Book Review: What Happened at Vatican II, by John W. O’Malley

In the Introduction to this marvellous book, Father O’Malley states his purpose as author:

In this book I will analyze [the sixteen conciliar] documents, but I will not provide a detailed theological commentary on them….What I will do, rather, is put the documents into their contexts to provide a sense of before and after….Only by tracing the documents’ genesis, and even more important, locating them in their contexts can their deeper significance be made clear.

He identifies the main historical contexts for Vatican II as “the long and the broad history of the Western church” from Constantine and Nicaea to the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation; “the long nineteenth century,” including the French Revolution and Pius IX and Vatican I; and “the period beginning with World War II and continuing up to the opening of the council.”

O’Malley also identifies what he considers to be the most important issues dealt with at Vatican II. These included the place of Latin in the liturgy, the relationship of Tradition to Scripture, the relationship of the church to the Jews and then to other non-Christian religions, religious liberty, the role of the church in the modern world. There were many more.

But the author believes that it is really the “issues under the issues” that characterize Vatican II and make it unique in the history of ecumenical councils. These are:

1. The circumstances under which change in the church is appropriate and the arguments with which it can be justified.

2. The relationship in the church of center to periphery, or put more concretely, how authority is properly distributed between the papacy, including the Congregations of the Vatican Curia, and the rest of the church.

3. The style or model according to which that authority should be exercised. Here the council becomes more explicit by introducing a new vocabulary and literary form. Words like “charism,” “dialogue,” “partnership,” “cooperation,” and “friendship” indicate a new style for the exercise of authority and implicitly advocate a conversion to a new style of thinking, speaking, and behaving, a change from a more authoritarian and unidirectional style to a more reciprocal and responsive model.

I believe that this is the issue captured by the expression “the spirit of the council,” that is, an orientation that goes beyond specific enactments.

Once O’Malley’s account reaches the opening of the council, the book often reads like a novel, filled with characters in conflict with each other, intrigue, surprises, and pathos. The council fathers quickly split into what the author calls the majority and the minority. The latter group was made up of members of the Roman curia and its supporters who believed that the council should be a reaffirmation of doctrine laid down by previous councils and by popes like Pius X. The majority, on the other hand, soon recognized that the council was an opportunity to bring about significant change in the way that the church related to the modern world. These two opposing views resulted in four years of tension and more-than-occasional vitriolic outbursts.

While faithfully recording these dramatic moments, the author does not fail to bring us back to the issues he laid out in his Introduction, placing events and outcomes in their proper historical and ecclesiological context.

Let us take the “lightning-rod issue” of collegiality—“the relationship of the bishops, or episcopal hierarchy to the papacy”—as an example.

What kind of authority did the bishops have over the church at large when they acted collectively, that is, collegially; how was that authority exercised in relationship to the pope; and how was collegiality different from “Conciliarism” (supremacy of council over pope), a position condemned in the fifteenth century and repeatedly condemned thereafter?

The issue of collegiality was addressed primarily in chapter two—later to become chapter three—of the much revised schema on the church, which in its final form would be entitled Lumen Gentium. One of the points made by this chapter was that bishops were ordained rather than consecrated and that this sacrament of ordination conferred on them “the tripartite office of teaching, sanctifying, and governing their flocks.”

O’Malley tells us:

It was over the last of those three—governing—that the difference arose. Thus this difficult topic blended into the final point [of chapter two], episcopal collegiality. The original [version of the schema, prepared by members of the curia] insisted that, though the sacrament conferred the office (munus) of governing, it did not confer the power to exercise it, which bishops received from the Roman Pontiff.

The new text was more intent on emphasizing that bishops have inalienable authority by virtue of the sacrament….This text agreed with the original that bishops were “vicars of Christ,” and a few lines later added a telling quotation from Leo XIII that they were “not to be thought vicars of the Roman Pontiff. They are called bishops (antistites, overseers) because they exercise an authority properly their own and really govern the flocks that are theirs.

