The Generational Divide in the Church

[00:00:00] Foreign. [00:00:09] There is a growing generational divide within Catholicism, particularly between Gen Z and the baby boomers. It's becoming more and more confrontational. At least that's what I've noticed. Can this divide be healed or are we going to be stuck with it? That's what I want to talk about today on Crisis Point. Hello, I'm Eric Sims, your host editor chief of Crisis magazine. [00:00:28] Before we get started, I just want to encourage people, as always, smash that like button, subscribe to the channel, let other people know about what we're doing here. I really appreciate when you do that. Also go to crisismagazine.com put in your email address and we will send you our articles every morning, usually two a day at 9am Eastern time. But the other big thing I want to say this only happens twice a year. [00:00:50] We are doing our fundraising campaign. [00:00:53] We do this twice a year. We don't like, I don't like to ask for money all year round. I think that gets annoying. People don't like that. But at the same time we do have to raise money every we have nothing behind a paywall at Crisis. Every single thing we do is offer for free everything you podcasts, you listen to, watch, read, whatever the case may be. It's all offered with at no charge. But obviously we have to pay the bills. So I really appreciate it. If you go to crisis magazine.com right now you will get a pop up. [00:01:21] We're doing our fundraising campaign in fact today on Giving Tuesday, December 2, 2025. [00:01:28] If you donate today, it will be doubled. Your donation will be doubled. We have a generous donor who offered to double it for giving Tuesday up to I think $15,000. So I really appreciate that. Like I said, I don't like asking for money but obviously we have to do it every once in a while. So please donate to our fundraising campaign. [00:01:47] Another thing I wanted to bring up was it is December, which means you were probably thinking about hopefully about Advent first and foremost, but also about Christmas shopping, about what you're going to buy for people in your life. Well, I have a recommendation if you have a science fiction lover in your family or somebody, you know, maybe perhaps a young man who likes science fiction and perhaps he's not completely practicing the faith, but you like to give him a good science fiction book that will not undermine his the Catholicism in any way, shape or form. Well, I recommend my book Shard of Eden. It's my new science fiction novel, has a very Catholic ethos but it's a good science fiction story. I've had a great response to it. If you go to shardofeden.com, you can order it direct. You can order from Amazon, a link there or directly from me, a signed copy. I actually have a copy right here in my hands, which is a little bit rare lately because they've been selling. [00:02:40] To be honest, I've been selling so well, I keep running out of copies. I do know I have at least, I think about 20 or so more copies until I run out again. I did put another order in, but they won't come until after Christmas, which means if you want to get something, a signed copy for somebody for Christmas, you need to order it from me very soon. Obviously, Amazon's going to have it available all the way up till. Right. Right before Christmas, you know, to get to by Christmas, if you want to get there. But that's not a signed copy. So, anyway, I want to let people know about that. Okay, so the topic today is the general generational divide in the church. And it really is this generational divide in culture, in society and politics and everywhere that's happening. [00:03:25] I've been actually thinking about this a lot because I keep seeing it over and over again. [00:03:30] I wrote an article last week, editor's desk at Crisis Magazine, called Boomers, Doomers and Zoomers. I think it was. Or maybe it was Boomers, Zoomers, Doomers. Can't remember the order I put it in. But it was about a lot of the generational divide that we have in the church that we're seeing. [00:03:48] And it's. It's something I've noticed that people are becoming more and more obsessed with this. And it's. It's always. It's been around for a while, this idea of what generation is. You know, I'm Gen X. Just to be put my cards on the table, I'm Gen X. I'm not baby Boomer, not millennial. I'm Gen X. [00:04:02] And so, I mean, I've been aware of that for a very long time. But people are getting more and more kind of hardened in their identification with their generation and the idea that they're so different from every other generation. [00:04:18] And it really is creating a divide. Now, one thing I do want to say is just at the outset, this is something my wife often says, and she talks about a lot in the divide between men and women. [00:04:29] She says, like, that feminism has brought about. [00:04:32] And she likes to say anything that divides people is from the devil. If something's dividing people in