Paradise Lost or Found?
Fort Wayneâs Catholics Part Ways Over Liturgy and Politics
Jim Didier grew up as the eldest of 12 children in a devout Roman Catholic family whose roots in Fort Wayne, Indiana, date to the mid-1800s. Now 75, he was a teenager when the Second Vatican Council (1962â1965) transformed liturgical practice in the Church. Musical programs embraced contemporary styles. Local languages replaced Latin in the Mass. Broadly, the Church tried to make its rituals and revelation more accessible. Coming of age in the 1960s, Didier experienced these reforms as a liberation.
âI grew up with the pomp and circumstance and smells and bells,â he says. But after the Second Vatican Council, commonly known as Vatican II, âthe traditional Latin church that we grew up with in the 1950s and 1960s was no moreâto the chagrin of many, but to the joy and kind of cosmic release of others. And I was the latter.â
Didierâs parents were faithful, âfairly conservativeâ Catholics who accepted the reforms without much angst. They just âwent to Church and choir and worked hard and raised us to be good, moral, spiritual people,â he says. Most of his siblings still live in the Fort Wayne area and are still practicing Catholics.
Along with Vatican II, a professor at the University of St. Francis, in Fort Wayne, was pivotal to forming Didierâs adult relationship to the Church. âWe called him âthe mind melter,ââ he says of Dr. Earl Kumfer, now an emeritus professor of philosophy and theology at St. Francis. Didier took Dr. Kumferâs undergraduate class on the philosophy of religion, and it âtruly altered the course of my life.â The professor âtook my little foundation and threw a stick of dynamite in the middle of it and blew it to smithereens,â Didier says.
Yet Didierâs move away from Catholic traditionalism never led him to leave the Church. He has missed only a few Masses in his life, always due to illness. And he has been deeply involved in the life of his current parishâMost Precious Blood, on the edge of downtown Fort Wayneâsince 1980.
Most Precious Blood was built in 1897 to serve the areaâs rapidly growing population of German and Irish immigrants. It added a school the following year. Didier taught math and religion there for nine years, and he was the churchâs music director from 1992 to 2021, with a two-year hiatus in the late 1990s. He returned as interim director in 2024.
The Pushback to Vatican II
Jim Didierâs story is familiar among Catholics who grew up in the 1960s and 1970s. But younger, practicing Catholics tend to tell a very different story. Theyâre more conservative in general, both in their political orientation and their liturgical preferences. And their relationship to Vatican II is more about repairing its perceived harms than celebrating its reforms.
For example, a 2022 survey of more than 10,000 priests found that nearly 70 percent of those ordained between 1965 and 1969 self-identified as somewhat or very progressive. The cohort ordained between 2015 and 2019 was the exact opposite: Nearly 70 percent self-identified as either somewhat or very conservative. A majority of the rest identified as centrist. Less than 10 percent identified as any variety of progressive.
The shift is similar among the laity. The percentage of adult Americans who identify as Catholic has remained relatively stable for decades. The share was about 24 percent in the mid-2000s but fell to 20 percent in 2014 and has remained steadily there through 2024. But this surface stability disguises some profound changes.
Most notably, contemporary Catholics of all ages are much less likely to attend church regularly. A survey measuring the frequency of mass attendance between 1970 and 2021, for example, found that 55 percent of self-identified Catholics attended church weekly in 1970. By 2021, only 17 percent attended weekly.
So Catholic identity is holding steady, but the type of people who show up faithfully for Mass has changed. And, for many of the faithful, reversing the liturgical reforms of Vatican II is a top priority.
Mass as "Another Dimension"
Nicole and Randy Carey are prime examples. The couple and their 10 children faithfully attend Our Lady of Good Hope (or âOur Ladyâ), a parish located on Fort Wayneâs northeast side. Four of the children attend its school, which enrolls about 150 students in kindergarten through eighth grade.
The Careys began attending Our Lady soon after the onset of the COVID pandemic. Tensions with the pastor of their former church over its masking policy were the tipping point. But they had felt for years that âGod was calling [them] somewhere else.â
One thing they appreciated immediately about Our Lady of Good Hope was that the priest didnât ask congregants to do the sign of peaceâi.e., take a moment to greet each other with a handshake or friendly nodâduring Mass. For the Careys, the sign of peace detracts from the sense of awe and reverence that should define the service.
They believe the liturgy should create a space and time clearly set apart from the world. The style they prefer, called the Latin Mass, is defined by not only the use of Latin but by greater formality in general. For example, it features elaborate vestments on the clergy and choral singing (versus congregational singing). Modern liturgical styles are too âProtestant,â they believe, meaning too concerned with accessibility rather than focusing on worship.
