Discussions on Traditionalism: The Council Documents
Before I ask you questions about the council, I wanted to mention that I went to the New Mass this last Sunday to observe.
Not at all like you remembered the Mass, was it?
No! It really seemed much more ... I don't know ...
Laid back. Relaxed. Like "Catholicism Lite," right?
I guess so ...
It's no wonder Mass attendance is down 50%. The New Mass is boring and uninspiring. The solemn chants and majestic organ music have been replaced with folk guitarists singing hippie songs from the 70s and 80s (many of which, by the way, were written by Marty Haugen, who is a Lutheran).
The beautiful vestments that the priests used to wear have been replaced by those bland robes that look like horse blankets.
The glorious high altar has been replaced with a common table, and even the vessels - the gold chalice, the gold paten, etc. - have often been replaced with clear-glass cups and dishes.
I did see quite a bit of that.
Well, there you go - that's the fruit of the council's intention to make the mysteries of Faith more relevant to Modern Man. They brought everything down to Man's level, instead of raising Man up to heaven, and in the process they stripped from the Mass whatever was mysterious and beautiful. Now it's just plain bland.
Anyway, we were going to discuss the council some more.
Yes, I wanted you to back up your previous statements about the documents being ambiguous.
No problem. But first, I want to step back and set the historical scene for you, so you get an idea of how these documents were created and how the ambiguities slipped in.
Ok.
Pope John XXIII announced his intention to call the council in 1959. The council didn't actually open until October of 1962. In the two or so years that came between, there were several Commissions that were given the task of drawing up schemas that would be the basis for the council's official documents.
Like rough outlines?
More or less, yes. So the various Commissions came up with 70 schemas that
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, a very conservative and orthodox man, was on the Central Preparatory Commission that was in charge of reviewing the schemas. His recollection was that
Ok, so what's the point?
When the council opened, a liberal faction in the council managed to have those original schemas tossed out the window. Lefebvre tells the story of how the matter came to a vote, and the liberals didn't get the required two-thirds majority - but they did come out on top, 60% to 40%.
So they complained to the pope that, basically, 60% was close enough, and they shouldn't be forced to go forward with something that the majority wasn't in favor of - and the pope agreed. So he intervened and that was the end of the 70 schemas.
So they started from scratch?! Ugh.
Yes, basically. It really caused a lot of confusion for the bishops, because they weren't working with the prepared material which they had all had a chance to review before coming to Rome. So for the rest of the council, documents were being drafted for discussion, and then the bishops were being asked to vote before they'd had a chance to really review the new material.
I don't know if you've seen the documents of Vatican II, but they're quite dense. A bishop can't be expected to read and digest so many hundreds of pages, and then cast a responsible vote. Many of the bishops voted in favor of documents of which they had only read parts, and they just trusted the majority - kind of a "go with the flow" scenario.
So who drafted the new documents?
Various commissions, but usually there was some principle architect behind each document. So, for example, the document on Religious Liberty was drafted by the liberal bishop from America, John Courtney Murray; the two documents on the Church, Lumen Gentium and Gaudiem et Spes were mostly the work of Karol Wojtyla, later Pope John Paul II; the document on the Liturgy was drafted by Annibale Bugnini, who - neatly enough - also ended up being the one largely in charge of implementing the document.
There was definitely a liberal force behind the drafting of the new documents, and Archbishop Lefebvre commented on this:
I think I'm beginning to get a better picture of what went on ...
It was a blitzkrieg. Most of those 2,400 bishops came to Rome expecting to rubber-stamp the prepared schemas, and suddenly they were broadsided by the liberal faction who - it cannot be stressed enough - had really done their homework. The rest just stumbled through the council blindly, looking for some kind of guidance - they didn't know what had hit them.
So the bishops were working with tainted documents to start with.
Right, and mostly documents drawn up by men with progressivist ideas - like Murray, Bugnini, Wojtyla, etc. But these men couldn't just come right out and embed heresies in the documents - they had to craft their statements carefully, with a great degree of ambiguity.
Even still, they raised a lot of red flags. Archbishop Lefebvre was only one of many who stood up and presented "interventions" (formal objections to the documents) during the periods of discussion, objections in which he often complained of how proximate to heresy some of the statements were. He ended up publishing his interventions in a book after the council was over, called I Accuse the Council!
Ok, so we've established that the documents were created with the ambiguities already in them. Can you give some examples?
Yes, I can. Let's start with the first document promulgated by the council: Sacrosanctum Concilium, Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy.
Sounds foreboding.
Funny!
This was the document that called for the revision of the Mass; and since it's pretty safe to say that the council fathers had no idea that the New Mass was what was going to result from this document, this is a pretty good place to start looking ambiguity.
Cardinal Heenan once made the comment that neither the council fathers nor the pope foresaw just how radical the liturgical reforms would be, based on the document they approved:
So obviously there must have been enough ambiguity in the document on the Liturgy to warrant the views of the conservative council fathers, as well as the radical plans of the liberals.
So what does this document say, exactly?
Many things. It begins by saying that the liturgical reform is intended "to adapt more suitably to the needs of our own times those institutions which are subject to change." (SC, 1) Of course, it never defines exactly which "institutions" are "subject to change."
In a similar way, it says a few paragraphs later that "where necessary, the rites [should] be revised carefully in the light of sound tradition, [so] that they be given new vigor to meet the circumstances and needs of modern times." (par. 4) Again, no mention is made of what specific "circumstances and needs of modern times" are being referred to in this paragraph - nor does it define what constitutes "necessity" in the question of revision of the rites. At what point does a particular revision become "necessary?"
