Tag: Gen X

The Illusion of Liberation: Ethical Non-Monogamy and the Tragedy of the Human Heart

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Behind the mask of fleeting pleasure lies emptiness; only in the embrace of God as Father does the human heart find security and joy.

Lifestyle journalism increasingly celebrates what it calls “ethical non-monogamy.” Readers are invited into the worlds of open marriages, threesomes, swinging, and even boasts of encounters with hundreds of partners. Such practices are presented as adventurous, authentic, and even virtuous when cloaked with the language of “consent” and “honesty.”¹

Yet the sadness beneath these glossy confessions is unmistakable. The very need to insist upon “ethics” reveals the unease of those trying to sanctify what conscience knows to be disordered.² The endless “rules” of aftercare, negotiation, and constant reassurance betray not freedom but fragility. In place of security there is anxiety: fear of being replaced, fear of being less desired, fear of being left outside the circle of intimacy.³

The Fathers of the Church understood this restlessness well. St Augustine admitted in his Confessions: *“Our heart is restless until it rests in Thee.”*⁴ St John Chrysostom warned against marriage reduced to passion alone, for it debases the dignity of both spouses.⁵ And Pope Pius XI, in Casti Connubii, taught that the true purpose of matrimony is the union and mutual perfection of husband and wife, a purpose impossible in transient liaisons.⁶

Modern psychology, too, bears witness to the wounds concealed beneath the rhetoric of liberation. Studies of “consensual non-monogamy” often report higher levels of jealousy and lower relationship satisfaction compared with faithful marriages.⁷ Relationship counsellors frequently note the unequal burdens carried by so-called “unicorns” (single women invited into couples’ encounters), who often feel objectified or disposable.⁸ Clinical psychologists have highlighted the correlation between compulsive sexual novelty-seeking and underlying issues of anxiety, attachment insecurity, or trauma.⁹ What is proclaimed as exploration is often, in reality, an attempt to numb wounds or to chase validation through endless repetition.

Even those who champion these lifestyles sometimes confess the emptiness. Many speak of the need for “aftercare,” long debriefs, or even counselling following encounters. This very vocabulary suggests not fulfilment, but recovery from an ordeal. The human heart craves intimacy, not performances; belonging, not variety. The psychologist Viktor Frankl observed that man cannot be satisfied by pleasure alone, but only by meaning and purpose.¹⁰ Where the search for meaning is absent, pleasure becomes compulsive and hollow.

The tragedy is not only personal but social. Children raised in homes where relationships shift and partners come and go may adapt outwardly, but often carry deep insecurity within. Developmental psychologists consistently observe that children thrive best in environments marked by stability and predictability.¹¹ Attachment theory, pioneered by John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth, demonstrates that secure bonds are formed when children experience consistent love and reliability.¹² When the family unit becomes fluid, with parental figures changing or introducing new partners, children may internalise the message that love is provisional and conditional.¹³

Clinical counsellors report that such children are more prone to anxiety, behavioural difficulties, and trust issues later in life, often struggling to form lasting relationships of their own.¹⁴ Adults may normalize instability as “flexibility,” yet for children, each new partner can feel like a quiet displacement, reinforcing the fear of not being truly chosen or secure.¹⁵ What society lauds as open-minded honesty, children often experience as uncertainty and confusion—an erosion of the very foundation upon which their identity and confidence are built. A culture that applauds such patterns undermines the bedrock of stability that allows not only trust and love to flourish, but also the healthy psychological development of the next generation.¹⁶

For Christians, the deepest tragedy lies in the distortion of what God created as holy. Man and woman, made in His image, are called to become His children.¹⁷ Sexual intimacy, ordered rightly, is meant to be a sign of God’s own fidelity—faithful, fruitful, exclusive, and life-giving. To scatter that sign in novelty and experimentation is to abuse the image of God within us. It is not freedom, but a travesty of love.

The Church does not gaze upon these lives with contempt but with compassion. She recognises the deep yearning that lies behind such stories: the hunger to be loved, to be seen, to be secure. These are not wrong desires, but misplaced ones. True liberation is not found in multiplying encounters, but in discovering the One in whom love is perfected. Christ offers what no encounter, no thrill, no experiment can ever grant: the adoption as sons and daughters of God, heirs to joy everlasting.¹⁸

To pity rather than condemn is to recognise the sadness behind the spectacle, the insecurity behind the bravado, the brokenness behind the smile. Only in God can the heart be healed, intimacy be secured, and love be made whole.

