Tim
Drake is an award-winning journalist and author, and a staff writer with
the National
Catholic Register and Faith
and Family magazine.
His most recent book is Young
and Catholic: The Face of Tomorrow's Church (Sophia Institute Press,
2005)Tim grew up in a Lutheran home in St. Paul, Minnesota. He attended the University of Minnesota, Morris, graduating with a bachelor's degree and social science teaching certificate in 1989.
A convert to the Catholic faith (1995), he has published more than 600 articles in publications such as the National Catholic Register, Our Sunday Visitor, Catholic World Report, CatholicExchange.com, Columbia, Envoy Magazine, Gilbert!, Saint Austin Review, The Catholic Faith, and This Rock. He has appeared on numerous radio and television programs
Tim has published two other books. They are There We Stood, Here We Stand: 11 Lutherans Rediscover their Catholic Roots (1stBooks, 2001) and Saints of the Jubilee (1stBooks, 2002). He has also contributed chapters to several other books.
Tim resides in Saint Cloud, Minnesota with his wife and five children. For more about Tim, visit the YoungandCatholic.com website.
IgnatiusInsight.com recently spoke to Drake about his new book, Young and Catholic, which examines the state of Catholicism among America’s youth.
IgnatiusInsight.com: Why did you decide to write Young and Catholic and how did it come to fruition?
Tim Drake: Young and Catholic stems from two separate, but related, experiences. The first experience being my family’s attendance at Mass. We do our best to attend daily Mass as a family as often as we can. Over the years I’ve noticed what I describe as the "graying of the pews," not only at weekday Masses, but also at Sunday Mass. I found myself wondering, "Where are the young people?"
The common misperception is that the youth have abandoned their faith and that they are disengaged from the Church. However, over the years in covering things Catholic for the National Catholic Register, and most especially in covering World Youth Day in Toronto in 2002, I came to realize that this simply wasn’t true.
In Toronto, I was very moved by the dialogue that took place between the youth and Pope John Paul II. Young adults lined up by the hundreds for the Sacrament of Reconciliation. They knelt in adoration for long periods of time on a hard convention center floor. They gathered in the rain, filling the streets to watch the Stations of the Cross, which had been written by Pope John Paul II, as they were reenacted along Toronto’s main thoroughfares. And they pilgrimaged to the site of the final Mass, enduring mud and rain overnight to celebrate Mass with the Holy Father on Sunday morning. I came away from Toronto longing to learn more about the ways in which the young were engaged and active in their faith.
Sophia Institute Press approached me with the idea for the book not long after World Youth Day. I spent the next year and a half traveling, conducting interviews, doing research, and writing the book. In the end I spoke with more than 300 young adult Catholics.
IgnatiusInsight.com: American culture seems to have a schizophrenic approach to youth. On one hand it celebrates the culture of youth; on the other hand, it seems to trivialize youth and be cynical about them. Do you think that is accurate? If so, how much of this perception is driven by pop culture, Hollywood, and the media?
Drake: Yes, the Western attitude toward youth has always been a bit perplexing. We tend to treat our young adults at times as if they are still children, and at other times like adults. You can drive at age 16, join the Army when you’re 17, but you can’t vote until you’re 18 and can’t drink alcohol until you’re 21. At what point does a young person truly become an adult?
While there’s some rebelliousness built into the very nature of teenagers, the media tends to exploit that while ignoring that very rebellion when it works in ways opposite to what we might expect.
What I mean by that is that it’s common for the media to use stereotypes to portray youth as rebellious, sex-obsessed, materialistic, self-centered and casting off the shackles of the influence of their parents, especially when it comes to religion.
However, if you sift through the data and spend time talking with youth, a very different picture emerges. An increasing number of young adults are embracing chastity. Major studies by Barna and the National Study on Youth and Religion show that the majority of youth do not feel alienated from their faith. Young adults long to find something larger than themselves to serve, as evidenced by their involvement in a variety of youth service projects at home and abroad. The mainstream media, however, would rather not report that the young are embracing their faith, sometimes despite the actions of their parents.
In interviewing young adults, many of them spoke to me of the impact of rampant divorce, broken families, the sexual revolution and abortion upon their generation. The young recognize that they are paying a price for the behavior of the previous generation, and they are genuinely seeking another way. That way is Christ.
IgnatiusInsight.com: What are some facts about today's youth–both Catholic and non-Catholic–that may be surprising to readers?
Drake: First off, with a total U.S. Catholic population of 66.4 million, the Catholic cohort between the ages of eighteen and forty make up approximately one-third of the total, at roughly 22 million.
Perhaps the most shocking fact is that at least one-third of Generation X & Y doesn’t exist. They’ve been killed in the womb through legalized abortion. Today’s youth recognize that some of their potential friends, students, co-workers and worshippers, and brothers and sisters were not given the same opportunity as they were. You can’t talk about what Naomi Schaefer-Riley has termed the "Missionary Generation" without dealing with that fact.
Perhaps the most surprising statistic I came across during my research was a figure from a 2004 National Study on Youth and Religion (NSYR) conducted by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
In one of the most comprehensive studies of twelfth-grade students ever conducted, NSYR discovered that about two-thirds did not appear to be alienated from or hostile toward organized religion. The study found that two-thirds of them closely agree with the religious ideas of their parents. Three-fourths believe that churches and religious organizations are doing a good or fair job for the country, and seven in ten would like to see religion exert the same, more or much more influence in society.