the sense that we're talking about here, we're not distinguishing between people, but really dividing them, putting them at odds with each other, pitting them against each other. [00:04:46] That's going to be from the devil. And she talks about in the context of, like, say, feminism has done that in, in putting a divide between men and women instead of recognizing their complementarity and how they. They should work together. Well, the generational divide, I, I feel like, is very similar in that it really is kind of bringing us apart, not bringing. Taking us apart, not bringing us together. [00:05:10] So ultimately, I think when it. It gets to an extreme, it is. [00:05:15] It is from the devil. [00:05:17] So I want to talk a little bit about that generational divide we're talking about in the church. It's kind of. I mean, it's pretty blaringly obvious, the differences between the generation. Now. Okay, first of all, before I continue, if you're somebody who's so sensitive, you're going to get triggered by me calling, talking about boomers or criticizing Gen Z because, like, you're, you feel like you're a victim or whatever the case may be, just go leave the podcast now. You just won't be able to handle it. I'm going to make statements that are generalizations, and it's not. If I say something about boomers do this. I know if you're 65 years old and you're. You love the traditional Mass, I'm not including you. I mean, just, just understand we make these generalities because they are generally true. [00:06:04] Doesn't mean every single person in. In every generation fits it to a T. [00:06:10] Okay. So in the church. So it's pretty obvious if you go like, I lived down in Florida for, in a retirement community area for about five years, and boy, it was Boomer central. And you could really see it in the different parishes. In fact, that is what got me to start going to a traditional Latin Mass was because, you know, we had young children, we weren't boomers. And every parish we went to nearby was Boomerville, and we didn't want to raise our kids in a parish like that. And by Boomerville, I just simply mean it was what you'd expect. The 1970s flavored liturgy with the terrible music, the, the, the insipid homilies, the, the focus on things like, you know, having felt banners, this ugliness, ugly architecture, all that stuff. [00:07:00] We just were like, we can't handle this. Our kids are not going to be raised in the faith. Well, if we are going to a Boomer parish. [00:07:08] So we're like, well, there's a fraternity St. Peter Parish not that far away. I guess we'll try that out. And that's what we first started. This is like 15 years ago now. We first started going to traditional Mass. It was simply because we're trying to avoid Boomerville. What. And the other reason was like we started going to that parish because we knew that's where the homeschool families were. That's where the kids were for our kids. [00:07:29] And that really is kind of a microcosm of what's happened in the church, at least in America is the, the boomer baby boomer generation is very much still focused on. They love their like kind of ant. Anti pre Vatican 2. Anything before Vatican 2 they're allergic to. The music is from the straight from the 1960s and 70s. The message of like ecumenism above all else, inter religious dialogue, all religions are equal. It's all there. [00:07:59] But if you go to the traditional at Mass, it's a lot more young families, young people. [00:08:05] And that's still true today. In fact, you know, my parish, it's just, just a case in point. [00:08:12] When I showed up for mass on Sunday, this past Sunday, the long. The line for confession was about, about 15 to 20 deep. [00:08:23] And I noticed something that most of the people in line, in fact I counted because it was so, it was, it struck me so much. Twelve of them were young men. And my young men, I don't mean, you know, young teenagers there because their parents had them in line. I'm talking about 20 something men who lived, you know, they're, nobody's telling them to go to confession, but they were predominantly. What was made up the confession was young men. [00:08:47] And this is just, this is something that you hear over and over again. The demographics of more traditional parishes, more conservative, no sort of parishes, they're much more dominated by young people. Whereas the parishes that are very much still kind of living, riding the wave of Vatican ii, they're much more predominantly older parishioners. There's this extremely strong generational divide inside the church and it is reflected also in wider society. I mean ultimately the younger Catholics, the Gen Z very much reject Boomer Catholicism. They just. But what's interesting is, is they're not the same. It's not the same as like people my age, you know, Gen X and maybe even a little bit of millennials. [00:09:38] They're not invested in the old battles. Like I have spent a large amount of my adult Catholicism, which