For Catholics: No we're not. For others: No we're not

We have now survived our first day of being unPoped. DePoped? Fear not; soon enough we'll be rePoped.

The day after the Pope announced his pending retirement the front page headline in the Quad City Times read, "Catholics Face Uncertainty."

O, come on now. Seriously?

We've been around for almost 2,000 years. Been there, done that. A Pope retires? Four times. The last two were voluntary, although Celestine's fate wasn't pretty. Things have changed over the last 600 years.

At any rate, the strength of the Roman Catholic Church does not lie in Rome. It never has. It does not reside in the bishops or in the College of Cardinals or in the Curia.

It lies in the Parishes. It lies in my Sunday School class. If I live another 25 years, my parish, St. Mary's, will be in the care of that class. I will be in the care of that class. It will be in great, trustworthy, faithful, strong hands. And it will be stronger than ever. The reason the Catholic Church has survived and thrived for two millenia isn't because of some old guy in Rome who has a yarmulke and red shoes. It's because of generation after generation of kids and their forming their relation with Jesus. Jeans and t-shirts and Chucks and the Holy Spirit. The Church is a bottom-up institution, or it is nothing at all. That's true of any church. Don't waste time talking about what great guys are at the top of the pyramid. Tell me about the congregations.

The strength of the church is local. It's in Africa, where the growth has been explosive. One parish recorded 102 baptisms in one week, and the Church in Africa has more vocations to the priesthood than they know what to do with. It's in southeast Asia and, most of all, it's in Mexico, Central America, South America. . .the largest Catholic nation in the world is Brazil.

May the Cardinal electors be blessed with wisdom and the Spirit. May the next Pope govern with wisdom, the Spirit, and a strong pastoral sense.

But we know where the true might of the Roman Catholic Church is. It meets at 10 AM on Sundays, in an upstairs room in a house right across Fillmore Street from St. Mary's.

Thanks for hanging out!