Ralph M. McInerny - What Went Wrong With Vatican II: The Catholic Crisis Explained

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Copyright 1998 Ralph M. McInerny

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

Jacket design by Lorraine Bilodeau

The cover artwork is a detail of the photo
Council at St. Peters, 1962, by David Lees ( Corbis)

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

McInerny, Ralph M.

What went wrong with Vatican II : the Catholic crisis explained / Ralph M. McInerny.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 0-918477-79-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)

1. Vatican Council (2nd : 1962-1965) I. Title.

BX830 1962.M39 1998

Contents

Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, but to be young was very Heaven. Thus wrote William Wordsworth in a bout of enthusiasm for the French Revolution, perhaps possible only because he had the English Channel as a buffer between himself and it. Many felt the same exhilaration during the halcyon days of the Second Vatican Council, whose sessions were held from 1962 to 1965.

A new day had dawned. Windows were to be thrown open and the fresh air of modernity let in. This was indeed the day the Lord had made.

Surprise had been expressed when John XXIII announced that there would be a council. The usual conditions for calling such a high-level meeting of the bishops of the Church did not seem present, and, as if taking this into account, the Holy Father stressed that this would be a pastoral council, not one called to deal with doctrinal matters. Church teachings, the implication was, were about as clear as they could be. What was wanted was a renewed effort on the part of Catholics to evangelize the world, an updating, an aggiornamento.

JFK and John XXIII: They Werent What They Seemed John XXIII reminded many of Friar Tuck, who had been chaplain to a band of benevolent thieves. He seemed everyones grandfather, someone who, understanding all, would forgive all. He was often linked with John F. Kennedy, who had been elected president of the United States in 1960 and in one stroke had given Catholicism a social acceptability it had never had before in this country. The two Johns would somehow make the Faith palatable to the modern world. How could anyone fail to respond to the genial, pudgy little Pope? And how could anyone resist the charm of JFK, a celebrity, a star, who brought near frenzy to otherwise sober folk?

President Kennedys posthumous reputation, unfortunately, sinks lower every day. If he made it seem almost chic to be Catholic, it is difficult to grasp what, if anything, he himself really believed.

On the other hand, anyone who takes the trouble to discover what kind of man John XXIII really was will find it difficult to recognize the media persona with which he was invested. It is forgotten now that early in his papacy he issued a directive requiring Latin to be fully restored as the language of instruction in seminaries and pontifical institutions. His sense of the dignity and authority of the papal office is clear from the encyclical he wrote on Pope Leo I.

The real John XXIII does not look like the patron of our modern decentralized Church, whose Liturgy is celebrated in more languages than were known at Babel. And Vatican II, like the French Revolution, receives for the most part mixed reviews. Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity sounded wonderful, but a lot of heads would roll. So, too, aggiornamento had its attractions, but did so many cherished traditions have to go?

The Strength of the Church in the 1950s

What did the preconciliar Church look like? It would be very wrong to imagine that it was something broken and in need of repair. Here are some impressions of the Church in the United States just before the bishops convened at the Vatican to begin the council.

In his monumental 1979 book, The Battle for the American Church, Msgr. George Kelly provided a little tour de monde, listing dozens of Catholic intellectuals here and abroad who had world-class standings as artists, writers, and thinkers. The English Catholic firmament, he noted, was studded with stars,

Still, there was in the postwar world a sense that Catholics had not yet come into their own insofar as the intellectual and cultural life of the nation was concerned. In many ways, this mirrored the self-criticism of the WASP elite when it looked toward England during the nineteenth century. This discontent among Catholics had a galvanizing effect on Catholic colleges and universities, initiating a drive toward excellence that was soon to have astonishing results, both good and bad.

Msgr. Kellys evocation of the preconciliar scene compares interestingly with that of the acerbic English Catholic Evelyn Waugh. Like many British writers, Waugh tended to be condescending toward the former colonies. In his book The Loved One, he made the burial customs of California a metaphor for the nation. It would be easy to document his credentials as an anti-American. But Waugh was also a Catholic, a convert, and one whose loyalty to his adopted Church was profound.