The council states that the laity should become more involved in the liturgy by "fully conscious, and active participation" (par. 14), and - incredibly - that "In the restoration and promotion of the sacred liturgy, this full and active participation by all the people is the aim to be considered before all else." (par. 14)
What did they mean by "full and active participation"?
That's a very good question, to which this document never once gives a clear answer. And that's pretty amazing, considering that this "full and active participation" - whatever it might mean - is declared by the council to be "the aim to be considered before all else"! You'd think if this was going to be the paramount guiding principle for the reform, it would have received a little more definition.
So who ends up deciding what it means?
Apparently, the Consilium that was later appointed (after the council) to put this document into practice and give it some flesh.
Then this document serves as kind of a "blank check," of sorts?
Exactly. And then it goes on to say that "the liturgy is made up of immutable elements divinely instituted, and of elements subject to change. These not only may but ought to be changed with the passage of time if they have suffered from the intrusion of anything out of harmony with the inner nature of the liturgy or have become unsuited to it." (par. 21)
A whole flurry of questions arises from this paragraph: which of the "elements" are "subject to change"? What is the benchmark for deciding if any of these elements has "suffered from the intrusion of anything out of harmony with the inner nature of the liturgy"?
For that matter, what is this "inner nature of the liturgy"? What makes an element in-or-out of "harmony", suited or "unsuited", to this "inner nature"?
I mean, here the document says that anything out of "harmony" with this ill-defined "inner nature" of the liturgy "not only may but ought to be changed" - but it becomes up to the Consilium to determine what is or is not in harmony with the "inner nature" of the liturgy, so that pretty much leaves everything open to the fate of being revised.
Sounds like a free-for-all.
That is exactly what it turned into. And it didn't help that the very next paragraph accomplished a kind of bait-and-switch: on the one hand, the regulation of the liturgy "depends solely on the authority of the Church, that is, on the Apostolic See and, as laws may determine, on the bishop." Which is to say that such regulation "belongs also to various kinds of competent territorial bodies of bishops legitimately established." (par. 22, 1-2)
So this power of regulating the liturgy belongs to Rome first, then to the bishop and "territorial bodies of bishops." Got that?
I think so.
Ok, so then the council says, "Therefore no other person, even if he be a priest, may add, remove, or change anything in the liturgy on his own authority." (par. 22, 3)
Which is probably as it should be, don't you think?
Yes! Except for one problem. After the council had finished declaring its ambiguous teaching on "collegiality," the pope and bishops began acting in a much more democratic fashion - so Rome conceded authority over the liturgy to the bishops, and the bishops in turn conceded that authority to ...
Let me guess: the priests and laity.
Uh-huh. And the document actually foresees this eventuality, because it says much later, "It is desirable that the competent territorial ecclesiastical authority mentioned in Art. 22, 2" - that's the groups of bishops - "set up a liturgical commission, to be assisted by experts in liturgical science, sacred music, art and pastoral practice."
So the bishops own the liturgy; but the council wants those bishops to set up liturgical commissions and seek the help of "experts" - whoever they may be.
Then it says:
Ahhh ... this is something entirely different, isn't it? The bishops set up commissions, the commissions are run by experts - and this "[includes] laymen as circumstances suggest," which means it always includes them, because circumstances always suggest it.
Then comes the blitz: "Under the direction of the above-mentioned territorial ecclesiastical authority" - who, of course, is going to roll over and play dead like a good democratic bishop should - "the commission is to regulate pastoral-liturgical action throughout the territory, and to promote studies and necessary experiments [!!!] whenever there is question of adaptations to be proposed to the Apostolic See."
Promote experiments?
You heard right.
So keep in mind that whenever the document says "competent territorial ecclesiastical authority," it means these lay-led liturgical commissions.
That becomes rather important in statements like this: "The competent territorial ecclesiastical authority ... must ... carefully and prudently consider which elements from the traditions and culture of individual peoples might appropriately be admitted into divine worship." (par. 40, 1)
This is what started the liturgical "inculturation" craze. And with no one to regulate the madness except for the liturgical commissions spread from here to kingdom come ... well, now you know why American parishes have Masses that feature folk guitars. That's part of our "culture" ever since the 60s, so it must be considered appropriate to "be admitted into divine worship."
But by that logic, what wouldn't be considered "cultural", and therefore appropriate for the Mass?
Ask the "competent territorial ecclesiastical authority." What the liturgical commissions say is what becomes normal practice.
Moving on ...
Yes ...
Another paragraph says: "The rites should be distinguished by a noble simplicity." Again, no definition whatsoever is given for what is to be considered "noble simplicity" - that becomes a relative measuring stick which manifests itself in different ways depending on who's in charge.
It goes on: "[the rites] should be short, clear, and unencumbered by useless repetitions; they should be within the people's powers of comprehension, and normally should not require much explanation." (par. 34)
But what does "useless repetitions" mean? There are plenty of repetitions in the Old Mass - the Kyrie is repeated, the mea culpa is repeated, the Domine non sum dignus is repeated ... the genuflection at the consecration is repeated, and there are dozens of repetitions of the sign of the cross throughout. Who's to say which of these repetitions is "useless"? What makes a thing "useless" or not?
Let me guess: the document doesn't tell us.
No, it doesn't. So one council father might have been perfectly orthodox and would have been thinking one thing when he read "useless repetitions" - maybe he was thinking of just one or two parts of the Mass - but the liberal who reads this (and later gets to help implement it) is thinking about a bunch of things that he's planning on removing from the Mass!
Have you seen enough examples of ambiguity in this document?
Sure. Let's move on to another.
Alright, we'll look at the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, called Lumen Gentium.
Where do they get these goofy names for the documents?