is my only Catholicism because I converted as an adult. But I've been Catholic for 30 years now. [00:09:50] A large Amount of my kind of debates that I've been involved in, discussions I'm involved in, have revolved around Vatican II and all the things that kind of revolve around Vatican ii. So the debates that kind of were generated by that, debating the Council itself and how much it had to do with the loss of faith, debating the liturgy, that, you know, change after Vatican ii, all the changes. [00:10:16] It seems like a lot of the younger people just don't care about those debates. It's not that they don't care about the faith, they just don't care about those debates. [00:10:24] They're not invested. First of all, they're not like the boomers that they're invested in Vatican ii. Like, they have some emotional attachment to it, but they're also not really investing in a lot of the battles of the next generation or two, like my generation, of trying to fight over Vatican ii. They clearly prefer more traditional forms of liturgy, more traditional forms of practicing the faith. [00:10:45] But that doesn't mean they go out and are like, oh, let's go debate Vatican ii. [00:10:51] I also think it's reflected a little bit in how their attitudes towards the papacy, towards the Pope. That's been another big thing, you know, during the Francis years. Like, every debate, every discussion was about, was about Pope Francis. [00:11:04] And it does seem like Gen Z is a little bit not. They have a. [00:11:09] They have a respect for the papacy, and they don't really feel like fighting against it when it does something wrong or. Or whatever. It just kind of like, let's, you know, let's just practice our faith. So there's a certain. [00:11:22] Whereas, you know, the boomers, if you say anything critical of the pope, like Pope Francis, I should say it was like they just. They. Their minds blew. At the same time, a lot of people, my generation of my generation, like Gen X, they couldn't say anything good about Pope Francis. It was like just they had to always attack him. And they've kind of transferred that to Pope Leo now. [00:11:43] And that's obviously a very unhealthy way of doing it. [00:11:47] And so what do we see here then is the fact that historically what's happened is the church has changed radically in 1960s and 70s. Now, we call this like the boomer generation then. But remember, they're not the people who were in charge when all the changes were made. It was actually the generation before them that made the changes, most of them, that being said, they did embrace them and really ran with them. [00:12:15] And, you know, they're the ones who made the parishes like they are they were the dominant force that made them like they are. And what happened was, is my generation, Gen X and millennials as well, they simply left the church. [00:12:29] They simply said, okay, this isn't something attractive to me. This isn't something I think is helps my life. [00:12:39] They found things outside the church that were more attractive to them than the church, than the insipid homilies, the, the just terrible liturgies and all that. [00:12:50] It was better for them just to go elsewhere. Some went to like evangelical parish, Protestant parish churches where they had on fire preaching. They really, you know, were hardcore about, you know, moral teachings of Christianity, things like that. [00:13:05] But then a lot also just left and became atheist and embraced that. [00:13:10] Gen Z has been a little bit different because, because there's so many generations removed from the changes. Like their parents had already left the church, if they left the church or their parents were already like, you know, into the church, like it's remained. So the most of them though, their parents just simply didn't practice the faith anymore. So they weren't raised like that. So what we're seeing is we're actually seeing a decent, a large amount of conversions to Catholicism in this generation that wasn't raised with any, you know, really understanding, knowing the Catholicism or anything like that. It's people who aren't even cradles. They're, they're, they grew up Protestant or they grew up nothing actually is more likely they grew up nothing. That's one thing I've noticed. I've been teaching RCIA OCIA conversion class, wherever you call it these days. [00:14:02] I've been helping teach that for off and on for almost 25 years, something like that. [00:14:08] And when I started maybe 25 years ago, almost everybody who was there was a former Protestant. [00:14:17] They're coming from Protestantism. There was a few exceptions I've noticed though in recent years. There's a lot, there's a, there's more people who are coming from nothing, coming from no religious background at all, particularly young people who are coming from no religious background. [00:14:34] And I think that's very interesting to see that now there's still Protestants converting, but it's more people