There are still those who cannot quite swallow the fact that the faithful are no longer ignorant, uneducated, credulous peasants and townsmen.

Oh, please! Ever watch Leno's "Jay-walking" or the comparable stuff popping up today?

Every (responsible) Bishop in the USA is bemoaning the ignorance of the Faith in his Diocese, and you think otherwise?

I know. That must have been sarcasm, right??

...bemoaning the ignorance...

...for which they are responsible. The post-conciliar Church is of their making.

When I see liturgy and music improving by leaps and bounds as a result of systematic programs to that end, when I see well catechised use of propers and better music (in English as well as Latin), when I see more people going through the mass as if they really understood what was going on, when I see priests and bishops waiting in line to learn how to sing the mass (every last word of it), all this and more, I'll change my tune. Liturgy and faith are what they are because priests, bishops, and their chosen musicians and teachers have made it that way. (And they made it that way because that's how little they think of people.) If they wanted it changed for the better they would see to it that it happens. When it gets 'down to it' priests and bishops get what they want if they really want it. There are no clergy on earth who are as lionised, adored, and reverenced like Catholic clerics and hierarchs.

I have taught numerous courses to Catholics about chant, liturgy, sacred music, and have been singularly impressed that they had but a minimal understanding of their faith - particularly of the mass. Without fail they have expressed deep thanks to me for teaching them things about the mass that they had never heard before and which the priests had never told them. Numerous times have they said, absolutely unprompted, of their priests, publishers, and the catechetical apparatus of the Church, that 'they think we are stupid'.