Especially since the Second Vatican Council, the church has acknowledged that the wisdom of God is to be discovered in the hearts, the lives, of ordinary faithful people, the people who are God's own: the people of God, the body of Christ. We believe this, we teach this, but I am not sure that we have always acted on this belief. We church leaders, for example, have not always listened carefully enough to the experience of parishioners struggling to lead lives of faith in a violent, competitive and materialistic society; to parents struggling to raise children in a culture that trivializes the importance of education and shows little respect for human life; to youth and young adults, for whom the truths of our faith raise more questions than they answer; to our own priests and religious, whose pastoral experience deserves to be taken far more seriously.

Excerpt from Origins, Feb 27, 2003, Vol. 32:No.37