from nothing, especially the Gen Z people. [00:14:43] Now I will say that like my generation, Gen X, we did have a conversion class, so to speak, in the 1990s. A lot of people came into the Catholic Church in America. I'm one of them. I mean we had over 150, 175,000 people a year coming to the church. [00:14:58] Sadly, however, a lot of them ended up leaving. I Mean, the numbers just show this. [00:15:03] We're now having a next kind of our second in the next generation of a conversion class with these Gen Z's. And what I'm praying is, is that they don't also leave at the same numbers that my generation did, that the Gen Xers did. The people who converted in this, in the, in the 1990s, a lot of them left eventually, whereas the Gen Z, we don't know yet. I mean people are coming in and we just have to pray and hope that they, they remain within the church as well. [00:15:32] But this kind of, this whole generational divide thing, I, I think we need to look a little deeper than just saying, okay, Boomer's bad, Gen Z doing great, whatever. I feel like a lot of people, including a lot of like Catholic influencers, they're really catering, they're trying to cater to Gen Z and trying to be like, okay, how can I be hip and cool to them? Listen, I'm in my mid-50s, I am not cool, I am not hip. There is no way, shape or form. I identify with some 25 year old young man in the sense of like growing up the same. Now I don't think the change, the differences are that huge and I'll get in that in a second. [00:16:11] But I'm not going to try, I'm not going to be the hello fellow kids or whatever the meme is. [00:16:17] I should have got that so I could pop it up on the screen. [00:16:20] That meme. I, I, I, there's just no, it's silly to do that. And so I want to go a little bit deeper though and talk about the generational divide and kind of means and how we should Catholics look at. Like I said, if it's a divide, it's from the devil. So this generational divide is something the devil at the very least uses to pit us against each other. And that's what I'm more concerned about is how we're pitted against each other by generation because that's just, the devil's going to do that. He's going to find, okay, men and women pit them against each other. Different age groups pit them against each other. Black and white pit them against each other. That's what he does. And he's doing that with the generations. The first thing we have to recognize is that generational divide is a new thing. History. [00:17:06] Do you think there was much difference between somebody in 1350 born in 1390? [00:17:15] Do you think they are 40 years old when they were born? Do you really. [00:17:23] Phenomenon teenager modern was no Such thing As a teenager 200 years ago, yes, there were people who lived who were in their teens. [00:17:33] Obviously there's 14 year olds back then, but they weren't teenagers as a sociological kind of concept we have now in that there's some unique age group that is nothing like anybody else. No, you know what they were taught to be? They were taught to be adults. [00:17:51] When you're, they might be young adults but they're taught to be adults. That's something I've always thought in my own parenting I've tried to do is like I'm trying to raise people to these kids to be adults. I'm not trying to, you know, emphasize their teen years. I want them to be good and strong adults one day. And that's what it's geared towards. And so 200 years ago, 15 year old kid, young man, you know what he was doing? He was helping out around the family farm as much as in probably more than anybody. And he was working his tail off every day. And he wasn't saying like oh I'm going to spend my time playing video games or whatever the case may be. So there were was no generational dividend. [00:18:29] And it's but that generational divide we have now that sociological construct of this, you know, baby boomers, Gen X, millennials, Gen Z, what Gen Alpha. I think there's is a new one. [00:18:41] We act like as if people of one generation can simply not understand people of another generation. [00:18:51] Now there is some truth to that. The devil always uses some truth when he wants to do his will. [00:18:57] But the fact is the human condition remains the same. The human condition today is the same as it was 50 years ago, 500 years ago, 5,000 years ago. [00:19:10] We are made in the image of God. We are fallen creations. We desire the same thing. We desire to be fulfilled by God, by the true, the good, the beautiful. [00:19:20] That is true. Whether or not you are 25 or 55 or 75, the human condition is the same. [00:19:28] But we act as if growing up, if you grew up in this, in this century, for example, if you're born after 2000, somehow we just, there's no way anybody born before that could even begin to understand your life experience. And that's just simply not true. It is true that Gen Z in particular has some unique life experiences that, that some unique