Discussion of chapter two, which was often heated, went on from October 4 to October 15, 1963 during the second session of the council. Finally, in “a congenial meeting” with Pope Paul VI, the council moderators came up with the idea of asking the fathers to vote “on the contested issues of chapter two in a way that would indicate where the bishops stood on them and also be binding on the Doctrinal Commission in its revision of the chapter.”

On the day of the vote, however, it was suddenly announced that it had been cancelled; no explanation was given for this move. According to O'Malley, “Somebody had got to Paul VI.” As a result of his unexpected intervention, the pope was “besieged” for several days, and following a series of negotiations and no doubt due to pressure from leaders of the majority, a revised ballot was created and the vote took place.

The issue of collegiality was addressed in one of five questions to be voted on by the council fathers:

Should the schema assert that the so-called Body or College of Bishops in its evangelizing, sanctifying, and governing task is successor to the original College of the Apostles and, always in communion with the Roman Pontiff, enjoys full and supreme power over the universal church?

The result of the vote on this question was 2,148 affirmative, 336 negative. But as we shall later see, this was not the end of the story for collegiality at the council.

In his Conclusion O’Malley underlines the overall significance of this issue for the council and for the church.

No instance of ressourcement was more central to the drama of Vatican II and to its aspirations than collegiality. Proponents of collegiality at the council saw it as a recovery of an aspect of church life increasingly sidelined in the West since the eleventh century. It had been virtually pushed off the ecclesiastical map by the ways the definition of papal primacy of Vatican I had been determined and implemented. Yet, though the church had never officially defined collegiality as part of its constitution, for centuries it had taken it for granted as its normal mode of operation. The church of the first millennium functioned collegially…and in local councils and other ways the collegial mode continued to function even in the West well into the modern period.

In the West, papal primacy “developed” incrementally in a steady and almost continuous line up until the long nineteenth century when it accelerated at (for the church) almost breathtaking speed—papal definitions of the Immaculate Conception and the Assumption, the growth and increasing authority exercised by the Roman Congregations, the devolution of the appointment of bishops almost exclusively into the hands of the pope, and of course, in 1870 the definition of papal primacy and infallibility.

The majority at the council certainly did not press for a statement on collegiality merely to make a theological point. They brought it to the fore, like other ressourcements, because it had practical ramifications. The bishops who promoted the doctrine and fought for it so passionately wanted to redress what they saw as the imbalance between the authority exercised especially by the Roman Congregations and their own authority as heads of “local churches.” Collegiality was the supreme instance in the council of the effort to moderate the centralizing tendencies of the ecclesiastical institution, of the effort to give those from the periphery a more authoritative voice not only back home but also in the center.

I had hoped that Father O’Malley would deal with the apparent reversal of at least the spirit of the council by John Paul II and Joseph Ratzinger. He does not do so in this book but his treatment of Pope Paul VI gives a clear indication that this process was underway long before John Paul II was elected; in fact, the dismantling began during the council itself.

By the time the second session of the council opened in September 1963, it was clear that the majority of the council fathers would be more and more insistently calling for the reform of the curia. “The Curia abused its authority, its critics maintained, and tried to lord it over the bishops. The behavior of some its members during the first period seemed to justify the indictment. The animus was widespread, by no means confined to the leaders of the majority.”

In a an address to the curia shortly before the resumption of the council in 1963, Paul admonished its members to cooperate more fully with the council and informed them that changes would have to be made to the curia’s mode of operation. At the same time, “he communicated that he was removing reform of the Curia from the agenda of the council. ‘The reform will be formulated and promulgated’, he said, ‘by the Curia itself.’” Naturally, a curia that has no interest in reform in principle will be unwilling to consider reform for itself; John Paul II had a ready and willing tool waiting for him when he ascended the throne of Peter and began dismantling Vatican II and restoring the Church of the “long nineteenth century.”

Unlike John XXIII, Paul intervened often and significantly in the business of the council. “His interventions and the way they were made are a crucial part of the story of Vatican II and of the larger problem of the relationship of center to periphery” and they reflect a preference for the primacy of papal authority over episcopal collegiality.