  1. Alice Garnett, “How threesomes and swinging went mainstream (and the rules to follow),” Telegraph, 3 Dec 2024; Carla Crivaro, “I’ve slept with nine men and one woman since my marriage break-up,” Telegraph, 8 Sept 2025.
  2. St Paul, Romans 2:15: “They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts.”
  3. Moors, A. C., & Schechinger, H. A., “Consentual Non-Monogamy: Attitudes, Desire, and Practice,” Current Opinion in Psychology 35 (2020): 76–80.
  4. Augustine, Confessions, I.1.
  5. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Colossians XII.
  6. Pius XI, Casti Connubii (1930), §23.
  7. Conley, T. D., et al., “The Fewer the Merrier? Assessing Stigma Surrounding Consensually Non-monogamous Romantic Relationships,” Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy 13, no. 1 (2013): 1–30.
  8. Weitzman, G., “Therapy with Clients in Open Relationships,” Journal of Bisexuality 6, no. 1–2 (2006): 137–164.
  9. Grubbs, J. B., et al., “Self-reported compulsive sexual behavior: A meta-analysis of prevalence and correlates,” Journal of Behavioral Addictions 9, no. 3 (2020): 701–716.
  10. Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning (Boston: Beacon Press, 2006), 115–118.
  11. Amato, P. R., “The impact of family formation change on the cognitive, social, and emotional well-being of the next generation,” Future of Children 15, no. 2 (2005): 75–96.
  12. John Bowlby, Attachment and Loss: Vol. 1. Attachment (New York: Basic Books, 1969); Mary Ainsworth, Patterns of Attachment (Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 1978).
  13. Osborne, C., & McLanahan, S., “Partnership instability and child well-being,” Journal of Marriage and Family 69, no. 4 (2007): 1065–1083.
  14. Cummings, E. M., & Davies, P. T., Children and Marital Conflict: The Impact of Family Dispute and Resolution (New York: Guilford Press, 2010).
  15. Hetherington, E. M., & Kelly, J., For Better or For Worse: Divorce Reconsidered (New York: Norton, 2002).
  16. Amato, P. R., “Research on divorce: Continuing trends and new developments,” Journal of Marriage and Family 72, no. 3 (2010): 650–666.
  17. Genesis 1:27; 1 John 3:1.
  18. Galatians 4:7; Romans 8:15–17.

The Priest’s Prayers at the Ablution of the Chalice: A School of Reverence, a School of the Soul

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The manner in which the priest purifies the chalice after Holy Communion in the traditional Roman Rite is no trifling detail, but a school of reverence and a daily examen of conscience. In the older form, the ablutions are solemn, careful, and doubled: the chalice is first washed with wine alone; then the thumb and forefinger that touched the Body of Christ are purified with wine and water. These actions are not performed in silence or haste but are accompanied by profound prayers, whispered by the celebrant as he consumes the ablutions.

In the modern rite, by contrast, the ablutions have been reduced to the level of functional housekeeping. The prayers are gone. The gestures are abbreviated, often postponed until after Mass, sometimes delegated to a deacon or acolyte. The priest may rinse a chalice as he chats with servers, as though dealing with ordinary tableware. And yet, at this very moment, he has just touched the Holy of Holies. What once was a moment of trembling compunction has been stripped of its meaning. The chalice is clean, but the soul of the celebrant may remain untouched. This is no minor alteration: it is emblematic of the desacralisation of the priesthood itself.

The First Ablution: A Dialogue with God
After Communion, the priest pours wine into the chalice and consumes it, praying: Quod ore sumpsimus, Domine, pura mente capiamus: et de munere temporali fiat nobis remedium sempiternum — “Grant, O Lord, that what we have taken with our mouth we may receive with a pure mind, and that from a temporal gift it may become for us an eternal remedy.”¹

This prayer is brief, but it pierces the conscience. The priest acknowledges that the Sacrament he has dared to consume is no mere food but a remedy against eternal death. He has touched Christ; he must beg that this not turn to his condemnation, but to his healing. Adrian Crogan, in his Liturgical Commentary on the Mass, explains that these hidden prayers of the priest are “an intimate dialogue with God, hidden from the congregation, which safeguards the reality of the Presence in every particle and deepens the priest’s own assimilation of the mystery.”² Even in purifying the chalice, the priest is being purified.

The Second Ablution: A Fire that Clings
The rite continues. The priest purifies the thumb and forefinger with wine and then water, saying: Corpus tuum, Domine, quod sumpsi, et Sanguis quem potavi, adhaereat visceribus meis: et praesta; ut in me non remaneat scelerum macula, quem pura et sancta refecerunt sacramenta — “May Thy Body, O Lord, which I have received, and Thy Blood which I have drunk, cleave to my inmost being; and grant that no stain of sin may remain in me, whom these pure and holy Sacraments have refreshed.”³

The prayer does not deny the cleansing power of the Sacrament, for by Holy Communion the priest has been touched and sanctified in both soul and body. In an incarnational sense, he has been made whole: the divine Food heals, elevates, and divinises. And yet, the priest acknowledges that the mystery of sin is not simply a matter of external acts, but of internal dispositions. Sin lurks most insidiously in the heart — in the tangled motivations of pride, vainglory, or negligence. He has received Christ, yes; but has he received Him with singleness of purpose? Has he offered the Sacrifice for the glory of God, or with self in view?

Peter Chaignon, SJ, in his The Sacrifice of the Mass Worthily Celebrated, warned that “every rite, every prayer is given to you that you may sanctify yourself even as you handle the Holy.”⁴ The ablutions are thus a merciful trap: the priest cannot pass them without being forced to ask whether his motives are pure.