The official Latin document names are taken from the first few words of the document. This one begins, "The Light of nations is Christ ..." - and "light of nations" is lumen gentium in Latin.
Ok - just curious. Carry on.
LG was written to "unfold more fully to the faithful of the Church and to the whole world its own inner nature and universal mission." (par. 1)
It then goes on to review salvation history in a series of paragraphs that are pretty well saturated in Scripture - nothing too out of the ordinary there. In fact, much of what is said in these first six or seven paragraphs is quite orthodox, and worth reading.
However, after doing such a marvelous job of explaining the nature of the Church, the document says, "This Church constituted and organized in the world as a society, subsists in the Catholic Church, which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the Bishops in communion with him." (par. 8)
This one sentence has caused much consternation, because it is very difficult to say what the council meant by the word "subsists." When Pius XII described the relationship between "the Church of Christ" on the one hand, and "the Catholic Church," on the other hand, he used the verb "is":
For whatever reason, the council chose the word "subsists in" to describe that same relationship.
What does the phrase mean - how is it different from what Pius XII said?
It may well not be different at all. But some theologians assumed that it was. Fr. Bouyer is quoted as saying that this phrase
In the same article, Fr. Congar (another liberal peritus at the council) is quoted as saying:
So the "subsists in" phrase could mean that the "Church of Christ" is a larger entity that encompasses more than just the Roman Catholic Church?
That's how some theologians interpreted it. Others disagreed. Just recently, in fact, the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity released a document trying to correct this error:
So as you can see, the very fact that there is still this argument going on over this phrase proves that there is a lot of ambiguity in the phrase itself.
It would appear so!
The council document goes on to say that "many elements of sanctification and of truth are found outside of [the Catholic Church's] visible structure." (par. 8)
What are these "elements" that are found outside the Church?
Most likely this refers to things like Sacred Scripture and the various sacraments that are still found in a valid form outside the Church - Protestant baptism, for example, is a valid sacrament, and the Eastern Orthodox still possess valid sacraments of Holy Orders and the Eucharist.
But nevertheless, a statement like this can only lead to confusion - if "elements" of sanctification and truth can be found outside the Church, is this sufficient for salvation? Is the Church still necessary for salvation?
That's why I think it's important that the document immediately adds, "These elements, as gifts belonging to the Church of Christ, are forces impelling toward catholic unity." (par. 8)
So it still affirms that the Catholic Church is the sole source of the sacraments, and that wherever they exist outside the Church, they are intended to lead souls back into the Church ... but it's still a bit ambiguous, taken as a whole, and then combined with other statements in the document.
Such as?
Such as this statement:
That's ambiguous at best. In "many ways" the Church is "linked" with those outside the unity of the papacy? What does this mean? In what way are they "linked"? In past ages it was more precise: those outside the Church are, objectively speaking, heretics who have no hope of salvation.
That doesn't appear to be the council's position!
Well, but the Church has always said that there is such a thing as "baptism of desire," meaning that some people - through no fault of their own - are not aware of the Church or their obligation to belong to it. But they follow the Divine Law as best as they know it, and are of sufficient good-will such that - had they known better - they would have gladly been a part of the Catholic Church. These souls can be saved because they belong to the Church implicitly - by way of desire.
Pope Pius XII spoke of this when he said that there are those who are outside the Church who "by an unconscious desire and longing ... have a certain relationship with the Mystical Body of the Redeemer," but he was more precise than Vatican II, because he immediately added, "they still remain deprived of those many heavenly gifts and helps which can only be enjoyed in the Catholic Church," and he pleaded with the separated brethren to "correspond to the interior movements of grace, and to seek to withdraw from that state in which they cannot be sure of their salvation." (Mystici Corporis Christi, 103)
So even Pope Pius XII acknowledges that non-Catholics have a "certain relationship" to the Church, but that in their separated state they "cannot be sure of their salvation." Not that their salvation is impossible, but it is by no means guaranteed, especially considering that they are "deprived of ... many heavenly gifts and helps which can only enjoyed in the Catholic Church."
So what did the council say that Pius XII didn't say?
The council simply emphasized the "maybe" aspect of this relationship between the Church and non-Catholics, without as forcefully stating that they are in a gravely deficient situation.
I do have to add, though, that the council did state rather clearly in this document that "the Church, now sojourning on earth as an exile, is necessary for salvation ... Whosoever, therefore, knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by Christ, would refuse to enter or to remain in it, could not be saved." (par. 14)
It just seems like what the council gives with the left hand, it takes away with the right, and vice versa.
And we haven't even touched on the question of those who aren't even professing Christians.
Why, what did the council say about them?
Regarding the Muslims, the document says:
Obviously, this statement needs a lot of clarification before it can be given full assent of faith.
Obviously! Is the council saying that Muslims will be saved too?
Not if you read closely - it only says that the plan of salvation includes them - which is true. The plan of salvation includes all men; redemption is not withheld from anyone who desires it.
But what does it mean that the Muslims "along with us adore the one and merciful God?" Can we really say that the Muslims worship the same God as we do?
Do they?
Only in the sense that they're monotheists who believe in the God of Abraham. But the true God is a Trinity, and so it would seem that in order to worship the true God, one would have to accept the Second Person of the Godhead, Jesus Christ.
But notice that the council didn't say "the true God." It just said "the one and merciful God." Like I said, this needs serious clarification. The statement is too open-ended as it stands.
But enough about salvation - let's move on to that question of collegiality.
Please do.
The fundamental teaching of the Church is that the pope possesses supreme authority in the Church, and that each bishop possesses a similar "monarchical" authority in his own territory - an authority that is derived from the papacy.