The most substantive—and to some, the most egregious—intervention came in the last week of the third session. The pope “communicated for Lumen Gentium [the final text of which was due to be voted on during this last week] a ‘Preliminary Explanatory Note’ (Nota Explicativa Praevia) that interpreted the meaning of collegiality in chapter three.” Most commentators agreed that the Note did not change the meaning of the text, but Joseph Ratzinger “found this ‘very intricate text’ marked by ambivalence and ambiguities and saw it tipping the balance in favour of the primacy.”

The Note won the support of the minority for the chapter and for the schema, as shown in the final voting— only 5 negative votes out of 2,156 cast. The price for that virtual unanimity was high. No matter what the pope hoped to accomplish, he in fact gave those opposed to collegiality a tool they could—and would—use to interpret the chapter as a reaffirmation of the status quo.

Father O’Malley has successfully incorporated a thoughtful and credible analysis of the issues treated by the council into the gripping story of Vatican II. I could not help but wonder, all the way through, how such a seemingly powerful wave of optimism and enthusiasm for change, such a compelling movement for dialogue and conciliation could be so quickly and so thoroughly subdued.

This book will never spend long enough on my bookshelf to gather much dust. Highly recommended.

Bishop Dowling, the "cappa magna," and humility

The blog of America Magazine has re-posted a piece that appeared on the site of the Independent Catholic News. The piece is the text of an address “given by Kevin Dowling CSsR to a group of leading laity in Cape Town, South Africa on 1 June." [Note: the text has been removed from the site of the Independent Catholic News but has been posted on the website of the National Catholic Reporter, with the bishop's permission.]

Bishop Dowling’s address essentially takes a metaphorical scalpel to a trend that has developed over the last 30 years in which all Church authority has steadily become concentrated in the hands of the pope and the “Curial Departments and Cardinals.” Much of this authority, according to Dowling, rightfully belongs in the hands of the People of God at the level of the local churches and of the local episcopate, and of the Synod of Bishops. The letter and spirit of Vatican II, which reaffirmed this horizontal paradigm, has been replaced by

“the mystique which has in increasing measure surrounded the person of the Pope in the last 30 years, such that any hint of critique or questioning of his policies, of his way of thinking, his exercise of authority, etc. is equated with disloyalty. There is more than a perception, because of this mystique, that unquestioning obedience by the faithful to the Pope is required and is a sign of the ethos and fidelity of a true Catholic.”

For Dowling, a potent symbol of the “restorationism” that has been taking place these 30 years was the “cappa magna” worn by Bishop Edward Slattery of Tulsa, Oklahoma as he celebrated a Tridentine Mass at the Basilica of the National Shrine in Washington in April. Dowling describes the garment as “the 20-yard-long brilliant red train behind a bishop or cardinal that has become one of the symbols of the revival of the Tridentine Mass.” The wearing of the cappa magna and the elaborate processional pageantry that preceded the Mass in Washington “bore the marks of a medieval royal court, not the humble servant leadership modeled by Jesus.”

Dowling laments the disappearance of

the great theological leaders and thinkers of the past…and the great prophetic bishops whose voice and witness was a clarion call to justice, human rights and a global community of equitable sharing….Again, who in today’s world “out there” even listens to, much less appreciates and allows themselves to be challenged by the leadership of the Church at the present time? The moral authority of the Church’s leadership today has never been weaker. It is, therefore, important in my view that Church leadership, instead of giving an impression of its power, privilege and prestige, should rather be experienced as a humble, searching ministry together with its people in order to discern the most appropriate or viable responses which can be made to complex ethical and moral questions—a leadership, therefore, which does not presume too have all the answers all the time….

The concentration of authority in the hands of the Pope and the Vatican Curia and “the policy of appointing ‘safe’, unquestionably orthodox and even very conservative bishops to fill vacant dioceses over the past 30 years” has made it very unlikely that the College of Bishops “will question anything that comes out of Rome, and certainly not publicly.” How courageous it is, then, for Bishop Dowling, a single voice in this deafening chorus of orthodoxy, to raise it in respectful and humble dissent and to point out, however indirectly, the hubris of those who would take it upon themselves to reject the spirit of Vatican II and scorn the legacy of Blessed John XXIII by usurping the authority of the local churches and thus the People of God.