Doctrine Confirmed by Miracle
The De defectibus in the Missal insists that every fragment, however small, must be treated with utmost care, for Christ whole and entire is present in every particle of the Host.⁵ The Eucharistic Miracle of Lanciano confirmed this doctrine. In the eighth century, the consecrated wine coagulated into five globules of blood, unequal in size yet equal in weight whether weighed singly or together.⁶ Later forensic study confirmed the Flesh as myocardium and the Blood as human type AB, remarkably preserved across twelve centuries.⁷ Laurence Hemming has argued that Catholic worship is “tangible theology, a live epiphany of God’s self-disclosure.”⁸ The miracle of Lanciano was precisely such an epiphany. The ablution prayers are another: outward acts that disclose divine truth.

The Fathers: Medicine, Fire, Transformation
The Fathers proclaimed the same truths. St Ignatius of Antioch called the Eucharist “the medicine of immortality.”⁹ St Augustine declared that unlike ordinary food, which the body assimilates, in the Eucharist it is we who are assimilated to God.¹⁰ St John Chrysostom urged that those who receive the Body of Christ should go forth “like lions breathing fire.”¹¹ The ablution prayers, whispered at the altar, echo these patristic themes. The priest begs that the medicine truly heal, that the fire truly burn, that the transformation be real.

For the Modern Celebrant: A Severe Admonition
The absence of these prayers in the reformed liturgy has had grave consequences. The chalice is rinsed, but the conscience is unexamined. The vessels are set aside, but the heart may remain unpurified. No prayer compels the modern celebrant to ask whether he has celebrated for the glory of God alone, or with pride, routine, or self-interest.

The Fathers would not have been silent. Chrysostom warned: “If anyone unworthily draw near, he perishes.”¹² Ambrose declared that the impure celebrant “draws down not grace but judgment upon himself.”¹³ Durandus explained that the washing of fingers signified the need for purity of intention.¹⁴ Aquinas taught that although the sacrament itself cannot be corrupted by the minister’s unworthiness, it may bring his condemnation.¹⁵ The Council of Trent confirmed this with anathema: “If anyone says that it is not necessary for one receiving the holy Eucharist to confess his sins beforehand when he is conscious of mortal sin… let him be anathema.”¹⁶

Here, then, is the tragedy: priests today who treat the Host as though it were a wafer, who neglect to genuflect, who chat idly while purifying vessels, who tolerate sacrilege in Communion lines. The chalice may be polished, but their motives remain tarnished. The outward act may be tidy, but the inward reality is neglected.

If the modern celebrant would recover reverence, he must recover these prayers — not as antiquarian curiosities, but as the medicine of his soul. For it is not the rinsing of chalices that saves, but the cleansing of the heart; not the outward order of vessels, but the inward ordering of love. Without them, the priest risks standing at the altar with vessels purified but heart defiled, lips sanctified but motives corrupt. And what then has he gained? Only this: to have touched the Fire of God, and to have let it pass him by unheeded.

Footnotes

  1. Missale Romanum (1962), Orationes post Communionem.
  2. Adrian Crogan, The Mass: A Liturgical Commentary (London, 1948), p. 219.
  3. Missale Romanum (1962), ibid.
  4. Peter Chaignon, SJ, The Sacrifice of the Mass Worthily Celebrated (Paris, 1859), p. 143.
  5. De defectibus in celebratione Missae, X.5.
  6. Inscription, Church of St Francis, Lanciano, 1574 investigation.
  7. Odoardo Linoli, Quaderni Sclavo di Diagnostica Clinica e di Laboratori (1971).
  8. Laurence Hemming, Worship as Revelation (London: T&T Clark, 2008), p. 67.
  9. St Ignatius of Antioch, Epistula ad Ephesios 20.
  10. St Augustine, Confessiones VII.10.
  11. St John Chrysostom, Homiliae in Matthaeum 82.5.
  12. Ibid.
  13. St Ambrose, De Sacramentis IV.4.
  14. William Durandus, Rationale Divinorum Officiorum IV.54.
  15. St Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q. 82, a. 5.
  16. Council of Trent, Session XIII, Canon 11 (Denzinger 1661).

Flags and Ironies: National Identity, Ideological Symbols, and the Battle for Public Space

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The United Kingdom today finds itself in a paradoxical struggle over symbols. The Pride Progress flag, widely promoted as an emblem of inclusivity, has been adopted by councils, schools, and even police forces, while the Cross of St George and the Union Flag—historic banners of national unity—are increasingly treated with suspicion. The irony is stark: national flags are the rightful and legally protected emblems of shared belonging, yet they are sidelined, while a partisan movement flag is raised in their place.

Civic Neutrality and the Law

In Smith v Chief Constable of Northumbria Police [2025] EWHC 1805 (Admin), the High Court ruled that Northumbria Police acted unlawfully by marching in uniform at Newcastle Pride 2024 while displaying the Progress Pride flag. The judgment concluded that this was not a neutral act of civic engagement but a partisan endorsement of a politically contested ideology.¹ The ruling is a landmark: it confirms that public authorities must maintain impartiality and refrain from appearing to endorse controversial causes, echoing the long-standing prohibitions of the Local Government Act 1986.