challenges. I mean I think I've talked about a lot. You know my book Moral Money goes into this. I'll pull it up for those watching. Moral Money Goes into this. The our monetary financial system has, has really Put Gen Z behind the eight ball. There's no question it's geared. It's basically our finding our monetary system is like basically how do we make boomers rich and keep them richer? And how do we have have Gen Z pay the bill? I mean that is true. And so they do have some things. But the truth is like when I was, you know, that age, you know, 30 years ago when I was in my 20s, it was very, it was different financially than my own. My own father, when he was in his 20s and 30s, like he bought a house. I think I've said this for. I think he bought his first house for like $8,000. [00:20:38] And I think our first house, you know, we paid like it was like almost $200,000. And now it's like no, it's less than 152. No, something like that. I can't remember now exactly what it was. And now of course, you know, a lot of Gen Z, they can't find a house for under 200. [00:20:54] More like 300, something like that. Because the monetary system also I think one big factor I think that is unique to Gen Z, they were locked down in high school, they were locked down in college and high school. And that had a tremendous effect on them. They were basically told everybody you see could be a vector for disease and death. You got a mask up, you can't show your face to anybody else. You have to remain behind closed doors. You can't like go interact with people in real life. Everything will be on a screen. I mean already things were on a screen, but now it's like you're forced to be on a screen. So no question that that's the case. Plus Gen Z's had to deal with the relentless wokeness of our culture. I think this is particularly true of white young men. They have been told from birth, subconsciously, consciously, all everywhere that white men are the cause of all problems, the cause of all evil. I mean, find me a commercial where a white man isn't the dummy in it. Isn't the, you know, being taught by the, the smart black person, a smart woman or something like that. [00:22:01] Find me the television show or movie that presents the white man as, you know, something to be admired, especially the white father. [00:22:09] Just is never, always something's wrong with them and they had to grow up with this. [00:22:16] That being said, we're still this, we're still human beings with the same, created the same, basically the same way. [00:22:28] And so this human experience is still the human experience. [00:22:32] Gen Z, you can learn from your Elders, every time you hear a criticism from an older person, if you react by saying, okay, Boomer, that's really a problem on your end. [00:22:44] Like, one thing I. And here's where I'm going to Chris, I've been very clear in criticizing the boomers. Here's what I'm going to criticize Gen Z. I'm not saying it's not understandable why they're like this, but it's still true. [00:22:56] You play the victim card too much. [00:22:59] I'm sorry, but Gen Z plays the victim card too much. I'm not. Again, I'm not saying everybody, but like, inevitably when I say something on my, you know, like on X or something like that, that suggests that perhaps it's not the worst thing in the world to be Gen Z. It's not the. The word awful in every way, I inevitably get the victim. People. The people are like, oh, you don't understand how awful it is. You just don't understand. It's impossible. It's impossible for us to buy a house. It's impossible for us to get married. It's impossible for us to find jobs. [00:23:31] I mean, I'm not trying to tout my own horn or anything like that, but I have A son who's 22, happily married, has a job and owns a house. So don't tell me it's impossible. I'm not saying it's not difficult. I'm not saying there aren't sacrifices you don't have to make in order to make that happen, but it is possible. I also have two sons in laws who are also in their 20s, have jobs, happily married, one owns a house, one's about to buy a house. I mean, they're not getting all this because they inherited a million dollars or something like that. So it is possible, first of all, to find a spouse, to get a job, and even to buy a house in your 20s. [00:24:15] It might not be as easy as it was in my day, and it wasn't as easy in my day as it was in my dad's day, but it is possible. So don't play the victim all the time. Because what happens is when you play the victim, you aren't willing to listen to constructive criticism, to actual wisdom. [00:24:31] Now, here's the thing that we need to understand. [00:24:36] Healthy societies revere their elders. [00:24:42] A healthy society reveres its elders. [00:24:45] This is also a very Catholic way of thinking as well. [00:24:50] Catholics believe in tradition. What is tradition? It's receiving what's been handed on to us by our elders. Now, the problem is, and I'm sorry, boomers, but