church.
Well that very humbling to know. I really hope we can put on some live shows next year and get to meet lots of listeners once again
You are welcome to join the Catholic Church and build with us. Just follow Gavin Ashenden’s lead.
Thank you but I am called to serve this church.
"Christian" Therapeuticism needs to die.
Great essay! Thank you, sincerely!
If a based “new” arrival is a bit too much for these middle religio-managers, what in the world will they do when one of them shows up and becomes truly transformed, reborn a new man?
Ha! It makes me chuckle to think of the hand wringing and pants shitting that would accompany the efforts to control a truly reborn, fearless, fiery servant of Hope. His very freedom would shame the managerial clowns into feeling the unpleasantness of their own slavery.
What is the problem with the Latin Mass? I'm not catholic, so the idea of Mass in English seems reasonable, if a little disrespectful. But why try to get rid of the traditional Mass completely?
The official reason stated is it's only attended by old people who have trouble accepting Vatican II, all of which is false. The real reason is because TLM Churches act as a buffer against the radicalism some in the Vatican want to introduce.
So the Vatican wants to queer the church and the traditionalists are in the way?
Pretty much.
As someone who remembers the old Latin Mass (I've got my missal as proof!), I think many Latin Mass people feel they are superior Catholics compared to the hoi polloi. They are not. But they are snobs, with their code words and acronyms.
Meanwhile my friend, an Eastern Rite Catholic Abbot, is getting a flood of inquirers. Literally running out of room behind the cloister gate.
John Paul II said the Eastern Rite was the other lung of the Church. It is going strong.
Amazing as their services aren't in Latin...
When was the last time you went to one? Your description does not fit my experience.
TLM Catholics aren’t snobs for wanting fellow Catholics to embrace the Church’s liturgical and cultural traditions. Also it’s not fair to tar Latin Mass Catholics with the same brush.
Any update on when this article will be available for viewing again?
It takes a while for things to change. The old is replaced by the new over time.
You seem to have little faith in young people.
🤨
I got to read this by the seat of my pants. I had the unrefreshed tab that still had the full content. It describes my experience perfectly in conservative Presbyterian churches.
In 2018, I rocked the boat in a PCA church by being strongly conservative on pretty normie issues like abortion forming a rift, that culminated in the church staging an ambush to get me divorced from my wife.
In 2025, I got struggle-sessioned from an OPC church for becoming race-realist and recognizing the dangers that white people face from blacks - the same views held by heroes of the faith including the founder of the denomination, J Gresham Machen. Ultimately, I resigned membership. I watched as one pastor had extra-judicial means employed to strip him of his ministerial credentials for being anti-feminist and holding a Christian position on Jews. Meanwhile, a "company man" of the denomination had 20 years of grooming and sexually harassing underage girls and only lost his office when a liberal group did an exposé - resulting in him getting 11 months of $10k+/mo severance from the <100 member church.
One of my friends said that the pastoral office is a guild and that the number one loyalty of the guild is to the guild. Your statement that it is middle-management is a fascinating and illuminating observation.
"Christians talk a good game about 'spirit', yet that abstract term is uniformly applied to everything in the non-corporeal world, and they neither believe in nor acknowledge most of the incorporeal world. Like Harry Potter fans, they are not sure whether or not they believe in magic outside of their storybook because they have never seen anyone with rays shooting out of his fingers or a dude walking on water."
"The leaders of churches are supposed to be . . . spiritual. They are religious, for sure, but not spiritual. Most of these guys are worshipping Mammon and whatever leagues of lesser comfort demons he commands. These are the ostensible experts of Christianity, the men and women who get paid money (taxpayer and congregation provided) to play shepherd to a human flock. When I was a kid and sat through my own local church’s service every Sunday along with occasional visits to my friend’s churches, I was struck by how empty those services always felt. If religion is supposed to be the opiate of the masses, where is the feeling during the services? How is any given church more than a glorified social club?"
"Ignorant pastors, priests, and reverends cannot provide those experiences because they are the blind leading the blind. They have no connection to the Divine because they have never suffered. They have lived beige lives where lawns are mowed and Costco paper towels never run out. They have far less spiritual knowledge than the crystal/tarot card lady at the Renaissance fair, and their main claim to spiritual expertise is to quote Bible verses like board game trivia. Pastor Artur Pawlowski and Carlo Viganò aside, preachers have no substance. They are cowards with no inner fire. They have never battled the demons within and are Elmer Milquetoasts made good with a cozy pension. The only internal conflict they have ever faced was their own homosexual desire to pound another male’s ass."
All of these are quotes from my latest essay called Life After Christianity. I won't post a link to it because it is paywalled and I do not want to frustrate anyone. Here is a link to what I consider as one of my better essays on Christianity where I make the connection between corporate America, multi-level marketing schemes, and Mormons/LDS: https://kimberlysteele.substack.com/p/the-lds-mlms-and-npcs
Many of these Pastors sound like Wormtongue, exhorting Theoden to stay home.
This is why I have little faith that the current Churches can be recovered. They will need to be cleansed root and branch before they can really take off in the inevitable second religiousness.
One thing about the second religiousness is though that it usually is a surprisingly tolerant syncretic mix of various traditions, which is why I expect Western Christianity to take on it's more Gothic Germanic-Catholic aspects as we move forward rather than the cold intolerant conceptualism of the post reformation branches.
If history plays out like it usually does in the decline phase, we could have a church where Jesus, Odin and Santa Muerte are all worshiped.
The purpose of a system is what it does. The Protestant systems celebrated the personalities, while Roman authorities tried to shut them up. If you want a movement that allows great men to flourish, you need a different system.
https://biblehub.com/library/kleiser/the_worlds_great_sermons_volume_8/brooks__the_pride_of.htm
Excellent analysis. Pick up the Crown. Guard the Deposit of Faith. Join the new Fellowship of the Ring. Be a wise Templar in modest but bold ways, intellectually and morally. Build new farms, cillages, and establish alternative economies that are anti-fragile, semi self-sufficient, cohesive and like Benedictine monasteries that attract traditional minded youth. Youth who are smart, pious, humble, witty and not woke.