And how clever the bishop is to use the words of Joseph Ratzinger himself to demonstrate how far we have strayed from Vatican II:

Over the pope as expression of the binding claim of ecclesiastical authority, there stands one's own conscience which must be obeyed before all else, even if necessary against the requirement of ecclesiastical authority. This emphasis on the individual, whose conscience confronts him with a supreme and ultimate tribunal, and one which in the last resort is beyond the claim of external social groups, even the official church, also establishes a principle in opposition to increasing totalitarianism.

(Joseph Ratzinger in: Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II ,Vol. V., pg. 134 (Ed) H. Vorgrimler, New York, Herder and Herder, 1967).

Among the many things about this article that impress me is its call for greater humility on the part of the leadership of the Church—“the humble servant leadership modeled by Jesus.” Church leaders would do well to return to the New Testament accounts of the life of Jesus so that they might learn the true meaning of humility. Surely a man who regularly ate with sinners, with the impure, and with the marginalized; who, unlike “foxes and the birds of the air,” had “nowhere to lay his head;” and who allowed himself to be subjected to the most degrading punishment of his day, has by his very way of life and death something to teach the wearers of the “great cape.”

When will they attend?

Photo Credits

IMG_5985: "Cardinal Rode in Cappa Magna"

IMG_5937: "The Cardinal assumes the Cappa Magna at the throne"

by jdbradley

Creaative Commons: Some rights reserved

What's Next?

With each subsequent revelation of curial negligence in cases of clerical sexual abuse, and especially with allegations of calculated indifference to victims of abuse aimed at then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the calls for the resignation of Benedict XVI increase in number and in decibel. The Vatican and bishops throughout the world continue to vigorously defend the pope and excoriate the press for misrepresenting the crisis and attributing blame where it does not belong. Meanwhile, the pundits - journalistic, clerical, or otherwise - offer up celibacy, homosexuals in the priesthood, or clerical culture as underlying causes of the crisis; global warming has not yet been cited, but I am sure it is only a matter of time. My point is that, as in any crisis, few wise voices and words emerge until the crisis has passed and there has been time for reflection and study. I do not pretend to be one of those voices; there are others far wiser and more experienced and knowledgeable than I. I only offer a humble opinion - or two.

In the unlikely event that Benedict does "retire," who will replace him? Is there an eminence among the members of the College of Cardinals who would have the courage as pope to first acknowledge that the current crisis, tragic and painful as it has been for victims of sexual abuse and their families, is a symptom of a chronic illness rather than the illness itself? The disease from which the Church suffers is complicated and difficult to cure because it has afflicted her for a very long time and has spread throughout her body. What is this illness? It is the loss of humility and compassion in the leadership of the Church; it is the lust for power and the desire to exercise unquestioned authority over others; it is the failure to recognize and to accept the pastoral role of bishop to love and to nurture and to protect his flock.

After many years away from the Church, I was advised that the best way to fully become Catholic again was to receive the sacraments of Reconciliation and Holy Communion. In my first confession after thirty-five years, the confessor told me that one of the keys to being Christian was to make a commitment to imitating Christ. What does imitating Christ mean? I do not think it means fostering a cult of royalty and a culture of exclusion. To imitate Christ does not mean that the Church needs a monarchical leader; it does not mean that the Church should exclude women from ministry; that it should marginalize priests who have married, those who have divorced and remarried, and unmarried couples who live together; or that it should refuse a place in Catholic school for children of lesbian (or gay) parents. These attitudes and actions are anathema to the teachings of the Jesus we see in the Bible.  I have failed again and again since that first confession to imitate Christ. I am not alone.

Is there a cardinal who would have the courage as pope to begin to cure this complicated disease? The humble John XXIII had such courage. His curial bureaucracy was aghast at his decision to call a council whose purpose was aggiornamento, an updating of the Church, a throwing open of the windows to let in fresh air (and to sweep away the dead air), and they did everything in their power to thwart that purpose and to guard the status quo. Yet this man, of humble peasant origin, held his ground and inspired bishops from around the world to begin to reform the Church.