The First Vatican Council declared the following:
At Vatican II, what happened is that two conflicting factions collided and ended up producing a statement that was a hybrid of the two opinions. On the one side was the traditional view: the pope possesses supreme authority in the Church; this authority can and is sometimes extended by the pope to the college of bishops when he convenes an Ecumenical Council. On the other side was the progressive view: the pope, in union with the college of bishops, possesses supreme authority, and the pope only exercises this authority as the representative head of the college of bishops.
That sounds very similar to the Eastern Orthodox position.
I believe it is quite close. It tends to view the pope as merely a figurehead, or a "first among equals."
The resulting council document somewhat blended these two views. The entire third chapter of Lumen Gentium goes back and forth on these points - it's far too lengthy to quote, but a few representative passages should give a decent idea of the conflict:
Notice the order: Jesus established the college of bishops, willed them to exist until the end of time, and secondly, in order to preserve unity in the college, He placed the pope over them.
Again, the order is reversed: the apostolic college was formed, and then Peter was placed over them - "chosen from among them" - you can almost hear the echo of "first among equals" here. This New Testament model is then applied to the modern-day Church:
The emphasis appears to be on the college of bishops here - is that right?
It certainly appears that way. But then the council - as if now speaking with the voice of the traditional council fathers - emphasizes the role of the pope:
So far so good, but then the council takes away with the left hand ...
Which statement receives the emphasis here? That the college of bishops "is also the subject of supreme and full power over the universal Church," or that "we understand this body together with its head ... and never without this head"?
Yeah, that doesn't seem to be quite so clear as it was in the First Vatican Council.
It was meant to be ambiguous. And then it meanders into the question of the college of bishops acting as a college - that is, a democratic body of bishops having authority over a single bishop's territory, when really that bishop has authority in his own proper diocese(s).
Archbishop Lefebvre foresaw this problem, and warned the council of it in one of his many interventions:
And did that come to pass?
In many ways, yes it did. It seems more and more than individual bishops don't feel right about exercising their rightful authority in their own diocese(s). You hear stories all the time about how a national synod of bishops will meet together to decide on some practical matter, and all of the bishops will go along with it - even if they individually don't want to.
A good example is communion in the hand - a national conference may approve it, and so an individual bishop will approve it in his diocese, even though he personally is against it, because he doesn't want to contradict the national conference. It works much more like a democracy now.
And all because of some ambiguities in the document ...
That's the story of the whole council. Almost every one of these documents can be neatly chopped up and sorted into two categories: statements that are cleanly orthodox, and statements that are, at best, ambiguous and bordering on the edge of heterodoxy.
The real problem came after the council, when the various synods of bishops starting implementing the council, and the liberal theologians who were at the council as periti began spreading their ideas publicly, citing portions of Vatican II as their justification.
Why didn't the pope put a stop to it?
That may be one of the most difficult questions of all. And that question can be asked of both Pope Paul VI and John Paul II - they both lamented the problems in the Church, but then they both continued to make practical decisions that only exacerbated the problem.
I sense another topic coming up for discussion.
The conciliar popes? Sure. They're a huge part of this, as is the role of Archbishop Lefebvre and his Society of Saint Pius X that sought to counter-act the revolution.
Ok, maybe we'll hit those subjects some other time then.
Whenever you're ready.
Not at all like you remembered the Mass, was it?
No! It really seemed much more ... I don't know ...
Laid back. Relaxed. Like "Catholicism Lite," right?
I guess so ...
It's no wonder Mass attendance is down 50%. The New Mass is boring and uninspiring. The solemn chants and majestic organ music have been replaced with folk guitarists singing hippie songs from the 70s and 80s (many of which, by the way, were written by Marty Haugen, who is a Lutheran).
The beautiful vestments that the priests used to wear have been replaced by those bland robes that look like horse blankets.
The glorious high altar has been replaced with a common table, and even the vessels - the gold chalice, the gold paten, etc. - have often been replaced with clear-glass cups and dishes.
I did see quite a bit of that.
Well, there you go - that's the fruit of the council's intention to make the mysteries of Faith more relevant to Modern Man. They brought everything down to Man's level, instead of raising Man up to heaven, and in the process they stripped from the Mass whatever was mysterious and beautiful. Now it's just plain bland.
Anyway, we were going to discuss the council some more.
Yes, I wanted you to back up your previous statements about the documents being ambiguous.
No problem. But first, I want to step back and set the historical scene for you, so you get an idea of how these documents were created and how the ambiguities slipped in.
Ok.
Pope John XXIII announced his intention to call the council in 1959. The council didn't actually open until October of 1962. In the two or so years that came between, there were several Commissions that were given the task of drawing up schemas that would be the basis for the council's official documents.
Like rough outlines?
More or less, yes. So the various Commissions came up with 70 schemas that
... renewed the anathemas of Trent and Vatican I, as well as the wholesale denunciation of the contemporary world already found in Pius IX's "Syllabus of Errors." (Gary McEoin, book review for "History Of Vatican II, Volume IIII", National Catholic Reporter, Sept. 22, 2000)
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, a very conservative and orthodox man, was on the Central Preparatory Commission that was in charge of reviewing the schemas. His recollection was that
... in them the Church’s doctrine is absolutely orthodox. They were adapted in a certain manner to our times, but with great moderation and discretion. (Archbishop Lefebvre, Open Letter to Confused Catholics, online source)
Ok, so what's the point?
When the council opened, a liberal faction in the council managed to have those original schemas tossed out the window. Lefebvre tells the story of how the matter came to a vote, and the liberals didn't get the required two-thirds majority - but they did come out on top, 60% to 40%.
So they complained to the pope that, basically, 60% was close enough, and they shouldn't be forced to go forward with something that the majority wasn't in favor of - and the pope agreed. So he intervened and that was the end of the 70 schemas.