IgnatiusInsight.com: As you note in the book, the media tends to focus on stories of disgruntled Catholic youth who are upset with the Church or have left the Church. In fact, that was readily evident in some of the media coverage of the conclave and election of Pope Benedict XVI. But what you describe in Young and Catholic is quite different, isn't it?
Drake: You can’t argue with the lasting images from the death of Pope John Paul II and the election of Pope Benedict XVI. They stand as a testament to the youthful embrace of Christ and His Church.
When Pope John Paul II fell ill, there the young were, camped out in St. Peter’s Square, not wanting to leave the pope’s side as he lay dying. When, John Paul died, millions of youth traveled from across Europe and the U.S. to stand in line for hours, just to catch a glimpse of his body, even if for just a few seconds.
When Rome’s bells tolled, signaling that a new pope had been elected, the young were among the first to leave their posts, running in Rome’s streets, flocking into St. Peter’s Square to hear the news. And once the word "Joseph" was uttered from the balcony, the young were the ones who responded so loudly with clapping and shouting that nothing could be heard afterwards.
The past weeks demonstrate that the Church is neither tired nor old. The Church is young, vibrant and full of life. This is precisely the story I am telling in Young and Catholic.
IgnatiusInsight.com: It would be difficult to overstate the influence that the late Holy Father, John Paul II, had on Catholic youth. What was unique about his approach? Why did youth react so positively to him?
Drake: The young loved Pope John Paul II because he loved them first. His pastoral friendship with young people began when he was just a young priest assigned to rural St. Florian's Catholic Church outside of Krakow. While working at the parish, Father Wojtyla served students at the Jagiellonian University, the Krakow Polytechnic and the Academy of Fine Arts. He visited students in the dormitories and got them to attend conferences on Christian doctrine.
He launched the parish's first marriage preparation course. He traveled, hiked, skied and camped with the young. He held retreats and led intellectual discussion groups with young adults and young married couples. He continued this relationship with youth as a priest, bishop, Cardinal, and Pope.
When Cardinal Wojtyla became Pope, young people sensed his enthusiasm for youth. He carried on a preferential dialogue with the youth from his first days as Pope, until his very last days on this earth.
In John Paul II, young people encountered the love of Jesus himself: that's what made him so attractive.
IgnatiusInsight.com: It's very early in the pontificate of Benedict XVI, but what do you think he will do to connect with youth?
Drake: Based upon the young’s reaction to his election, I imagine that there will be an exciting exchange between Benedict XVI and the youth. If you’ve seen some of the images of young adults reacting to the announcement of his election, their faces show tremendous joy. There is one image posted at my web site, www.youngandcatholic.com, that shows a young seminarian reacting with this infectious enthusiasm. The young have already taken to chanting, "Benedetto, Benedetto!" when they are in his presence.
Within 24 hours of Pope Benedict’s election, he was speaking of continuing the dialogue and expressed his anticipation for Cologne. When World Youth Day in Cologne rolls around this August, we’re going to witness a sight similar to what we saw in the days following Pope John Paul II’s death. The young, starving to encounter Christ, will flock to Cologne in massive numbers. There, Pope Benedict will do what his predecessor did. He will challenge the youth with the message of the Gospel, and the young will respond just as they have in Paris, Rome, Manila, Denver and Toronto.
IgnatiusInsight.com: What do you hope your book will accomplish? Why is its message important?
Drake: The Church has been bogged down by negative news over the past three years. My prayer is that my book will inspire hope. The Church needs hope now more than ever.
The book’s message is important for the young and the old alike. The young, who are often isolated in their own parishes, need to know that there are others like themselves. The Church is much larger than their individual parish.
The aging need to hear this message as well. They need to know that there is a faithful generation that is following them.
IgnatiusInsight.com: Describe some of the signs of hope that you see among Catholic youth today. What trends do you see possibly developing in the next ten to twenty years?
Drake: It’s easy for us to think that the youth aren’t involved with the Church simply because they aren’t sitting next to us in the pew. What I discovered is that they are active in other ways.
They often attend youth Masses on Saturday and Sunday evening. They are active in Catholic evangelism online. They participate in missionary programs abroad. Through programs like Theology on Tap, they are gathering in bars and restaurants to learn about their faith. They are embracing ancient devotions — such as the Rosary and Eucharistic Adoration — modernizing them and making them their own. They are active in programs on both Catholic and secular college campuses, and they are involved in young adult discussion and faith-sharing groups across the country. They’re cracking open Scripture, as well as Pope John Paul’s writings, such as Love and Responsibility and his "Theology of the Body" and putting it into practice. This can’t help but have an enormously positive impact upon the Church.
A new group of Catholic leaders is just beginning to emerge around the country. The "John Paul II Generation" is just beginning to enter positions of leadership. Over the next two decades this generation of intelligent, faithful Catholics will exert their influence upon individual parishes, dioceses, and the Church at large. Over that same time period we will witness a complete transformation in the priesthood as older priests retire and younger seminarians are ordained and become pastors. One young nun told me that every modern vocation owes itself to some degree to John Paul II. The seeds of the New Springtime have been sown and are beginning to sprout. I expect to see the springtime come into bloom over the next 15 years.