Ep. 82—A Habitual Counterculture—Brandon McGinley

Jul 28, 2020

The Catholic Church in America has largely lost its distinctive
flavor and with it, its ability either to retain the faithful or to
evangelize the infidel. The problem precedes Vatican II: in the
Tridentine 1950s, many Catholics, eager for mainstream
respectability, had already adopted a bourgeois spirituality.

In his first book, The Prodigal Church: Restoring Catholic
Tradition in an Age of Deception, Brandon McGinley calls for
Catholics to return to the essence of the faith, rather than to a
previous era of Catholic “success”, and so find creative ways to
restore a robust and evangelical Catholic culture in the unknown
years to come.

Contents

[2:03] Fr. Ratzinger’s famous quote about a smaller and more
spiritual Church

[8:30] Catholicism an embodied faith

[12:32] Incompatibility between American and Catholic
principles?

[19:10] American Catholicism in the 1950s—incipient
worldiness

[27:15] The importance of small habits in living out the reality
of faith and Christ’s passion

[33:04] Spiritual corrosion caused by immoderate anger towards
the hierarchy

[39:44] Remembering the Church Triumphant

[43:05] “Third places” and the importance of the parish as a
community space

[51:05] The need for community among nuclear families

[55:05] Catholic hospitality and vulnerability

[1:00:04] Why we shouldn’t separate “moral” from “social”
teaching