REGINA Magazine 29 | Page 68

Dutch religious ordinations plummeted from 300 in 1962 to less than five priests ordained per year after 1975. The country also saw mass resignations from the priesthood between 1964 and 1975. It has not recovered since and today the Faith is in a shocking state. Some anecdotal evidence of cultural and church decline:

•In 2015 the head of the Catholic bishops’ conference of the Netherlands issued his Lenten message to the nation’s remaining Catholics, warning them against “bitterness” at the almost total loss of their Church. Cardinal Willem Eijk, archbishop of Utrecht, told the faithful to prepare for the closure of about a thousand Catholic parishes, or about 2/3 of those in the country.

•A porn flick was recently shot in a church in the diocese of Hertogenbosch, where Bp. Gerard de Korte also gave his blessing to the Dutch gay pride celebration known as Pink Saturday, or Roze Zaterdag.

•Dutch euthanasia pioneer and psychiatrist Boudewijn Chabot wrote an opinion piece recently that described the "worrisome rate" at which dementia and psychiatric patients are killed by the nation’s aggressive euthanasia laws.

In the midst of this depressing state of affairs, however, there are a few green shoots of the authentic Faith sprouting. REGINA caught up with Jakob (not his real name) a twenty-something convert, who reports unflinchingly on what he is finding there.

REGINA: It’s pretty prevalent in your country, but do you like rock and folk music at Mass?

JAKOB: No, the mass is not a concert, that can be done after mass and preferably not in the church itself. I'm ok with guitars as long as it's not rock music coming out because that's way too loud and harsh (I listen to heavy metal so it's not that I think it's evil, there's just a time and place for mostly everything).

REGINA: What do you think of the Catholic bishops’ leadership in Holland?

JAKOB: I don't really know too much (yet) about this topic. I do know that I have sent an e-mail to my local bishop telling him that the parish I take RCIA at is doing self-tincture.

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