A Movement to Reclaim the Flags

Amid this debate, the grassroots campaign Operation Raise the Colours has sought to normalise the everyday display of the Cross of St George and the Union Flag from homes, businesses, and civic spaces. Its aim is straightforward: to restore the ordinary, unifying presence of national flags in daily life, free from the unfair stigma of extremism or xenophobia with which they have been associated. It is, at heart, about reclaiming our flags. Yet it is a sad commentary on our times that cynicism and bigotry so often obscure this purpose. Critics denounce the campaign as divisive, even while unthinkingly cheering the same national colours at sporting events.²

Controversies Over the Pride Flag

By contrast, public enthusiasm for the Pride Progress flag has embroiled councils and institutions in bitter disputes:

  • In Matlock, Derbyshire, a Pride flag was removed after Christian complaints, only to be reinstalled by order of the town council.³
  • Warwickshire County Council witnessed internal conflict when its Reform UK leadership ordered Pride flags down, but the chief executive insisted such decisions were administrative, not political.⁴
  • The county’s planning authority went further, noting that the Pride Progress flag requires advertising consent to be lawfully displayed, unlike national flags.⁵
  • In Camden, a judicial review challenge has been launched against a transgender-coloured road crossing, with the claimant arguing that local authorities must not promote partisan causes under the 1986 Act.⁶

These incidents underscore the ideological preference given to movement banners over the neutral emblems of civic identity.

The Double Standard

Government guidance makes plain that national flags—including the Union Flag and St George’s Cross—are legally privileged: they do not require planning consent and enjoy protected status.⁷ Yet national banners are often criticised as “provocative” or “exclusionary.” A Reuters report on Operation Raise the Colours suggested that widespread flag-flying might embolden far-right groups, casting suspicion on what was once the ordinary language of civic unity.⁸

This double standard reveals a deeper malaise in public life. National flags have historically served as rallying points in times of joy and grief alike, whether at coronations, jubilees, or memorials. They speak not of one party, ideology, or faction, but of a people bound together in a shared story. To stigmatise them while championing movement flags is to turn reality on its head: it is to call “inclusive” what is divisive, and to call “divisive” what is unifying. The result is cultural disorientation, where loyalty to nation and heritage is mistrusted, while allegiance to fluid and transient causes is celebrated.

The irony becomes sharper when one recalls that even the Pride Progress flag itself is not stable but constantly altered to reflect the ever-shifting politics of identity. By contrast, the Cross of St George and the Union Flag remain fixed symbols, transcending ephemeral trends. The selective suspicion directed against them, then, is not about design or visibility but about the deeper rejection of national identity in favour of ideology.

Conclusion: The Banner of the Cross

The High Court has reminded public institutions that neutrality is a constitutional duty. Yet neutrality is persistently undermined by the preferential treatment of ideological symbols over national ones. The task of Operation Raise the Colours is, therefore, not merely aesthetic but civic and cultural: to reclaim the ordinary right of citizens to take pride in their flags without fear of stigma.

This is not only about patriotism but about principle. If public space is surrendered to partisan banners, the state itself becomes captive to ideology. National flags stand for all citizens equally—believer and unbeliever, traditionalist and progressive, immigrant and native-born. The Progress flag, by contrast, stands only for those willing to assent to a contested worldview. To elevate it above the Union Flag or the Cross of St George is not inclusivity—it is exclusion.

For Christians, the deeper lesson is clear. The Cross, borne on the banner of St George, is the truest and most universal standard of unity, for it signifies not transient politics but eternal salvation. Scripture itself declares: “Vexilla Regis prodeunt”—“the banners of the King go forth.”⁹ St Augustine contrasted the two cities: the City of Man, marked by pride and self-assertion, and the City of God, gathered under the standard of the Cross.¹⁰ And Pope Pius XI, in Quas Primas, reminded the world that “nations will be reminded by the annual celebration of this feast that rulers and princes are bound to give public honour and obedience to Christ.”¹¹

To reclaim our national flags, then, is more than an act of civic assertion; it is a reminder that no people can endure without symbols of common belonging, and that the highest of these is the banner of the Crucified King. To despise that heritage while enthroning ideological emblems is not only civic folly but spiritual blindness. True unity will not be found beneath the shifting colours of identity politics, but beneath the immovable standard of the Cross. For in Christ, patriotism is purified of faction, and love of country becomes an act of justice: pro patria et pro Deo, for country and for God, in whom all citizens may rediscover their common home and higher unity.

  1. Smith v Chief Constable of Northumbria Police [2025] EWHC 1805 (Admin); The Guardian, “Uniformed police officers were wrong to march in Pride event, high court rules,” 16 July 2025.
  2. The Sun, “Reform councils ban LGBT Pride flags from flying on council buildings,” 17 July 2025.
  3. The Guardian, “Dismay as council removes Pride flag in Derbyshire after Christians complain,” 19 June 2025.
  4. Local Government Lawyer, “Warwickshire chief exec defies Reform council leader’s request to remove Pride flag,” 21 June 2025.
  5. Local Government Lawyer, “Flying Pride flag needs advertising consent, says planning authority in Warwickshire row,” 21 June 2025.
  6. Local Government Lawyer, “London borough facing judicial review threat over road crossing painted in colours of Transgender Pride flag,” 24 June 2025.
  7. UK Government, Flying Flags: A Plain English Guide (updated 2023).
  8. Reuters, “England flags spark pride and concern amid anti-immigration protests,” 27 August 2025.
  9. Hymn of Venantius Fortunatus, Vexilla Regis prodeunt (6th century).
  10. St Augustine, De Civitate Dei, Book XIV.
  11. Pius XI, Quas Primas (1925), §32.