âAs Catholics, no matter what church weâre going to, weâre searching for the truth,â says Randy. âIn the Latin Mass, it just seems like there are more truths being toldâor shown.â
This liturgy appeals to their children because âitâs comforting for them to go into church and be almost in another dimension. Because itâs so different from the outside world,â Nicole says. âItâs a place of peace and quiet.â
In 2007, Pope Benedict XVI lifted the Churchâs restriction on the number of churches in a diocese that can offer the Latin Mass without permission from the Vatican and their bishop. Pope Francis restored the restriction in 2021.
A 2021 Pew poll found that 65 percent of U.S. Catholics had heard ânothing at allâ about Pope Francisâ decision to restrict the Latin Mass. The Catholics who attended Mass at least weekly were most aware of it. Within that group, 29 percent opposed the restrictionâversus only 12 percent of all US Catholics. There was also a sharp political divide, with 20 percent of Republicans opposing it versus only 6 percent of Democrats.
Sorting by Liturgy
Our Lady doesnât offer a full Latin Mass, but it has a reputation as the most conservative Catholic church in Fort Wayne. Its pastor, Father Royce Gregerson, age 37, incorporates some elements of the Latin Massâlike heavy use of incenseâduring the early Sunday service.
Our Lady was founded in 1969 as a daughter church of St. Charles Catholic Church, which was founded in 1953. Together, the two churches symbolize the rapid suburbanization of American cities after World War II. St. Charles is about five miles northeast of downtown Fort Wayne, and Our Lady is about three miles north of St. Charles. About 1,200 people (in total) attend its three weekend Masses.
Just as Most Precious Blood was built to serve the influx of European immigrants to Fort Wayneâs urban core around the turn of the twentieth century, Our Lady was built to serve migrants to the towns and suburbs north of the city in the centuryâs later decades. Those suburbs are among the most Republican parts of a very Republican county. Donald Trump won about 55 percent of Allen Countyâs vote in both 2020 and 2024.
A key difference from the earlier era is that, with the spread of interstates and suburbs in the later twentieth century, parish boundaries lost most of their meaning. Most Precious Blood, built near Fort Wayneâs center, was very much a neighborhood church in the early twentieth century, and it remains so to some extent. Jim Didier, for example, lives within the parish boundaries.
By contrast, the Careys drive about 20 minutes each wayâpast several other optionsâto attend Our Lady. And thatâs typical among the churchâs members. Fr. Gregerson says that sorting by liturgical preference began to accelerate in the mid-2010s, driven in large part by Catholic media focusing on Pope Benedict lifting the restriction on the Latin Mass in 2007.
The Careys also regularly drive to a parish with a full Latin Mass located on Fort Wayneâs south side, even farther from their home than Our Lady. The familyâs regular trek to the opposite side of town teaches children that âMass is a sacrifice, not a convenience.â Nicole says, âWe have a parish just five minutes down the road thatâs convenient. But we donât want to [prioritize] convenience.â
Within the laity, the preference for traditional worship styles is made visible by the rising number of female worshippers who âveilââi.e., wear a head covering, usually made of silk or laceâat Mass. The practice fell out of fashion after Vatican II but has been revived by younger Catholic women. One veil-maker told The Free Press that orders have spiked over the past decade, from about 60 a month to an average of 900 per month.
âWhen I step into church, I put my veil on, and that brings me to a prayerful mindset,â says Ashley Morse, who attends St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Fort Wayne. Her four-year-old daughter also veils, along with about 10 percent of the women in the congregation (by Morseâs estimate). âThe way it drapesâit almost has blinders on it, so that your focus is on one thing, looking up at the tabernacle and the altar and being present.â
A Smaller But Politically Mighty Church
In an interview published in 1997, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who became Pope Benedict in 2005, said that the Church might be entering an era where it âwill again be characterized more by the mustard seed, where it will exist in small, seemingly insignificant groups that nonetheless live in an intense struggle against evil and bring good into the worldâthat let God in.â
Pope Benedict wrote about this idea often. Called âthe Benedict option,â it is popular among Catholics who believe that the hard truths and ancient rituals of traditional Catholicism might well lead to a smaller Churchâand that this price is well worth paying. If the Church stays true to its calling, after all, secularized Westerners might eventually rediscover Christianity âas the answer they have always been looking for,â Pope Benedict once wrote.
A paradox of the purifying trend within the Church is that, even as the number of people in the pews has declined, the Churchâs political influence has increased. The GOP, at least, has found in the Church the answer it had been looking for.
The anchor of President Donald Trumpâs winning coalitions was an alliance of Catholics and evangelicals. He won 52 percent of Catholicsâ votes (and about 80 percent of the evangelical vote) in 2016. Trump and President Joe Biden (a Catholic) split their vote almost evenly in 2020, 50 percent versus 49 percent, respectively.
