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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, 'DECEMBER 30, 1983
A Rembrandt landscape after a storm: ineffective, confused and
conflicted, if sincere, church leaders; poor religious education;
disheartened priests; unenlightened preaching; angry women; a
vigorously independent laity; a moribund sexual ethic; ... short
ages of priests; democratization of local institutions; fads;
conflict; shouting; anger; hope, and a new religious sensibility
among the young--thus American Catholicism 20 years after Pope
John XXIII's breeze became a whirlwind after crossing the
Atlantic.
There is no reason to think that the storm will stop blowing for
the next two decades•••• The American Catholic Church will con
tinue to be a noisy, contentious, disorderly place.
More about this very important trend in a succeeding report.
--Gene H. Hogberg, News Bureau