Gen Z and the Latin Mass: Beauty, Statistics, and a Quiet Revival

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In recent months, secular media outlets that once predicted Christianity’s decline have begun to notice a different story. Fox News reported a “major resurgence among Gen Z,” the New York Post spoke of conversions “en masse,” and CNN launched a podcast entitled “Catholicism Is So Hot Right Now. Why?” The shift suggests that a quiet revival may be underway, though its depth remains uncertain.

Statistical Signals
New data have helped fuel this narrative. Pew Research reported in February 2025 that the decline of Christianity in the United States had slowed and may have stabilised. The Harvard Cooperative Election Study showed an increase in Gen Z Americans identifying as Catholic, rising from 15 percent in 2022 to 21 percent in 2023. In Britain, the Bible Society reported that 41 percent of Gen Z now identify as Catholic, compared to 20 percent as Anglican.

While striking, these statistics measure identification more than conversion, and cannot by themselves prove fidelity to Catholic teaching or sacramental life.

The Attraction of the Latin Mass
A key feature of this revival is the attraction of youth to the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM). Codified by Pope Pius V in 1570 and eclipsed after 1969 by the Novus Ordo Missae, the old rite has experienced remarkable growth.

The annual Chartres pilgrimage, centred on the TLM, drew 19,000 participants in 2025, with an average age of 20 and thousands placed on waiting lists. Traditional parishes, especially those served by the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter (FSSP) and similar institutes, have reported congregations doubling in size, with young adults and families leading the way.

The attraction lies in the ritual stability, silence, Gregorian chant, and eastward orientation of priest and faithful. These elements embody transcendence and permanence in a world marked by fragmentation and chaos.

Beauty as Evangelical Power
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger observed that beauty is not a superficial adornment but a piercing truth that “wounds man and opens his eyes.”¹ Romano Guardini, whose thought shaped much of the modern liturgical movement, emphasised that liturgy is not mere ceremony but the engagement of the whole person in worship.²

Dr. Peter Kwasniewski has underlined that the qualities which modern critics dismiss—length, silence, formality—are precisely those that form souls, offering “time for the mysteries to be absorbed.”³ For a generation immersed in digital noise, such contemplative worship offers healing and depth.

A Question of Depth: Gen Z Morality
Yet the decisive question remains: does this attraction to traditional liturgy correspond to conversion of life? Survey evidence is mixed.

  • Abortion and Assisted Suicide: In the United States, 65 percent of Gen Z men and 71 percent of Gen Z women support legal abortion.⁴ In the UK, nearly one-third of Gen Z respondents considered suicide “justifiable.”⁵
  • Honesty: Only 34 percent of Gen Z strongly agree that lying is immoral, compared with 61 percent of the oldest generation.⁶
  • Marriage and Modesty: 67 percent of Gen Z are indifferent to premarital cohabitation, and fewer than 40 percent affirm marriage as lifelong between one man and one woman.⁷
  • Family and Integrity: Family remains a strong personal value, often alongside honesty, but usually framed individualistically rather than sacramentally.⁸

The evidence suggests that while Gen Z is drawn to the beauty of Catholic worship, many remain shaped by secular relativism. Without catechesis, sacramental confession, and formation in moral truth, this attraction risks remaining at the level of aesthetics rather than maturing into conviction.

The Peril of Marginalisation
There is further danger in the ecclesial context. Traditional communities are often treated with suspicion by the mainstream hierarchy, restricted or marginalised under modernist policies. A Church controlled by bureaucratic hostility to tradition cannot hope to form a generation capable of resisting the world’s pressures. Communities reduced to mere enclaves, tolerated at best, are unlikely to engender the holiness and conviction necessary to withstand persecution or cultural collapse.

The lesson of history confirms this. During the English penal times, Catholics worshipped secretly in domestic chapels and barns, preserving not only the old Mass but the full moral vision of the faith. During the French Revolution, priests risked their lives to offer the sacraments in forests and private homes. In both cases, fidelity required more than aesthetic preference: it demanded conversion, sacrifice, and courage.

The Old Roman Apostolate (ORA) stands in this tradition. Born of the Catholic resistance to modernism, it has preserved both the traditional liturgy and the fullness of Catholic doctrine through decades of hostility. Like the underground priests of penal England or revolutionary France, the ORA insists that beauty without truth cannot save; only fidelity to the perennial magisterium can produce saints.

Conclusion: Beauty Must Lead to Conversion
The attraction of Gen Z to the Latin Mass is a hopeful sign. It reveals a generation longing for transcendence, permanence, and beauty. But beauty alone is insufficient. Cardinal Ratzinger reminded us: “The true apology of Christian faith … are the saints, and the beauty that the faith has generated.”⁹

To move from aesthetic attraction to authentic conversion, the Church must provide more than permission for isolated enclaves. It must preach moral truth, provide sacramental confession, restore ascetic discipline, and resist the corrosive influence of modernism. Only then will today’s “quiet revival” become a true restoration of Catholic faith—producing not cultural tourists, but saints.