So they started from scratch?! Ugh.
Yes, basically. It really caused a lot of confusion for the bishops, because they weren't working with the prepared material which they had all had a chance to review before coming to Rome. So for the rest of the council, documents were being drafted for discussion, and then the bishops were being asked to vote before they'd had a chance to really review the new material.
I don't know if you've seen the documents of Vatican II, but they're quite dense. A bishop can't be expected to read and digest so many hundreds of pages, and then cast a responsible vote. Many of the bishops voted in favor of documents of which they had only read parts, and they just trusted the majority - kind of a "go with the flow" scenario.
So who drafted the new documents?
Various commissions, but usually there was some principle architect behind each document. So, for example, the document on Religious Liberty was drafted by the liberal bishop from America, John Courtney Murray; the two documents on the Church, Lumen Gentium and Gaudiem et Spes were mostly the work of Karol Wojtyla, later Pope John Paul II; the document on the Liturgy was drafted by Annibale Bugnini, who - neatly enough - also ended up being the one largely in charge of implementing the document.
There was definitely a liberal force behind the drafting of the new documents, and Archbishop Lefebvre commented on this:
Anyone who has experience of either civil or clerical meetings will understand the situation in which the Fathers found themselves. In these new schemas, although one could modify a few odd phrases or a few propositions by means of amendments, one could not change their essentials. The consequences would be serious. A text which is biased to begin with can never be entirely corrected. It retains the imprint of whoever drafted it and the thoughts that inspired it. The Council from then on was slanted. (Archbishop Lefebvre, Open Letter to Confused Catholics, online source)
I think I'm beginning to get a better picture of what went on ...
It was a blitzkrieg. Most of those 2,400 bishops came to Rome expecting to rubber-stamp the prepared schemas, and suddenly they were broadsided by the liberal faction who - it cannot be stressed enough - had really done their homework. The rest just stumbled through the council blindly, looking for some kind of guidance - they didn't know what had hit them.
So the bishops were working with tainted documents to start with.
Right, and mostly documents drawn up by men with progressivist ideas - like Murray, Bugnini, Wojtyla, etc. But these men couldn't just come right out and embed heresies in the documents - they had to craft their statements carefully, with a great degree of ambiguity.
Even still, they raised a lot of red flags. Archbishop Lefebvre was only one of many who stood up and presented "interventions" (formal objections to the documents) during the periods of discussion, objections in which he often complained of how proximate to heresy some of the statements were. He ended up publishing his interventions in a book after the council was over, called I Accuse the Council!
Ok, so we've established that the documents were created with the ambiguities already in them. Can you give some examples?
Yes, I can. Let's start with the first document promulgated by the council: Sacrosanctum Concilium, Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy.
Sounds foreboding.
Funny!
This was the document that called for the revision of the Mass; and since it's pretty safe to say that the council fathers had no idea that the New Mass was what was going to result from this document, this is a pretty good place to start looking ambiguity.
Cardinal Heenan once made the comment that neither the council fathers nor the pope foresaw just how radical the liturgical reforms would be, based on the document they approved:
Subsequent changes were more radical than those intended by Pope John and the bishops who passed the decree on the liturgy. His sermon at the end of the first session shows that Pope John did not suspect what was being planned by the liturgical experts. (John Cardinal Heenan, A Crown of Thorns [London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1974], p. 223)
So obviously there must have been enough ambiguity in the document on the Liturgy to warrant the views of the conservative council fathers, as well as the radical plans of the liberals.
So what does this document say, exactly?
Many things. It begins by saying that the liturgical reform is intended "to adapt more suitably to the needs of our own times those institutions which are subject to change." (SC, 1) Of course, it never defines exactly which "institutions" are "subject to change."
In a similar way, it says a few paragraphs later that "where necessary, the rites [should] be revised carefully in the light of sound tradition, [so] that they be given new vigor to meet the circumstances and needs of modern times." (par. 4) Again, no mention is made of what specific "circumstances and needs of modern times" are being referred to in this paragraph - nor does it define what constitutes "necessity" in the question of revision of the rites. At what point does a particular revision become "necessary?"
The council states that the laity should become more involved in the liturgy by "fully conscious, and active participation" (par. 14), and - incredibly - that "In the restoration and promotion of the sacred liturgy, this full and active participation by all the people is the aim to be considered before all else." (par. 14)
What did they mean by "full and active participation"?
That's a very good question, to which this document never once gives a clear answer. And that's pretty amazing, considering that this "full and active participation" - whatever it might mean - is declared by the council to be "the aim to be considered before all else"! You'd think if this was going to be the paramount guiding principle for the reform, it would have received a little more definition.
So who ends up deciding what it means?
Apparently, the Consilium that was later appointed (after the council) to put this document into practice and give it some flesh.
Then this document serves as kind of a "blank check," of sorts?
Exactly. And then it goes on to say that "the liturgy is made up of immutable elements divinely instituted, and of elements subject to change. These not only may but ought to be changed with the passage of time if they have suffered from the intrusion of anything out of harmony with the inner nature of the liturgy or have become unsuited to it." (par. 21)
A whole flurry of questions arises from this paragraph: which of the "elements" are "subject to change"? What is the benchmark for deciding if any of these elements has "suffered from the intrusion of anything out of harmony with the inner nature of the liturgy"?
For that matter, what is this "inner nature of the liturgy"? What makes an element in-or-out of "harmony", suited or "unsuited", to this "inner nature"?
I mean, here the document says that anything out of "harmony" with this ill-defined "inner nature" of the liturgy "not only may but ought to be changed" - but it becomes up to the Consilium to determine what is or is not in harmony with the "inner nature" of the liturgy, so that pretty much leaves everything open to the fate of being revised.
