An Italian study poses some conclusions as the why there is a catastrophic decline in the practice of Catholicism in Italy. You can read a summary of that study
HERE.
In part, it states that women are ceasing to practice Catholicism the way more so than men in Italy. I am not sure this can be blamed on the liturgy, but on progressive Catholicism’s bowing to secular secularism and promoting an anthropology of marriage and Holy Orders at odds with Catholic identity. Women are told that one day they can be bishops, priests and deacons and that the LGBTQ+++ ideology will triumph over traditional Catholic morality.
We know in liberal Protestantism which approves of all these things, especially in the inverted image of Catholicism found in the Anglican Communion, that approving of all of this has not stopped the bleeding numbers leaving that communion but increased it. They have no identity as a Christian communion any longer compared to more traditional and orthodox forms of Protestantism.
But the study also blames the revision of the Mass and the loss of Catholic liturgical identity. I found this part rather fascinating:
Exploring the possible causes of such a catastrophic abandonment of Catholicism in a land which lies at the heart of the Church, the Roman professor surmised that among the likely causes are the liturgical abuses and upheavals to which the Church in Italy has been subjected. He particularly pointed to the “progressive spectacularization of Vatican liturgies that has occurred over the past three pontificates” in Rome, as well as the liturgical innovations with which Italian clergy have scandalized faithful Catholics.
“Many of the nominally still highly institutionalized and centralized (‘liturgy-centered’) rituals may now have been transformed, in part or entirely, into ‘performance-centered rituals.’” Diotallevi wrote. “For Catholic liturgies, a push in this direction may also have come from the progressive spectacularization of Vatican liturgies that has occurred over the past three pontificates, from the substantial deregulation of increasingly large sectors of ‘Catholic’ liturgical offerings, as well as from many of the solutions adopted by clergy during the lockdowns that have recently taken place to counter the spread of COVID-19 pandemic.”
The public liturgical abuses that Italy has seen in recent include a Mass sacrilegiously offered on a surf board, in the water, at the beach, with the priest bare-chested, an outrage that prompted local civil authorities to consider charging the priest with the crime of a public offense against religion. Another priest offered Mass at a park in a rainbow “pride” stole and a skin-tight cycling outfit, and joked when hosts were blown by the wind onto the ground after the consecration.
My own experience with the Modern Mass and my own changing attitudes about it are somewhat summarized in the quote above. Music is horrible and there is no tradition of Catholic music as it constantly changes. Gregorian chant is rare in the Modern Mass. Contemporary sounds constantly changing are prevalent. Liturgies are sloppy and banal. Homilies long and dismal.
But, where the liturgy is “done well” this means you have what is written above. The Mass is “spectacularized” with triumphal music, loud instrumentation, trumpets, tympani and cymbals. I have heard this for ordinations and weddings. It’s all veneer and no substance.
I can compare that to a EF or OF Mass celebrated with only Gregorian Chant for the propers and parts of the Mass even if the core parts of the Mass are in the vernacular. The Traditional chanted Mass is sober, filled with spirituality and devotion and not geared toward shallow entertainment and music used to excite hormones.
The Traditional Latin Mass bespeaks of Catholic identity now lost in the Modern Mass. The Modern Mass is so Protestantized that many can’t tell the difference between a Catholic Mass, an Anglican or Lutheran liturgy. Catholics attending a Lutheran or Episcopal Liturgy would say that there are no differences. Most Catholics now receive Protestant communion when attending a Protestant liturgy/service. And they like their music better.
And now some Catholic parishes are trying to imitate the music and style of worship of the Non-denominational churches. Praise and worship music which is fad oriented and constantly changing and like a rock concert or any other kind of concert is mimicked in the Catholic Mass. Anyone immersed in this nonsense in a Catholic Mass would feel at home in a non-denominational setting and more than likely to prefer the Protestant version of their service verses the “catholic” one.
Everything that progressive Catholicism has touched has ended in disaster. Think of the once great women’s religious orders who through synodality dumbed down their life, community, habits and charisma and became a collation of individuals doing their own thing, living alone in apartments and no longer identifiable as religious sisters or nuns.
That was done to religious life is now on steroids as it concerns the Church in general, synodality, that will accelerate the demise of the Church already declining in so much of Western Europe and Italy in particular. And yet this pope and his progressive cardinals and bishops gleefully go forward with their destructive policies never looking backwards to the evidence that progressivism is the cause for the decline and fall of this particular Roman Empire.