While the crisis may eventually bring about the retirement or resignation of the current pope, the election of a new pontiff will be of no significance if the one elected is not a man of extraordinary vision and courage. He must have the strength, as did John XXIII, to take a stand against the prevailing forces in the Roman curia and to maintain that stand with a balance of authority and humility until others have been inspired by his vision and change is initiated. In the present hierarchically organized Church, only the pope can create the conditions that will bring about reform. We have seen time and again that courageous theologians, individual priests or bishops, and organized lay groups that call - usually respectfully and lovingly - for change have been shut down and marginalized.

Let us pray for a pope who truly understands the meaning of imitatio Christi.

A New Pope, A New Church

If it turns out that the Joseph Ratzinger indeed knew about and personally approved of the return of a sexually abusive priest to parochial service and as a result the pontiff is forced to abdicate, who will be his successor? One envisions the election of a new pope from the college of cardinals by the college of cardinals being immediately followed by questions from the press about the possibility of his involvement in cases of abuse cover-up. In fact, why would the press even wait that long? At the time of the election there will no doubt be a group of papabile, those cardinals considered among the most likely to be elected, and their careers will be scrutinized by hordes of investigative journalists from around the world. We can be certain that at least a couple of the frontrunners will be dead in the water before the second cloud of black smoke is emitted from the chimney on top of the Sistine Chapel. The papal election will become a farce and whoever emerges as the new Holy Father of the Catholic Church will have gone from “popable” to laughable.

The tragic story of sexual abuse and its cover-up by bishops and chancery officials, which is no longer simply an American story reflecting so-called American liberalism and secularism, has exposed to Catholics and non-Catholics all over the world the failure of the post-Vatican II restoration of a monarchical papacy, a blindly loyal episcopacy, and a complacent and obedient laity. The Church hierarchy—and the entire hierarchical system—has lost all the trust it needs to lead the faithful. It is time for the People of God to take responsibility for their Church and return it to its proper place as the loving, welcoming, child-protecting home of Christ.

If a new pope is elected from the ranks of the cardinals, or even if the cardinals are bypassed and a bishop is found who has not been tainted by cover-up or other misdeeds, the likelihood is very high that the hierarchical system and the clerical culture that allowed this tragedy to continue for so long will remain in place. John Paul II was pope for 26 years; his successor—and close friend and loyal supporter—Benedict XVI has been pope for five years. Nearly every bishop in the world has been appointed by these two; and nearly all of them will have sworn an oath of loyalty to the orthodoxy promoted by the restoration papacy. Even a bold and courageous bishop would have difficulty opposing his brother bishops.

I have a suggestion: Benedict should stay. He should humbly bow his head and apologize to all victims of the post-Vatican II Church, including children who were abused; women, who have been denied their rightful place in the Church, to its tragic detriment; gay and lesbian people, who have been marginalized by the Church; the large majority of priests, who have toiled faithfully in the vineyard but whose voices for truth have been silenced by the stifling pressure of doctrine. He should then call a new Vatican Council, one that has equal representation from the laity (men and women) and the clergy; clerical delegates would include ordinary parish priests, male and female members of religious orders, and theologians, as well as some bishops. At the council, the Roman curia would only be allowed an advisory role; it would have no voting rights. The agenda, from which no issue could be excluded, would also be determined by balanced representation. The pope would pledge publicly to abide by the spirit as well as the letter of the council’s decisions.

Or we could allow the present pope to resign and then insist that the college of cardinals as well as the entire episcopate be considered ineligible for election and instead elect a humble and holy priest as pope. In this case, I have a few recommendations. How about Jim Martin, the Jesuit from America Magazine? He seems to understand that the Church can peacefully and productively co-exist with modern secular culture. He recognizes that women and gay people have been wounded by their Church. Or we could elect Hans Küng, who after all was one of the chief architects of some of the most important documents to come out of Vatican II. There is also Richard Rohr, the Franciscan who believes in the emerging church, which loves the tradition but recognizes the need for reform.

