Speaking of last Sunday's sermon, I thought you might enjoy seeing the larger context of the wonderful quote Pastor Allen read near the end of the message. You can read the entire article here, if you like:
http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/catholic_stories/cs0384.htm
But here is the context I find breath-taking, from the last section of the article:
"But what a bracing thing it is instead, to meet young people who are really young, and committed to the faith of their fathers! Those young people are here among us. They are still only a few; but they are dangerous.
"I think I see it in their eyes, the cheerful defiance that moved the best of the protesters in my generation, but a defiance not about to pad itself round with the comforts of the flesh. They will be the men and women to set their stagecoaches to rumble among the dry ruts of plains and deserts more barren than anything John Ford’s wagon masters ever faced. They will have the wreck that used to be the United States, and the wreck that used to be Europe.
"Let them go outdoors, then. I see them in my imagination, celebrating in the public squares, when everyone about them has forgotten the difference between a celebration and a debauch. I hear them singing together, when everyone else has forgotten that there is anything to sing about. I see them cheerfully being themselves, men being men and women being women, with their gangs of children hollering about them, climbing trees and getting into everything, as they should. I hear them pray in solemn unison, while the world looks away, abashed. Then they laugh with real mirth in their hearts, while the world looks askance in envy.
The churches may collapse into social clubs or philanthropic dispensaries or rubble. These men and women will have real communion, and will love their neighbors in truth. They will know the holy.
"I see them coming over the ridge. Wagons, ho!"
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