Love the Messenger, Hate the Message?

The cover story of today's USA Today deals with the fairly wide divide between the late Pope and his subjects here in the U.S. It's hardly a new issue, but it's particularly relevant as the College of Cardinals prepares to select the next pontiff. A few interesting quotes:

Others expect the Vatican to conform to their needs and tastes. Mark Hart of
Life Teen, a Catholic youth program active in 900 U.S. parishes, says: 'Young
people are looking for another Holy Father willing to enter into their culture.
It's less important what his native language is. … It's more important that he's
willing to speak their language, the language of post-modern culture.'

Buddy Christ, anyone?

'The church has totally lost control' of U.S. Catholics, says Ronald Inglehart,
who heads the survey at the University of Michigan Institute for Social
Research. Americans, he says, 'don't want big institutions telling them how to
think.'

OK, assuming for a minute that's true (an open debate), then why don't the so-called "cafeteria Catholics" leave the church and form their own or move in with one of the numerous Protestant sects that seem to split every time someone has an original thought. Those ultra-conservative Catholics (who think the Vatican is too modern) didn't have any problem doing that. I just can't understand the desire to subjugate yourself to an autocratic faith and then complain when you don't agree with the leadership. That's the whole point of free will and freedom of religion, people - if you can do it better yourself, have at it!