you just. A lot of blame does lie at your. At your feet. And for those good boomers out there, people who are baby boomer generator who are great, God bless you. I know you fought the good fight. It's not your fault for all of it. But the fact is, is that what happened was, for probably the first time in human history, a generation decided not to grow up, decided not to be elders. I know people in their 60s and 70s who act as if they're. They still think they're. They're like, in their twenties. They're still like. They're like, I can't believe I'm, you know, in my 70s. And they act like they're in their 20s or 30s. [00:25:37] And when you have a generation that refuses to grow up, they don't become. They don't become that elder generation passing on wisdom to the next. In fact. In fact, what they do is they are just narcissistic, looking at themselves. [00:25:52] You see this in the financial situation. I'll bring it up again. [00:25:56] Baby boomers think they did great because their houses, their net worth is so much because they bought a house at, let's say, you know, $50,000, and now it's worth a million. [00:26:07] The problem is they've screwed everybody under, everybody younger than them, because now somebody's got to buy that house for a million dollars that really is a $50,000 house. [00:26:16] But because of our fiat currency and the way, you know, and so many different ways housing prices have gone up, you know, you think it's some great investment, but really, you just got lucky. And when you bought your house and that's all it is. There's no. There's no, like, wisdom there. And so what happened was, is when they basically, they. They. They didn't pass on wisdom. In fact, not only that, but starting in the 60s and 70s, they lied incessantly, lied incessantly to the next generations of what it means to be happy, what it means to be holy, what it means to be, you know, live a good life. [00:26:56] I mean, think about all the movies, all the slop that's out there in which they say basically the good life is just, you know, looking out for yourself. Pray, love, and eat or whatever it is when they're not really praying, they're just going and traveling and living for themselves. I mean, how many movies are based upon somebody basically leaving their spouse to go because they need to be fulfilled? They have to look after themselves. [00:27:19] And so we've been lied to by our elders and so it's very difficult for us to trust them. And Gen Z, I think, more than Gen X and more than the millennials, they were one of the first generations to say, you know something? You are lying to us, and we're just simply going to ignore you now, and we're just simply not going to listen to you anymore. And that's very good in the sense that they're not listening to lies, but it's very bad in the sense that they don't have elders to kind of help them and give them wisdom and to challenge them when they might go off on the wrong path. [00:27:56] So what we really need to do is we really need to, we need older people, and that's like myself, people like me, to not lie to the younger generation, to pass on wisdom to the younger generation. [00:28:14] And we need the younger generation, though, not to call every bit of wisdom we pass on a boomerism or basically just say, you're a boomer and ignore what we're saying. [00:28:24] And in the church, this is the challenge. This is the real challenge. Because here's the thing. [00:28:30] In my entire life as a Catholic, Catholic leaders have basically tried to cater to the youth. [00:28:39] They have, they have spent so much time and energy on youth programs that are all based on, upon the same premise, which is let's make everything relevant to the youth by making it exactly like everything else they consume. [00:28:56] I had my, you know, my, my podcast with Trent Horn, my debate about this, where I was saying, I really just think most of those are a waste of time. In fact, they're counterproductive, they're harmful. [00:29:06] So it's like, we've done this. So the church, that's been their thing. And I do think that's a mistake. I don't think we should do other Gen Z as well either. You know why? One reason is because Gen Z will grow up, they will become 30, in their 30s and 40s, and they will no longer have the same ideas of what it means to be, you know, how, what it means to be, live a good life and what's true and stuff like that at that age, as they do in their 20s. Anybody who's in their 40s knows you've changed your opinions on many things. You've grown wiser, hopefully more mature. Certain things that you were attracted to in your 20s, you're not anymore, and vice versa. [00:29:42] And so when the church constantly is like, hey, let's make everything for young people, it's like a cycle that always fails because eventually they stop, you know, that becomes unfashionable The Church is always behind the times on that and so it doesn't really reach it. And so what the Church needs to do is not