In the diocese there are designated months to do an attendance count at mass.  The head of the ushers broke down the October count from 2003 until now.  Attendance has dropped 16% from 2003 till 2012.  Then he with all honesty said he didn’t know why and suggested maybe it was due to the economic down turn.  What? 

Then at that meeting I pointed out that in 2003 the clergy sexual scandal in Boston became know.  Since 2003 it has grown and grown, gone world-wide and the reaction of many bishops and clergy was to blame everyone and everything else.  That reaction by those representing the Church further alienated a lot of people, many of them just looking for an excuse to leave the Church.  Disregard for the gospels, justice and love was too much to handle.

People who understand the Eucharist as the true Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ know enough to stay with the Church in spite of these sinful men.  They will not allow themselves or their faith to be corrupted by corrupt men. 

Like so many people of faith I wish I could turn back time so that there was never innocence taken by priests, so that there was/is never any kind of abuse perpetrated by priests, that everyone, especially priests, bishops and lay-people live the gospel of Jesus Christ.  Utopia will never exist on earth, sin, (because all of us are sinners), will not be eradicated, but the gospel of Jesus Christ should be lived, as well as it can be, by sinful us, sinful priests and sinful bishops.