text: I have taught at four well-regarded Catholic colleges and universities, and my students seem to either have already left the church or are on their way out, as indicated by their reflection papers. This is true despite the fact they come from families willing to pay out tens of thousands of dollars a year to keep their children  in Catholic education.
  
  As one young woman told me last week, "The Catholic Church is so over!" (Really. Kids! I had to laugh.)
  
  The poignant dimension of my story is that these young people are remarkable in so many ways, often deeply spiritual but finding spiritual fulfillment in traditions like Buddhism, Sufism, nature-centered religion and mystically-inclined communities.
  
  When I ask them why, the most common answer is that they are uninspired by cut-and-dried dogmas/concepts purporting to control and contain a Vast Mystery they apprehend that is apparently beyond the wildest imagination of the hierarchy.
  
  The best are leaving. I doubt they will return.