But in 2024, Trumpâs margin among Catholics spiked to 18 percent: He won 58 percent of their vote to Vice President Kamala Harrisâ 40 percent. That outcome accelerated a decades-long shift among Catholic voters, who were a bedrock of the Democratsâ New Deal coalition in the 1930s and its civil rights coalition in the 1960s. Since abortion became a central issue in U.S. politics in the 1980s, however, the Catholic vote has moved steadily toward the GOP.
It is telling, for example, that Donald Trumpâs vice president, J.D. Vance, converted to Catholicism in 2019. Vance once explained that one thing he likes about Catholicism is that it is âjust really old.â His politics are infused with a deeply anti-modern, traditionalist Catholicism. The same is true of some current U.S. Supreme Court members. Six of the nine justices are practicing Catholics, including Chief Justice John Roberts and the Courtâs two most right-wing members, Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas.
Immigration Is Not a "Minor Issue"
The future of the Catholic Church in the United States is an open question. One possibility is that it will continue becoming a smaller, more conservative institution with immense political influence. That path seems likely from the current perspective. But in the mid-1960s, when many young people felt liberated by Vatican IIâs reforms, more openness and liberalism seemed like the Churchâs certain future. The plot has taken a very different twist.
The ongoing impact of immigration is a great unknown. Donald Trump made it central to his presidential campaign in 2024, and his victory confirmed its power to shape public opinion and motivate voters. But it can cut both ways. Like Most Precious Blood, many of the parishes in urban centers were built to serve immigrant communities. And Church thinkers have produced a long, distinguished history of social teachings around welcoming strangers, caring for the poor, and preferring âthe least of these.â So immigration could hardly be more central to the Churchâs history and identity.
Abortion has eclipsed teachings about the poor among the most influential Catholics in recent U.S. politics. And those voices have driven the shift among Catholics toward the Republican Party. But, historically, the Churchâs teachings about the dispossessed have also had a transformative power.
Fr. Gregerson is a case in point. He served in a largely Hispanic parishâSt. John the Evangelist in nearby Goshen, Indianaâfor about seven years before coming to Our Lady. A majority of St. Johnâs adult parishioners were undocumented immigrants. Our Ladyâs relatively affluent, mostly white congregation is a world apart from St. John, where âit always felt like [they] were in an existential battle for survival.â
Fr. Gregerson is a social conservative, but becoming friends withâand being pastor toâscores of immigrants âmade [him] think very differentlyâ about that issue. He now identifies as center-left on immigration.
Even so, when he came to Our Lady in the summer of 2024âat a moment when immigration was a defining issue in political debatesâhe âtotally ignored it.â He was too new to have earned peopleâs trust and to be able to share what the Church teaches on the subject. âWeâre going to talk about this, but we canât do so now.â
Yet some Catholics have pushed back on the Trump administrationâs policies and rhetoric. Most notably, in early February 2025, Pope Francis wrote a letter to the U.S. bishops in response to the âdelicate moment that you are living as Pastors of the People of God.â
In his letter, Pope Francis noted that he was following closely âthe major crisis that is taking placeâ in the United States regarding immigration policy. âThis is not a minor issue: an authentic rule of law is verified precisely in the dignified treatment that all people deserve, especially the poorest and most marginalized. The true common good is promoted when society and government, with creativity and strict respect for the rights of all . . . welcomes, protects, promotes and integrates the most fragile, unprotected and vulnerable.â
Destination Unknown
Immigration looks to be a major issue globally for the foreseeable future, and the focus on it might plant the seeds of a progressive resurgence rooted in the Churchâs social teachings. But it is far too soon to know how it will play out. Fifty years ago, after all, abortion barely registered as a political issue among evangelicals. Yet it would soon be the defining issue of the conservative evangelical/Catholic alliance that has reshaped American politics for more than four decades.
What is clear for the moment is that in liberal-leaning congregations, parishioners are likely to hear some variation on Pope Francisâ plea for the Church to extend love and âdignified treatmentâ to all people. Meanwhile, parishioners in conservative congregations are more likely to hear about the dignity of life as summed up in the abortion issue.
The divide isnât just about what is explicitly said. Itâs about what isnât saidâand, often, itâs also about the churchâs liturgical practices.
Trying to bridge these divides and silences can seem nearly futile. Jim Didier, for example, says that when he gets together with his (mostly conservative) family, âthereâs not a lot of discussionâ of flashpoint social issues. âWe just stay away from it. Youâre entitled to your opinion. I understand you have a story, and thereâs a reason why you got where you are. So we pretty much just treat each other with kindness and leave the politics and religion out of it.â
If the past is any guide, the Churchâs future will depend in large part on how, and if, these silences and differences are overcome. The post-Vatican II decades have mostly been a story of rising traditionalism and widening divides over liturgy and politics. What plot twists are comingâand how will they reshape the ChurchâGod only knows.
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