Recently, I was struck in a fresh way by a stale cliché. I heard someone opining that Massgoers are “voting with their feet” and, although I had heard those words many times before, on this occasion I was practically knocked off my own feet by the superficiality of the expression.
The issues facing the Church in Ireland certainly demand to be taken seriously: they call for analysis, reflection and action; but some of our truisms get in the way of serious analysis rather than promoting it. The notion that Irish congregations are voting, or have voted, with their feet is one such truism, and it should be gracefully retired.
That said, I don’t doubt that the phrase will continue to be used, and in what follows, I would like to punch a few cautionary holes in a jaded and unhelpful expression.
The phrase that is exercising me does not cast any light on the situation of those of whom it is used – the alleged voters, those who have ceased attending church. Nor does it do any justice to those who, by implication, have abstained from voting – those who continue to attend regularly. If those who have ceased practicing their faith have voted with their feet, then what have the others failed to vote for? If the decision to stop going to Mass on a Sunday is construed as the exercise of one’s franchise, it would seem to follow that continued attendance is a failure to exercise one’s franchise. After just a little reflection, it begins to sound as if those who leave are taking an initiative, while those who stay are failing to do so.
But really, it’s the other way around: in today’s Ireland, those who attend church faithfully, the weekly Massgoers, are the ones who are doing something that might be said to resemble going out to vote. It is they who are taking the initiative; it is they who are going against the current.
In contrast, I think that it is wrong to portray the cessation of regular church attendance as an instance of personal initiative. It is wrong, not because it seems to pay a compliment where none is merited, but because it attributes motivation where the real issue is more often demotivation.
Drift
There are, of course, many reasons why people stop practicing (I use the reductive term “practicing” with a degree of reluctance – there is, of course, a lot more to the “practice” of faith than regular church attendance).
For some, the cessation of practice is a deliberate decision, and the expression “voting with their feet” can admittedly convey something of the dynamic at work. The Church has a great and delicate duty of pastoral care towards those who have stopped practicing their faith because of scandal or disappointment. But for many others, the issue is drift, rather than decision, and the duty of pastoral care needs to be tailored to their situation.
This, it seems to me, is the kernel of the matter: people leave, people cease practicing, for many and varied reasons. Some have “voted”: they have acted deliberately. Others (many more, I would suggest) have slowly drifted away. They may prove harder to reach than those who have made a decision.
Whatever the specifics, this much seems clear: no fresh pastoral programme, no renewal, no evangelical outreach, will be built on the notion that people have voted with their feet. In the vast majority of cases, this crusty cliché says both too much and too little. It says too much in the sense that it attributes motivation that is not present; and it says too little in that it fails to explore the issues that underlie demotivation.
It says too much in that it suggests that anger is necessarily a dominant factor; it says too little in that it does not address the broader cultural issue of apathy.
No monopoly on decline
The Church does not have a monopoly on falling numbers. Many organisations are struggling to keep up their membership. The Church is not just another organisation, and it has, as I’ve suggested, a particular duty of pastoral care towards those who have ceased to practice their faith.
This duty of pastoral care should make us wary of substituting clichés for serious reflection.