The Old Roman Apostolate: Continuity Amidst Persecution

The attraction of Gen Z to the Traditional Latin Mass cannot be understood in isolation from the broader history of Catholic fidelity under persecution. In every age, when the dominant ecclesial or political powers sought to suppress the fullness of Catholic tradition, it has been small, marginalised communities that preserved both liturgy and doctrine intact.

Historical Parallels

  • Penal Times in England: Catholics deprived of churches maintained the Mass in manor houses, barns, and secret chapels. These gatherings were not social clubs but lifelines of grace, uniting fidelity to the ancient liturgy with courage to endure fines, imprisonment, or martyrdom.
  • The French Revolution: Priests risked execution to celebrate Mass clandestinely in forests or private homes. Here again, the faith survived not through accommodation but through heroic perseverance.
  • The Communist Era: In Eastern Europe, underground churches and hidden seminaries trained priests, preserving the sacraments against relentless hostility.

In every case, survival demanded more than aesthetic attachment. Fidelity to the Mass was inseparable from fidelity to Catholic moral truth, even at great personal cost.

The Witness of the Old Roman Apostolate
The Old Roman Apostolate (ORA) stands in this same line of witness. Originating in the rejection of modernist innovations, it preserved both the Traditional Latin Mass and the perennial magisterium through decades of marginalisation and misunderstanding.

Like the recusants of England or the confessors of Revolutionary France, Old Roman clergy and laity have endured the suspicion of mainstream ecclesiastical authorities while maintaining sacramental life with reverence, discipline, and doctrinal clarity.

The ORA insists that the liturgy cannot be severed from the fullness of Catholic moral teaching. It is not enough to be drawn by incense, chant, or solemnity; beauty must form souls for fidelity, for the daily carrying of the Cross, and for resistance to the spirit of the age. As the Apostolate has repeatedly emphasised, sacraments celebrated in continuity with tradition are efficacious only when accompanied by conversion of life.

A Model for Gen Z
For Gen Z Catholics newly discovering the TLM, the history and witness of the Old Roman Apostolate offers a model. The ORA shows that beauty and truth must be safeguarded together, that tradition without moral courage degenerates into aesthetics, and that authentic Catholic revival will always attract hostility from the world—and often from compromised churchmen.

The challenge is therefore clear: to ensure that the current “quiet revival” does not fade into cultural trendiness, but deepens into the kind of fidelity that produced martyrs, confessors, and saints. In this task, the ORA provides both example and encouragement: a living proof that amidst persecution, Catholic tradition endures.

  1. Joseph Ratzinger, The Feeling of Things, the Contemplation of Beauty (Rimini Meeting, 2002).
  2. Romano Guardini, The Spirit of the Liturgy (1923).
  3. Peter Kwasniewski, Reclaiming Our Roman Catholic Birthright (Arouca Press, 2020).
  4. Pew Research Center, “Public Opinion on Abortion” (2022).
  5. King’s College London, “UK now among most socially liberal of countries” (2021).
  6. Barna Group, The Gen Z Morality Report (2018).
  7. Pew Research Center, “Marriage and Cohabitation in the U.S.” (2019).
  8. Global survey data, Generation Z Values (2019).
  9. Ratzinger, The Feeling of Things.

“Though Unworthy…”: The Placeat tibi and the Priest’s Examination

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It is a striking paradox that one of the most important prayers of the Roman Mass is never heard by the faithful. After the dismissal Ite, missa est and the final blessing, the celebrant bows low before the altar, hands joined, and silently whispers the words:

“Placeat tibi, sancta Trinitas, obsequium servitutis meae; et praesta ut sacrificium quod oculis tuae maiestatis indignus obtuli, tibi sit acceptabile; mihique et omnibus pro quibus illud obtuli, sit, te miserante, propitiabile. Per Christum Dominum nostrum. Amen.”

The very positioning of this prayer is itself a lesson. It comes after all is completed, after the visible work has been done, after the blessing has been imparted. The priest remains bowed in silence, as if to say: “I have done what was commanded; yet I am nothing. May it please Thee, O Holy Trinity.”

Here the Roman Rite exposes the heart of the Catholic doctrine of the priesthood and of sacrifice. What has been accomplished is objectively perfect, for it is Christ’s own Sacrifice made present upon the altar. But the minister is not perfect. He is unworthy. He has carried the chalice of salvation with trembling hands, and now he lays it down again, begging that the Trinity may accept the homage offered through him.

The hidden examen of the altar
The Placeat tibi functions as an unspoken examen for the priest. It confronts him with questions he dare not ignore:

  • Have I offered Mass for God’s glory, or have I sought my own?
  • Have I been solicitous for the salvation of souls, or careless, indifferent, distracted?
  • Have I remembered that I am an instrument in the hand of Christ, and not the centre of attention?

The Missale Romanum itself underscores this perspective in its decrees De defectibus, printed at the front of the book. The priest is reminded that defects of matter, form, or intention gravely compromise the Sacrifice. Thus, “If any of the necessary words are omitted, or changed into others of different meaning, the consecration does not take place” (De defectibus in consecratione verborum, V.20)¹. And further: “If the priest does not intend to consecrate but only to perform a kind of show, he does not consecrate. If, however, he thinks falsely that the Host already present before him is consecrated and for that reason does not intend to consecrate, he does not consecrate” (V.24)².