Sounds like a free-for-all.
That is exactly what it turned into. And it didn't help that the very next paragraph accomplished a kind of bait-and-switch: on the one hand, the regulation of the liturgy "depends solely on the authority of the Church, that is, on the Apostolic See and, as laws may determine, on the bishop." Which is to say that such regulation "belongs also to various kinds of competent territorial bodies of bishops legitimately established." (par. 22, 1-2)
So this power of regulating the liturgy belongs to Rome first, then to the bishop and "territorial bodies of bishops." Got that?
I think so.
Ok, so then the council says, "Therefore no other person, even if he be a priest, may add, remove, or change anything in the liturgy on his own authority." (par. 22, 3)
Which is probably as it should be, don't you think?
Yes! Except for one problem. After the council had finished declaring its ambiguous teaching on "collegiality," the pope and bishops began acting in a much more democratic fashion - so Rome conceded authority over the liturgy to the bishops, and the bishops in turn conceded that authority to ...
Let me guess: the priests and laity.
Uh-huh. And the document actually foresees this eventuality, because it says much later, "It is desirable that the competent territorial ecclesiastical authority mentioned in Art. 22, 2" - that's the groups of bishops - "set up a liturgical commission, to be assisted by experts in liturgical science, sacred music, art and pastoral practice."
So the bishops own the liturgy; but the council wants those bishops to set up liturgical commissions and seek the help of "experts" - whoever they may be.
Then it says:
So far as possible the commission should be aided by some kind of Institute for Pastoral Liturgy, consisting of persons who are eminent in these matters, and including laymen as circumstances suggest. (SC, par. 44)
Ahhh ... this is something entirely different, isn't it? The bishops set up commissions, the commissions are run by experts - and this "[includes] laymen as circumstances suggest," which means it always includes them, because circumstances always suggest it.
Then comes the blitz: "Under the direction of the above-mentioned territorial ecclesiastical authority" - who, of course, is going to roll over and play dead like a good democratic bishop should - "the commission is to regulate pastoral-liturgical action throughout the territory, and to promote studies and necessary experiments [!!!] whenever there is question of adaptations to be proposed to the Apostolic See."
Promote experiments?
You heard right.
So keep in mind that whenever the document says "competent territorial ecclesiastical authority," it means these lay-led liturgical commissions.
That becomes rather important in statements like this: "The competent territorial ecclesiastical authority ... must ... carefully and prudently consider which elements from the traditions and culture of individual peoples might appropriately be admitted into divine worship." (par. 40, 1)
This is what started the liturgical "inculturation" craze. And with no one to regulate the madness except for the liturgical commissions spread from here to kingdom come ... well, now you know why American parishes have Masses that feature folk guitars. That's part of our "culture" ever since the 60s, so it must be considered appropriate to "be admitted into divine worship."
But by that logic, what wouldn't be considered "cultural", and therefore appropriate for the Mass?
Ask the "competent territorial ecclesiastical authority." What the liturgical commissions say is what becomes normal practice.
Moving on ...
Yes ...
Another paragraph says: "The rites should be distinguished by a noble simplicity." Again, no definition whatsoever is given for what is to be considered "noble simplicity" - that becomes a relative measuring stick which manifests itself in different ways depending on who's in charge.
It goes on: "[the rites] should be short, clear, and unencumbered by useless repetitions; they should be within the people's powers of comprehension, and normally should not require much explanation." (par. 34)
But what does "useless repetitions" mean? There are plenty of repetitions in the Old Mass - the Kyrie is repeated, the mea culpa is repeated, the Domine non sum dignus is repeated ... the genuflection at the consecration is repeated, and there are dozens of repetitions of the sign of the cross throughout. Who's to say which of these repetitions is "useless"? What makes a thing "useless" or not?
Let me guess: the document doesn't tell us.
No, it doesn't. So one council father might have been perfectly orthodox and would have been thinking one thing when he read "useless repetitions" - maybe he was thinking of just one or two parts of the Mass - but the liberal who reads this (and later gets to help implement it) is thinking about a bunch of things that he's planning on removing from the Mass!
Have you seen enough examples of ambiguity in this document?
Sure. Let's move on to another.
Alright, we'll look at the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, called Lumen Gentium.
Where do they get these goofy names for the documents?
The official Latin document names are taken from the first few words of the document. This one begins, "The Light of nations is Christ ..." - and "light of nations" is lumen gentium in Latin.
Ok - just curious. Carry on.
LG was written to "unfold more fully to the faithful of the Church and to the whole world its own inner nature and universal mission." (par. 1)
It then goes on to review salvation history in a series of paragraphs that are pretty well saturated in Scripture - nothing too out of the ordinary there. In fact, much of what is said in these first six or seven paragraphs is quite orthodox, and worth reading.
However, after doing such a marvelous job of explaining the nature of the Church, the document says, "This Church constituted and organized in the world as a society, subsists in the Catholic Church, which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the Bishops in communion with him." (par. 8)
This one sentence has caused much consternation, because it is very difficult to say what the council meant by the word "subsists." When Pius XII described the relationship between "the Church of Christ" on the one hand, and "the Catholic Church," on the other hand, he used the verb "is":
... this true Church of Jesus Christ ... is the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic and Roman Church ... (Pius XII, Mystici Corporis Christi, 13, emphasis added)
For whatever reason, the council chose the word "subsists in" to describe that same relationship.
What does the phrase mean - how is it different from what Pius XII said?