cater to Gen Z, but. But it does need to listen to them. You know, let's do citality for once. Actual Senate, understand, like our emotional attachments, like the Boomers, emotional attachment to Vatican 2 and Gen X and even millennials attachment, emotional attachment to the battles around Vatican 2. [00:30:20] They're just simply not helping. [00:30:24] I'm not saying we never have discussions in which we explain the history of why we are where we are today. It's important to know the history. [00:30:31] It's important to know like, for example, why is the Bishop of Charlotte hate the. The Traditional Latin Mass and attacking it so much? There's a history behind that. We do need to understand that. [00:30:41] But we should be more, I think, emphasizing we should have been doing this from day one. [00:30:47] Two young people, the truth, the beauty, the goodness of traditional Catholicism, that the Traditional Latin Mass, for example, why is so beautiful? [00:30:56] Why it is so true? Why it is so good? Why traditional spirituality? Why the saints and the doctors of the church, people who have come before us, why we should listen to them, why we should follow in their footsteps, not the footsteps of people who decide to break with a tradition in the 1960s, but instead recover it. Not to go back to the 1950s either, because the 1950s aren't like some idealized age either. [00:31:24] It's more to say, okay, we're going to take all this stuff we've learned from the past, from 2000 years of tradition. We're going to apply it to today. [00:31:34] We're not going to be stuck in the 1970s either fighting against it or embracing it. This is something that I will just say the bishops are so out of touch about. They just, I mean, they're just unbelievably out of touch when it comes to this. I mean, you just saw it when that Cardinal, Cardinal Pierre at the USCC beaming. I talked about this in a podcast a couple weeks ago, how he was talking about. His whole thing was focused on we have to basically Vatican 2 harder. We have to Pope Francis harder. And that's. That's going to revive the church. Nothing could be further from the truth. That's like a, that is like a plan to wipe out the church would be to do that. They're so out of touch. What we really need to do is, and this is something, by the way, for those who might be thinking, Eric, well, haven't you been pretty much, you Know, fighting these battles and that been consuming you for a long time. Yes. And that's what I'm saying is, is I feel like that time has passed. Of course I'm still going to talk about things and still be involved in discussions that revolve around changes that you're back into, because they still impact us. But I do think the days of, let's just talk about Vatican two more and more, let's just talk about, you know, all the battles. I do think we should start moving away from them and be much more directed towards, okay, what is the path to the future? [00:32:53] A future, a traditional future, you know, a blast from the past, so to speak. Back to the future, whatever you want to call it, whatever movie you want, you want to bring up here. [00:33:02] I think if we're faithful to tradition, what happens is we attract people of goodwill, all people of all ages of goodwill. The young person, maybe the young man who is like, hey, I can see I've been lied to my whole life. I can see the society, the culture around me is just. Does not bring happiness or completeness or holiness. I want something different. I want something more. [00:33:28] Nothing is more than tradition. That's the greatest more we have. So we present that to them, but also people who are maybe in their 40s and 50s, who maybe they got. They're divorced and their kids aren't talking to them anymore, and they're just not living the life, it hasn't turned out the way they had hoped it would. [00:33:46] We can point them to a better direction. We can. By pointing to tradition, we point them to Jesus Christ and a deep following of Jesus Christ's discipleship with him, where they can get out of that, you know, realize that, you know, life is more than the mistakes they've made in their life. And so maybe even some boomers will listen to us who have embraced the boomerism of the. The. All the. The past year. So I really do think we have to make it as I think church leaders, in particular, Catholic influencers and people like that, whoever you want to call them, we. We need to not be so consumed with the generational divide, but instead, instead present the truth for all that that is beyond generations. Jesus Christ is the same today, yesterday and tomorrow. [00:34:32] He always is the same, and he always is the solution to our problems. No matter how we grow up, Jesus Christ is the solution to our problems, and we only find him in fullness. In the Catholic Church. If we present that vision, it doesn't matter what generation the person is, it's going to Be attractive to them if they are of goodwill. So, okay, let