Even lesser defects are treated with gravity. For example, if the celebrant is not fasting, or is conscious of grave sin and dares to ascend the altar without confession, he sins mortally, even if the Mass itself is valid: “If anyone is a mortal sinner and dares to celebrate without confession, he sins mortally, yet he consecrates” (De defectibus in ministris, II.1)³.

The severity of these warnings is not clerical scrupulosity but priestly realism. The Placeat tibi is, in a sense, the subjective mirror of De defectibus: where the rubrics give objective law, the prayer gives interior humility. Even if all has been done correctly, the minister confesses: “Though unworthy, may my sacrifice be acceptable.”

The theology of propitiation
The key word of this prayer—propitiabile—is the word most absent from the postconciliar liturgy. The Council of Trent solemnly teaches that the Mass is a true propitiatory sacrifice, offered not only in praise and thanksgiving, but “for sins, punishments, satisfactions, and other necessities” of the living and the dead⁴. Here the priest acknowledges it directly: “Grant, O Trinity, that this sacrifice may be propitiatory for me and for those for whom I have offered it.”

What humility, and what comfort! Humility, for the priest admits that he, too, is in need of propitiation; comfort, because he knows that the Sacrifice he has offered is indeed sufficient for himself and for all. This is no empty self-examination, but a confession of faith in the propitiatory power of the Sacrifice of Calvary, renewed in an unbloody manner upon the altar.

A rebuke to modern liturgy
The disappearance of this prayer in the Novus Ordo is not accidental but symptomatic. It reflects the shift away from priestly humility, away from sacrificial language, away from propitiation. In its place we find a perfunctory dismissal—“Go forth, the Mass is ended”—which, while not false, lacks the depth of what came before. The priest is not invited to examine himself, nor to bow low before the Trinity, nor to beg mercy for himself and his flock.

The Roman Rite had preserved this final bow for nearly a millennium. It was the last safeguard against clerical presumption: you are not the master of this Sacrifice, you are its unworthy minister. Its suppression weakens the fabric of liturgical catechesis. Priests and people alike are deprived of that whispered lesson.

A lesson for every priest
Yet the prayer can still teach. Even priests who celebrate the reformed liturgy can adopt the Placeat tibi as a private examen. They may ask: Was my celebration today truly for God’s glory? Did I diminish myself so that Christ might increase? Or did I seek the approval of men?

The priest who takes the Placeat tibi to heart will never ascend the altar casually, nor depart it complacently. He will know that the Sacrifice is Christ’s, that his ministry is unworthy, and that mercy alone makes it fruitful. He will prepare with recollection, celebrate with reverence, and give thanks with humility.

Conclusion
The Roman Rite is wise to leave the Placeat tibi unspoken. Its silence teaches more than words could: the last word belongs not to the priest but to God. This prayer is the final bow of the servant who has done what was commanded. It is the whispered confession of unworthiness, the plea for mercy, the hope of propitiation.

If we priests allow this prayer to frame our approach to the altar, we will be saved from negligence, presumption, and pride. And if even those unfamiliar with the ancient liturgy take its lesson to heart, the celebration of every Mass will be deepened. For at the end of all things, after all our labours, one question remains: Has the sacrifice been offered for the glory of God, or for ourselves?

  1. Missale Romanum (1962), De defectibus in consecratione materiae et formae, V.20.
  2. Missale Romanum (1962), De defectibus in consecratione verborum, V.24.
  3. Missale Romanum (1962), De defectibus in ministris, II.1.
  4. Council of Trent, Session XXII, Canon 3; Denzinger-Hünermann 1753.
  5. St Augustine, On Baptism, Against the Donatists, Book III, ch. 10.
  6. Pius XII, Mediator Dei (1947), §§68–70.

The Rising Generation and the True Revival

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From Surveys to Sanctity: Britain’s Youth Called to Resist Idols and Embrace the Cross

Britain’s religious landscape, long marked by decline and indifference, may be entering a period of remarkable renewal. New data suggest a profound shift among the nation’s youth, whose openness to the Gospel is reshaping public assumptions about faith in a post-Christian society.

The statistics are striking. According to YouGov’s biannual tracker, belief in God among 18–24-year-olds has nearly tripled in just three and a half years—from 16% in August 2021 to 45% in January 2025¹. Monthly church attendance among UK adults has risen from 8% in 2018 to 12% in 2024², an increase that translates into nearly two million additional people. Bible sales, too, have doubled since 2019, rising from £2.69 million to £5.02 million in 2024³.

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The growth is not uniform. The Church of England continues to lose ground, its share of churchgoing Christians falling from 41% to 34% since 2018. By contrast, Catholic attendance has risen from 23% to 31%, and Pentecostal attendance from 4% to 10%⁴. Among young adults, Catholics now outnumber Anglicans two-to-one.

What explains this shift?