Of course, none of this is going to happen. The point is, however, that we need a new Church, not just a new pope. We need people of courage and vision from both the laity and the clergy to share their vision of a reformed Church with the grassroots. Sure, the vast majority of the faithful may be as conservative as Benedict XVI and his curial comrades, but are we content to allow a majority that trusts a hierarchical system that enabled abusers of children, that discriminates against women and gay and lesbian people, that silences all dissenters to prevail?

It appears that the structure is beginning to crumble. It can be shored up for a while perhaps, but eventually it will fall. We should be concerned with how the Church will rebuild itself when that day comes.

Tradition and Scripture

Last night I received the following e-mail from William in Dallas. He kindly gave his consent to my publishing it here, along with my reply.


Good Evening,

My name is william and i am not catholic but i do subscribe to the newsletter "Queering the Church" and this is where i found out about you.

I would like to ask you a question as a catholic man and please do understand i am not singling the catholic church out by any means.

I have wondered why after reading the post on Queering the Church about tradition and how many in Rome and in leadership positions within the catholic church seem to hold tradition with the same reverence as the word of God? Please understand that most if not all protestant churches including the one i am a member of are guilty of the same thing. Surprisingly our sunday school lesson was on this very subject with reference to Mark 7:6-8. Where the pharisees had confused and made the commandments of man more important than the commandments of God. I do know that all churches and all denominations have traditions but at least to me the catholic church is the most visible of churches that hold onto and follow traditions. I guess my question is two fold. Why do catholics put so much emphasis on all the liturgy and traditions of the church and little or no emphasis on the word of God? This question also could be used of protestant churches as well. And how has man in general been able to completely miss the true message of God and teach a message of man and calls it God's message?

I am a gay christian man and a member of a protestant gay church in Dallas. Those like me would not be welcomed into most conservative christian churches today and yet God's message of love is to all people without regard to their orientation, language, nationality, social standing,etc.

How and why did we all mess things up so bad?

Sincerely,
William


Here is my reply:


Dear William:

Thank you very much for your e-mail (It’s the first one I’ve received from anyone reading my blog.) Your question is an interesting and valuable one. But first a huge disclaimer: I am in no way a qualified theologian or expert on scripture. I am just a guy who decided to go back to the Catholic Church after a very long time and who has since that return thought and read and written about the experience. I hope that my blog does not give the impression that I actually know what I am talking about.

Having said that, I offer two propositions in answer to your question. The first is quite simple: I think that there is a huge range of opinion out there about Revelation, so it is likely that no two answers to your question are going to be the same.

The second is somewhat more complex.

In our local diocesan newspaper, a parish priest writes a regular column on the scripture readings for the week. A recent column touches directly upon your question. Here is what he says:

“Accordingly, ‘the Church does not draw her certainty about all revealed truths from holy Scriptures alone’, says the Catechism of the Catholic Church, quoting Vatican IIs Dei Verbum (The Word of God). She relies on Sacred Tradition: the ‘living transmission’ of God’s word by the apostles and their successors, a process demonstrated in the New Testament accounts themselves.

“The content of Sacred Tradition is what was ‘handed on’ (in Latin, ‘traditum’) by the preaching of the apostles, their example, and the institutions they established, even before anything was written down.

“Indeed, the criterion of the Church used in deciding what writings to include in the Bible was their agreement with the content of Sacred Tradition. (The canon, or catalogue, of the inspired books to be included in Sacred Scripture was not formally drawn up until 382 AD, at the Council of Rome.)

“The Catechism says that the Holy Spirit entrusted the task of authentically interpreting the word of God, both written and oral, to the Church, that is, the bishops in communion with the pope.

“It is this Church, founded by Christ on Peter, as on a rock, which Christ promised to guard from error: not the Bible, except insofar as the Bible would be backed by the Church’s Christ-given authority to teach. We call this authority her ‘magisterium’, from the Latin ‘magister’, meaning ‘teacher.’”

