Posted on 04/15/2005 4:34:46 PM PDT by Grey Ghost II
In church's dreams, Vatican II never happened
April 13, 2005
BY ANDREW GREELEY
The American TV networks spent huge sums of money and sent scores of people to Rome last week. Characteristically, they spent little time or energy on research and hence provided weak and stereotypical journalism, limited to questions about married priests, female priests, gays and sexual abuse. They missed completely the most critical issue for the church in the 21st century -- Vatican Council II and the changes it created.
Many, if not most, of the cardinal electors would tell you that the council was an incident, a bump in the road. The council fathers wrote some useful documents. There was misguided enthusiasm after the council, but Pope John Paul II sternly reimposed order on the church. The council is interesting mainly now as a historical matter.
Leaders lost their nerve
They could not be more wrong. The council was a revolutionary event that had a profound impact on Catholics who lived through it and indirectly on their children, who have barely heard about it. It's still the green dragon lurking in the Sistine Chapel even if the electors can't quite see it.
The model of unchanging Catholicism in response to the Reformation, the Enlightenment and the French Revolution assumed that the church would not change, should not change, could not change. Suddenly the laity and lower clergy experienced changes in liturgy, in Scripture interpretation, in theories of religious liberty, in attitudes toward other Christians and Jews, in trust of the modern world. The structures -- patterns of behavior and supporting motivations -- that had supported the church for several centuries collapsed.
The council fathers may not have foreseen this collapse, but they did vote for the changes (in overwhelming numbers) and hence the documents themselves and the action of the fathers (presumably in Catholic theology guided by the Holy Spirit) were responsible for the destabilization.
It was, as it seemed then, a new spring for the church, now flexible, joyful and confidently open to the world. However, the ferment frightened some of the leaders who lost their nerve and responded the only way they knew how -- repression. They issued new orders without any serious attempt to explain the reasons for them. They silenced some theologians. They appointed reactionary bishops, who were not always the brightest or most humane. They investigated seminaries. Their mood changed from optimism to grim warnings and solemn denunciations. The church, for a few years a bright light on the mountaintop, had once again become an embattled fortress afraid of the modern world.
House of cards collapsed
The leaders confidently expected that the laity would do what they were told. They could not have been more wrong, nor their strategy more counterproductive. The laity and the lower clergy for the most part simply ignored them and went about creating new structures in which Catholics would affiliate with the church on their own terms. Resignations from the priesthood and the collapse of priestly vocations began only after the desperate attempts to slow down change turned the mood of the council years sour. The present crisis of the credibility of church leadership arose precisely from mistaken attempts to reassert the old leadership style. The problem is not so much the council as restorationist attempts to undo it.
To be fair, no one realized how potentially frail was the so-called confident church of 1950, both in America and around the world. A push from a handful of conciliar documents and the whole house of cards collapsed. For many leaders who had known the seeming serenity of the pre-conciliar church, it was unthinkable that the structures had disappeared overnight and with them their own credibility. So they fell back on them to prevent a disappearance that had already occurred.
The restorationist style continues here in Rome, though it should be clear that it doesn't work. Despite the late pope's efforts to reassert the church's traditional sexual ethic, acceptance of it has declined everywhere.
Few willing to admit truth
In the pre-conclave atmosphere, it is necessary to pretend that this is not true. Or if there is a bit of truth in it, the proper response of the new pope should be yet tougher repression, more vigorous restoration. Almost no one is willing to admit even to themselves that the leadership strategy since 1970 has caused most of the problems in the church -- the decline of vocations and church attendance and the alienation of the young.
Vatican II is the dragon in their midst that they cannot see and they wish would go away. Unfortunately they have not, will not learn that you cannot repeal an ecumenical council and cancel its effects.
Your answer would have the desired effect provided good will on the part of the listener. Some people just don't want to accept the gracious gifts God offers for free.
The threat of going to hell ought to be enough to make a listener open his eyes. But today we have such sophistication deeply imbued in the minds of even young children thanks to television and progressive curriculum, that their hearts are hardened far in advance. I defer to the Act of Contrition, the one that was standard even before I was to learn the newer version, and I'm pushing 50. But since it is superior theologically, it is the one I have taught my own kids, which I hope will do its part to save them from some of the sophisticated self-centeredness that I suffered as a young adult, due in part, it seems to me, from the corrupted form of this prayer that I learned as a child:
Oh my God, I am heartilly sorry for having offended Thee and I detest all my sins because I dread the loss of heaven and the pains of hell; but most of all because they offend Thee, my God, Who art all good and deserving of all my love. I firmly resolve with the help of Thy grace, to confess my sins, to do penance and to amend my life. Amen.
This should be prayed every day by all Catholics.
Fear of hell is a starting point. If it works, well, that's better than the alternative. But more than that, one ought not stop there, since it is the higher virtue of love of God that ought to be our motivation. For someone to say, as the other response to this post of yours does, that the "stick of hell" is somehow insufficient for this modern, more highly informed age, is to speak with the same pride and foolishness that characterizes all the apostates of history. The Church is here for our good, to save our souls; and it is up to us to submit to her guiding lead lest we follow the wide path, the easy path, and the path of perdition.
Learn the Theology of the Body, start with West's "for Beginners" book, pick up the CDs at www.nakedwithoutshame.com, then move up to West's "explained" book then perhaps you can grasp the raw text of the Holy Father's audiences.