It may well not be different at all. But some theologians assumed that it was. Fr. Bouyer is quoted as saying that this phrase
... [proposed] again the idea of the one Church, even if it is presently divided among the diverse Christian Churches, as if among many branches. (quoted in Rev. Donald Sanborn, "A Critical Analysis of Ratzinger's Dominus Jesus", online source)
In the same article, Fr. Congar (another liberal peritus at the council) is quoted as saying:
Thus they are telling us ... that the Church of Christ and of the Apostles subsistit in, is found in the Catholic Church. There is consequently no strict identification, that is exclusive, between the Church of Christ and the "Roman" Church. Vatican II admits, fundamentally, that non-Catholic christians are members of the Mystical Body and not merely ordered to it. (ibid.)
So the "subsists in" phrase could mean that the "Church of Christ" is a larger entity that encompasses more than just the Roman Catholic Church?
That's how some theologians interpreted it. Others disagreed. Just recently, in fact, the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity released a document trying to correct this error:
The Council ... wished to do justice to the fact that there are found outside of the Catholic Church not only individual Christians but also "elements of the church" ... Understood in this sense "subsistit in" encompasses the essential thrust of the "est" [the word Pius XII used]. But it ... takes account of churches and ecclesial communities ...
Accordingly it is a misunderstanding of "subsistit in" to make it the basis of an ecclesiological pluralism or relativism which implies that the one church of Christ Jesus subsists in many churches, and thus the Catholic Church is merely one among many other churches. (Pontifical Council for Christian Unity, The Decree on Ecumenism – Read Anew After Forty Years, Nov. 11, 2004, emphasis added)
So as you can see, the very fact that there is still this argument going on over this phrase proves that there is a lot of ambiguity in the phrase itself.
It would appear so!
The council document goes on to say that "many elements of sanctification and of truth are found outside of [the Catholic Church's] visible structure." (par. 8)
What are these "elements" that are found outside the Church?
Most likely this refers to things like Sacred Scripture and the various sacraments that are still found in a valid form outside the Church - Protestant baptism, for example, is a valid sacrament, and the Eastern Orthodox still possess valid sacraments of Holy Orders and the Eucharist.
But nevertheless, a statement like this can only lead to confusion - if "elements" of sanctification and truth can be found outside the Church, is this sufficient for salvation? Is the Church still necessary for salvation?
That's why I think it's important that the document immediately adds, "These elements, as gifts belonging to the Church of Christ, are forces impelling toward catholic unity." (par. 8)
So it still affirms that the Catholic Church is the sole source of the sacraments, and that wherever they exist outside the Church, they are intended to lead souls back into the Church ... but it's still a bit ambiguous, taken as a whole, and then combined with other statements in the document.
Such as?
Such as this statement:
The Church recognizes that in many ways she is linked with those who, being baptized, are honored with the name of Christian, though they do not profess the faith in its entirety or do not preserve unity of communion with the successor of Peter. (LG, par. 15)
That's ambiguous at best. In "many ways" the Church is "linked" with those outside the unity of the papacy? What does this mean? In what way are they "linked"? In past ages it was more precise: those outside the Church are, objectively speaking, heretics who have no hope of salvation.
That doesn't appear to be the council's position!
Well, but the Church has always said that there is such a thing as "baptism of desire," meaning that some people - through no fault of their own - are not aware of the Church or their obligation to belong to it. But they follow the Divine Law as best as they know it, and are of sufficient good-will such that - had they known better - they would have gladly been a part of the Catholic Church. These souls can be saved because they belong to the Church implicitly - by way of desire.
Pope Pius XII spoke of this when he said that there are those who are outside the Church who "by an unconscious desire and longing ... have a certain relationship with the Mystical Body of the Redeemer," but he was more precise than Vatican II, because he immediately added, "they still remain deprived of those many heavenly gifts and helps which can only be enjoyed in the Catholic Church," and he pleaded with the separated brethren to "correspond to the interior movements of grace, and to seek to withdraw from that state in which they cannot be sure of their salvation." (Mystici Corporis Christi, 103)
So even Pope Pius XII acknowledges that non-Catholics have a "certain relationship" to the Church, but that in their separated state they "cannot be sure of their salvation." Not that their salvation is impossible, but it is by no means guaranteed, especially considering that they are "deprived of ... many heavenly gifts and helps which can only enjoyed in the Catholic Church."
So what did the council say that Pius XII didn't say?
The council simply emphasized the "maybe" aspect of this relationship between the Church and non-Catholics, without as forcefully stating that they are in a gravely deficient situation.
I do have to add, though, that the council did state rather clearly in this document that "the Church, now sojourning on earth as an exile, is necessary for salvation ... Whosoever, therefore, knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by Christ, would refuse to enter or to remain in it, could not be saved." (par. 14)
It just seems like what the council gives with the left hand, it takes away with the right, and vice versa.
And we haven't even touched on the question of those who aren't even professing Christians.
Why, what did the council say about them?
Regarding the Muslims, the document says:
... the plan of salvation also includes ... the Mohamedans, who, professing to hold the faith of Abraham, along with us adore the one and merciful God, who on the last day will judge mankind. (LG, par. 16)
Obviously, this statement needs a lot of clarification before it can be given full assent of faith.
Obviously! Is the council saying that Muslims will be saved too?
Not if you read closely - it only says that the plan of salvation includes them - which is true. The plan of salvation includes all men; redemption is not withheld from anyone who desires it.
But what does it mean that the Muslims "along with us adore the one and merciful God?" Can we really say that the Muslims worship the same God as we do?
Do they?
Only in the sense that they're monotheists who believe in the God of Abraham. But the true God is a Trinity, and so it would seem that in order to worship the true God, one would have to accept the Second Person of the Godhead, Jesus Christ.