The priest goes on to instruct his readers on how to read the Bible, in light of the above information. There are some problems with the idea of Tradition and where it comes from, just as there have always been questions about the interpretation of Scripture. I have quoted Hans Küng quite a bit in my blog as he is a highly respected theologian and as he was a major figure in the formulation of Vatican II documents. In his The Catholic Church: A Short History, he says, of Peter: “But today even Catholic exegetes accept that the famous saying about Peter as the rock on which Jesus will build his church (Matthew 16:18-19; the statement is in the future tense)—of which the other gospels know nothing—is not a saying of the earthly Jesus but was composed after Easter by the Palestinian community, or later by Matthew’s community.”

We also learn from Küng that the councils of the fourth century, including Nicaea, were as much political as they were religious. I do not know of the Council of Rome, but the Second Ecumenical Council in 381, at Constantinople, which was at the time the centre of political power as well as of Church authority, was convened by the emperor Theodosius the Great. Here is what Küng has to say about Theodosius: “…a strictly orthodox Spaniard, who at the end of the fourth Christian century decreed a ban on all pagan cults and sacrificial rites and accused of lèse majesté those who broke this law. That made Christianity now formally the state religion, the Catholic Church the state church, and heresy a crime against the state.”

The issue of the source of Revelation—Scripture or Tradition, or both; if both, how much emphasis should be placed on one or the other?—was hotly contested at the Second Vatican Council. The progressive bishops, who were the majority in the council, argued that Revelation must be based on Scripture, which is the revealed word of God; the conservative Roman Curia vehemently argues otherwise. In the end, the progressives won, but of course Vatican II itself has been steadily reinterpreted by John Paul II and by Benedict XVI, especially when the latter was prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

So what to believe? What to do? I am still forming my faith (In my blog there is an essay called “The Pilgrim and the Path,” which you might find useful. It is the story of my faith journey so far.), but I would tend to go with Jesus: “As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you. Remain in my love. If you keep my commandments you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my own joy may be in you and your joy be complete. This is my commandment: love one another as I have loved you.”

There is an article in today’s New York Times, by Eric Lax, entitled “Have Faith in Love.” You might enjoy reading it.

I wish you joy and many blessings on your journey and hope we will correspond again.

Regards,

Ross

I would be interested in further comment on this question.

The Church as the People of God

In Part V, "The Ecclesiology of the Second Vatican Council," in his book The Church: The Evolution of Catholicism, theologian Richard McBrien says the following about Lumen Gentium, or the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, which was approved by the council in its third session in 1964:

The second chapter of Lumen gentium is entitled “The People of God.” In teaching that the Church is a mystery, or sacrament, the council underscored the point that the Church, like a sacrament, has a visible and an invisible side. The invisible side is the presence of the triune God. The visible side is primarily the baptized persons who constitute the Church. The Church is not something apart from the baptized to which they “belong” as recipients and beneficiaries of its principal assets, namely, the sacraments. The People of God are the Church. Whatever structures and other institutional elements exist within the Church are to assist the People of God to fulfill their mission and ministries. These elements, therefore, exist to serve the whole People of God, not the other way around. Indeed, according to the fourth chapter, on the laity in the Church, the laity share in the threefold office of Christ: of teaching, ruling, and sanctifying. The lay apostolate is no longer conceived as a delegated participation in the ministry of the hierarchy, but as a direct sharing in the mission of the Church through Baptism and Confirmation and then “communicated and nourished” by the Eucharist.

It seems to me that as baptized Catholics we must understand and take to heart what the council fathers fought so hard to give us and what the Church hierarchy, since 1979, has been in the process of attempting to reverse. It is not by virtue of our obedience to the dictates of the Roman Curia that we are the People of God, and no matter who we are, as Catholics we are entitled to receive the sacraments from those whose duty it is "to serve the whole People of God." Every priest, bishop, and Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, along with each lay person, belongs equally to the People of God and is therefore equally a sinner who is striving for perfection. We must remember this, even if the hierarchy chooses not to remember.

We must not mistake the organization or the institution for the real Church. As Father McBrien also says:

The council’s understanding of the Church as mystery, or sacrament, represents a transcending of the preconciliar concept of the Church as primarily an institution or organization. In the latter instance, one “belongs” to the Church; in the former, one participates in the life of the Church, and with all its other members, constitutes the very reality of the Church.