me grab on the. The live chat here. I appreciate everybody in the live chat, as always. On Tuesday afternoons when I do the live show, you can jump in the chat, make your opinions know. I think there was a good debate going on. I could see the chat, you know, running through today. So let me see some things. Juan says Catholic Church, the only institution that the old say to get with the times and the young ones. Yeah. It is a funny thing. He says the Catholic Church is the only institution in which the old say get with the times and the young want to be like traditional Catholics. It is a funny thing in the Catholic Church, where we are today, that the old want to be the hip and relevant. They act like that. And the young are like, can we just go back to the way it used to be before I was even before born, before my. My parents were even born? That seems better than what we got now. It is very true. [00:35:38] Anna Kate says we don't think the young are wiser than the old. We think the preponderance of history is wiser than one generation who happened to be old right now. That's beautifully said. Yeah, I think she was just finding somebody who said that trads think that, like, the young are wiser than the old. Anna Kate hits it right there on the head because it agrees with what I was saying about we do. We need to respect our elders. The problem is there is a generation that very much did kind of corrupt the process that, that, that decided it was wiser than everybody else, wiser than history, rejected history. And what we're saying is, let's just go back the way things were, where we looked at history and said, okay, these people who have lived through life, they're. They're wise. They. They know the tradition that they've had on is wise is smart, not the tradition they made up in this. Excuse me, 1970s. So. Good point, Anna. [00:36:29] Okay, Anna's right. 2000 years of history and tradition is wiser than the 60s revolution. Yes, exactly. Thank you. I can't. I'm not sure how to say your name. El Skits. Fernand. [00:36:40] Anyway, yes, that's what we're trying to say here. We're not saying. [00:36:44] Because here's what the debate could be. The debate could be, okay, are the 1970s better, the 1950s better? [00:36:50] That is a doom for failure debate. Both sides lose. Once you say, you know, you're debating whether the 70s or the 50s are better, that's what that you. You lose both Sides lose. And I do think the younger people, Gen Z, they, that's what they think they're like and they're smart to think that. [00:37:07] What we need to say is, are the 2,000 years approximately that came before the 1960s wiser or the 60s revolution. That's really what we're trying to say. And obviously, hopefully people watching and listening to this podcast think it's the, it's the former. It's the 2000 years of tradition. August TV says the youth stuff in the church is often just stuff boomers want dressed up as outreach. The real youth Mass is the tlm and we know how they feel about that. Yeah, I mean that is basically been true for, for a number of years now, where the Mass you're going to find with the most youth is going to be a traditional at Mass or at the very least a very tradition coded Novus Ordo Mass. [00:37:50] And the, the, the perpetual youth ministry just needs to end. It just is not, I mean, it just isn't a good thing for the church overall. Because honestly, youth ministry is one of those divides I'm talking about, where it separates people where it really shouldn't. I'm not saying you can't do anything. Like I said in my podcast with Trent Horn, I'm not saying you can't do anything for youth. But I am saying though, that having a Mass for that, that's directed towards the youth and like everything and like every activity and like you don't incorporate them into the parish, that is a strategy doomed for failure. And we, we want, I'm just saying, as the great philosopher Rodney King said, can't we all just get along? That's basically my message here. And also, let's listen to the wisdom of our elders. And yes, it does mean for Gen Z people, it might mean millennials and Gen Xs and even some boomers. But mostly what it means is let's listen to the wisdom of our elders who came before us for thousands of years. That's really the path forward. [00:38:50] Okay, I'm going to cut it off there. I appreciate everybody who joined in live chat again, again, like I mentioned, doing our fundraiser right now. Please go to crisismagazine.com and donate. Either a pop up will come up or there'll be. Or there's a donate link in the upper right, I believe. [00:39:05] And donate your, your donation will be doubled if you donate today. Even if you don't donate today, our fundraising campaign is going to be going for the next few weeks. We might have some more matching gifts that. That we might announce as well. So we. I really do appreciate that. It helps us Just keep everything outside of a pay wall. Okay. Until next time, everybody. God love you.