But notice that the council didn't say "the true God." It just said "the one and merciful God." Like I said, this needs serious clarification. The statement is too open-ended as it stands.
But enough about salvation - let's move on to that question of collegiality.
Please do.
The fundamental teaching of the Church is that the pope possesses supreme authority in the Church, and that each bishop possesses a similar "monarchical" authority in his own territory - an authority that is derived from the papacy.
The First Vatican Council declared the following:
If anyone therefore should say that the Roman Pontiff has only the office of inspecting or directing, and not the full and supreme power of jurisdiction over the whole Church, not only in matters of faith and morals, but also in matters concerning the discipline and rule of the Church throughout the world; or that he has merely the principal part and not the full plenitude of this supreme power; or that his power is not ordinary and immediate, whether over each and all the churches, or over each and all the pastors and faithful: let him be anathema. (On the Church of Christ, Canon III)
At Vatican II, what happened is that two conflicting factions collided and ended up producing a statement that was a hybrid of the two opinions. On the one side was the traditional view: the pope possesses supreme authority in the Church; this authority can and is sometimes extended by the pope to the college of bishops when he convenes an Ecumenical Council. On the other side was the progressive view: the pope, in union with the college of bishops, possesses supreme authority, and the pope only exercises this authority as the representative head of the college of bishops.
That sounds very similar to the Eastern Orthodox position.
I believe it is quite close. It tends to view the pope as merely a figurehead, or a "first among equals."
The resulting council document somewhat blended these two views. The entire third chapter of Lumen Gentium goes back and forth on these points - it's far too lengthy to quote, but a few representative passages should give a decent idea of the conflict:
Jesus Christ ... willed that [the Apostles'] successors, namely the bishops, should be shepherds in His Church even to the consummation of the world. And in order that the episcopate itself might be one and undivided, He placed Blessed Peter over the other apostles, and instituted in him a permanent and visible source and foundation of unity of faith and communion. (LG, par. 18)
Notice the order: Jesus established the college of bishops, willed them to exist until the end of time, and secondly, in order to preserve unity in the college, He placed the pope over them.
The Lord Jesus ... appointed twelve to be with Him ... and these apostles He formed after the manner of a college or a stable group, over which He placed Peter chosen from among them. (LG, par. 19)
Again, the order is reversed: the apostolic college was formed, and then Peter was placed over them - "chosen from among them" - you can almost hear the echo of "first among equals" here. This New Testament model is then applied to the modern-day Church:
Just as in the Gospel ... St. Peter and the other apostles constitute one apostolic college, so in a similar way the Roman Pontiff, the successor of Peter, and the bishops, the successors of the apostles, are joined together. (LG, par. 22)
The emphasis appears to be on the college of bishops here - is that right?
It certainly appears that way. But then the council - as if now speaking with the voice of the traditional council fathers - emphasizes the role of the pope:
But the college or body of bishops has no authority unless it is understood together with the Roman Pontiff, the successor of Peter as its head ... In virtue of his office, that is as Vicar of Christ and pastor of the whole Church, the Roman Pontiff has full, supreme and universal power over the Church. And he is always free to exercise this power. (ibid.)
So far so good, but then the council takes away with the left hand ...
The order of bishops, which succeeds to the college of apostles and gives this apostolic body continued existence, is also the subject of supreme and full power over the universal Church, provided we understand this body together with its head the Roman Pontiff and never without this head. (ibid.)
Which statement receives the emphasis here? That the college of bishops "is also the subject of supreme and full power over the universal Church," or that "we understand this body together with its head ... and never without this head"?
Yeah, that doesn't seem to be quite so clear as it was in the First Vatican Council.
It was meant to be ambiguous. And then it meanders into the question of the college of bishops acting as a college - that is, a democratic body of bishops having authority over a single bishop's territory, when really that bishop has authority in his own proper diocese(s).
Archbishop Lefebvre foresaw this problem, and warned the council of it in one of his many interventions:
The national assemblies with their commissions would soon - and unconsciously - be feeding and governing all the flocks, so that the priests as well as the laity would find themselves placed between these two pastors: the bishops, whose authority would be theoretical, and the assembly with its commissions, which would, in fact, hold the exercise of that authority. (Archbishop Lefebvre, I Accuse the Council, quoted in Michael Davies, "Random Thoughts," The Angelus, Dec. 1984, Vol. VII/12)
And did that come to pass?
In many ways, yes it did. It seems more and more than individual bishops don't feel right about exercising their rightful authority in their own diocese(s). You hear stories all the time about how a national synod of bishops will meet together to decide on some practical matter, and all of the bishops will go along with it - even if they individually don't want to.
A good example is communion in the hand - a national conference may approve it, and so an individual bishop will approve it in his diocese, even though he personally is against it, because he doesn't want to contradict the national conference. It works much more like a democracy now.
And all because of some ambiguities in the document ...
That's the story of the whole council. Almost every one of these documents can be neatly chopped up and sorted into two categories: statements that are cleanly orthodox, and statements that are, at best, ambiguous and bordering on the edge of heterodoxy.
The real problem came after the council, when the various synods of bishops starting implementing the council, and the liberal theologians who were at the council as periti began spreading their ideas publicly, citing portions of Vatican II as their justification.
Why didn't the pope put a stop to it?
That may be one of the most difficult questions of all. And that question can be asked of both Pope Paul VI and John Paul II - they both lamented the problems in the Church, but then they both continued to make practical decisions that only exacerbated the problem.
I sense another topic coming up for discussion.
The conciliar popes? Sure. They're a huge part of this, as is the role of Archbishop Lefebvre and his Society of Saint Pius X that sought to counter-act the revolution.
Ok, maybe we'll hit those subjects some other time then.
Whenever you're ready.
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