Fr Damian Feeney of Holy Trinity, Ettingshall, points to a “desire for structure, shape, and routine… and a renewal of interest in traditional, liturgical worship among young adults.” He notes that beauty in language, colour, music, and ceremony exerts a growing appeal at a time when “secularism seems too one-dimensional and beige”⁵. This accords with the Catholic understanding of the liturgy as fons et culmen—the source and summit of the Christian life, where divine truth is mediated through sacramental signs.

Emma Buchan of the Church of England’s Networks Support Team interprets the trend differently: young people are “not primarily returning for tradition, but for an encounter with Christ that is transformative,” she argues, citing initiatives like The Way UK, a digital evangelisation project with a significant social media following⁶.

Both perspectives highlight something undeniable: the younger generation is spiritually searching. More than half of 18–24-year-olds report engaging in some form of spiritual practice within the past six months, while nearly a third express curiosity about learning more about the Bible⁷.

Yet questions remain. Is this revival durable, or a fleeting response to post-lockdown instability, economic anxiety, and political disorientation? One young woman told GB News that her faith, fervent in adolescence, dissolved at university when “Christianity’s rules” came to feel like “chains.” Such stories caution against triumphalism.

The Catholic tradition recognises both the fragility and the hope inherent in such moments. St Augustine warned that “the human heart is restless until it rests in God”⁸, yet Our Lord also warned of seed that “fell upon stony ground” and withered for lack of depth⁹. Revival statistics must therefore be weighed against the deeper question: are souls being truly converted to Christ and His Church, or merely drawn to a temporary sense of meaning?

From a doctrinal perspective, the present moment underlines two truths. First, the insufficiency of secularism, which Pope Pius XI described as a “conspiracy of silence about the problems of human life” that leaves man adrift without God¹⁰. Second, the perennial truth that authentic renewal in the Church always springs from fidelity to Christ, the sacraments, and the perennial magisterium. As Pius XII warned, “If the Church were to accommodate herself to the fleeting forms of modern life… she would betray herself”¹¹.

The opportunity is immense. Britain’s youth, once thought irretrievably secularised, are turning in fresh numbers toward Christ. Whether through the appeal of tradition, the witness of digital evangelists, or the simple human hunger for stability and truth, many are rediscovering the faith that built their nation. But revival cannot be sustained by statistics alone. It requires authentic catechesis, sacramental life, and the bold proclamation of the Gospel “in season and out of season”¹².

As Bible sales climb, churches fill, and young men and women step once more into the life of grace, the task of the Church is clear: to ensure that this moment of curiosity becomes a generation of conviction.

Yet revival cannot remain superficial. Numbers in a survey do not sanctify. The true test is whether this rising generation will resist the idols of their age, as St Agapitus resisted the idols of Rome¹³.

Those idols are no longer stone statues, but they are no less real. The world demands that we treat human nature itself as malleable, to be reshaped according to passing desire. Revival would mean young Catholics daring to affirm that “male and female He created them” (Gen 1:27), that the body is not an accident but a temple of the Holy Ghost (1 Cor 6:19).

The world glorifies promiscuity, parades vice as pride, and enslaves millions through the poison of pornography. Revival would mean a generation rising to embrace chastity and purity, showing forth the beauty of the body ordered to love, not to lust, and of marriage as a covenant, not a contract.

The world has made a golden calf of autonomy, sacrificing the most vulnerable—the unborn, the weak, the elderly—on the altar of convenience. Revival would mean young Catholics refusing to be silent, confessing with their lives that every child, every life, is a gift of God, never disposable.

The world demands conformity to slogans and ideologies, shaming those who dissent and silencing voices that speak the truth. Revival would mean youth willing to endure exclusion, ridicule, even persecution, rather than deny the Kingship of Christ.

And the world tells us that comfort is the highest good, that possessions and pleasure make us free. Revival would mean young men and women choosing sacrifice, fasting, prayer, works of mercy, and even martyrdom, rather than bowing before the idol of ease.

This is what revival looks like. Not vague spirituality or fashionable interest in religion, but radical conversion, public courage, and holy resistance. It is confessionals crowded, not survey answers ticked. It is Eucharistic adoration, not vague sentiment. It is vocations to the priesthood and religious life flourishing once more. It is families formed according to God’s law, not the world’s passing fashions. It is a generation of saints, unafraid to be mocked, ready to be martyred, who live as lights in the darkness.

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Footnotes

  1. YouGov, Belief in God Tracker (August 2021–January 2025).
  2. YouGov Polling Data, 2018 vs 2024, UK monthly church attendance.
  3. Nielsen BookScan UK, Bible Sales 2019–2024.
  4. GB News summary of YouGov denominational data, 2025.
  5. Interview with Fr Damian Feeney, GB News, 15 August 2025.
  6. Emma Buchan, quoted in GB News, 15 August 2025.
  7. GB News citing YouGov survey on spiritual practice, 2025.
  8. St Augustine, Confessions, I.1.
  9. Mark 4:5–6 (Douay-Rheims).
  10. Pope Pius XI, Divini Redemptoris (1937), §6.
  11. Pope Pius XII, Address to the Roman Clergy (1949).
  12. 2 Timothy 4:2 (Douay-Rheims).
  13. St Agapitus of Palestrina, a Roman martyr of the third century, who at fifteen years old refused to sacrifice to the idols and was tortured and killed for confessing Christ. Martyrology, August 18.