Floating Downstream

More than 40 years ago, in 1974, Archbishop Fulton Sheen made the following observations:

“First of all, we are at the end of Christendom. Now not Christianity, not the Church. Remember what I am saying.”

“Christendom is economic, political, social life as inspired by Christian principles. That is ending — we’ve seen it die. Look at the symptoms: the breakup of the family, divorce, abortion, immorality, general dishonesty.”

“The press that we read, the television that we see, is in no instance inspired by Christian principles. As a matter of fact, there is, on the part of many of us, the tendency to go down to meet the world — not to lift the world up. We are afraid of being unpopular — so we go with the mob.”

“Today the current is against us. And today the mood of the world is, ‘Go with the world, go with the spirit.’ Listen, dead bodies float downstream. Only live bodies resist the current. And so the good Lord is testing us.”

“And he is testing Western Christians with worldliness, and how many of us are falling?”

Well, we can only wonder what the good Archbishop would say today.