We need people who not only know it themselves but can teach it, because it is the cure for the culture of death. That's his legacy to us.
There is also a show running on EWTN that is going thru it. They haven't gotten very far so I can't really predict how well they are going to explain it.
If we could replace the contraceptive mentality that is being taught, even in parochial schools, with this beautiful teaching it would ignite a fire in the Church and in this society.
In our archdiocese we are trying to do just that, teaching parents and preparing catechists to go to the Catholic high schools
Good point, dear.
I think perhaps GBDDOJ was suggesting the 'deacon' should resign.
I agree. The "DEACON" should resign (or convert).
That's why Catholics observe it, right?
Lots of Catholics ignore several of the Ten Commandments.
In your AmChurch world, that means the Ten Commandments are still open to discussion, and God did not exactly do "a perfectly good job" of passing them down to us.
This is a bald-faced lie, you deceptive AmChurch "deacon." This is NOT Catholic teaching! This is apostacy!
The method (NFP or non-abortafacient contraception) is secondary.
This is proof of rank heresy.
Why don't you do your soul a favor and either cease and desist claiming to be a Catholic deacon or cease and desist in your open public persistent dissent? Does your diocese know you publicly advocate such rank heresy?
Perhaps it would also be a good thing to find out why a significant number of clergy don't accept the teaching either.
Perhaps you've never read about The End Times and the Great Apostacy.
Dissent on contraception is part of it, as are those who publicly undermine Church teaching on it.
Couples who use NFP are doing what, exactly?
And, when they engage in sexual intercourse only in non-fertile periods, what are they intending, exactly?
You know well the difference between NFP and artificial contraception. Your comments are are heretical, and for them you must answer to God.
Not even a remote possibility.
I will ask them again:
What exactly does a couple do when using NFP?
And, what exactly is the intention of the couple when using NFP?
If you don't know the answer to your rhetorical spin, you should resign. Or be removed.
You, apparently, either dont' know, or you do know, but won't respond because your answer will agree with what I wrote.
Are you a heretic too?
Be Catholic or get out of the diaconate, "deacon."
For lurkers who may not know, NFP is used by Catholic couples to regulate the spacing of children. When NFP is used, it is used at infertile periods when the couple may engage in sexual intercourse without the result of conception.
The intention of the couple using NFP is to avoid conception, which is why intercourse takes place during infertile periods.
You know my position quite well. I've posted it here repeatedly. You are posting rank heresy in your claim of moral equivalence between NFP and barrier methods. For that, you must answer to God.
You know well the evil of what you are saying, you understand the nature of this debate, you are saying it publicly in the capacity of an ordained minister of the Diocese of Fort Worth, you are publicly expressing open dissent and heresy, and as such, you are objectyively committing mortal sin. For that, you must answer to God
Repent and believe. Before you lose your soul.
And you know my position well. I have a personal opinion, but I teach that artificial methods of birth control are contrary to Church teaching.
When you post on this forum, claiming to be an ordained deacon of the Diocese of Fort Worth, you are publicly teaching, in the capacity of an ordained minister, in the name of your bishop.
You repeatedly draw a moral equivalency between barrier methods and NFP, and publicly admit you do not agree with the infallible continuous teaching of the Ordinary Magisterium of the Church expressed in Humanae Vitae.
This is documented public heresy for which there are definitive spiritual consequences.
Are you willing to lose your soul to serve this AmChurch agenda?.
No, I'm not. Contraception is contrary to the teaching of the Church. It doesn't matter whether I agree with it or not.
I don't practice contraception, don't teach it, and don't advocate it.
Nothing could be clearer.
I think they are. They're ok with the pill, they're even ok with abortion, in the sense that they don't think they're going to hell for having one. They think it just one more sin in that big ole pile, that the Lord is just ready to toss aside, while preparing to show them his love, his understanding, his ability to put himself in their place.
You have Holy Ordered reps of the Church refusing to teach what the Church teaches, and admitting such without a qualm. And they represent the majority, not the minority. How do you overcome such metasticization?
I do think that there are a decent share of Catholics as you've described them in your post. Ones who have put up with the insupportable because they were and are Faithful. But they're not red-fanged like the progressives. They're meek. They aren't rabble rousers.
My Mother and I were talking about obedience to Church doctrine just yesterday. She's 73 years old, grew up in Italy in the late 40s and 50s. And, she said that people have always disobeyed, the difference was that they disobeyed knowing they were being disobedient, and would have never admitted to anyone that they were using birth control, etc. Thus the disease was capable of being contained.
It's not that way at all now. The apostasy is propogated with much greater vigour than the Faith ever is. The Faith is second to what they believe is right for their life.
Since liberalization provided the means by which the apostasy metasticized, the Church should have been really selective about who She allowed to remain within her walls.
They shouldn't have allowed me or people like me back so easily. I abandoned her without a care, while others remained faithful. And yet the minute I was taken back, I could show up early on Christmas Eve, and get the best seat in the house, even though I should have been forced to stand, and the Faithful be given the privilege of appreciating what they had remained faithful to.
I think 'progress' will continue unabated. Only catastrophy will mobilize a realignment.
I hope I'm wrong, and that our future Pope and many of the up and coming young Priests will lead the Church back to her moorings.
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