Vatican II – the creation of a New Church
Isolated quotations do not provide us with a complete picture. In order to understand the Council’s goals, and achievements, it is necessary to provide quotations from various parts of the documents along with their authoritative interpretations by the post-Conciliar 'pontiffs’. We shall do this under four headings: 1) The New Orientations – seeing history and the world in a different light. 2) The New Church – how the post-Conciliar Church sees itself. 3) The New Understanding of man’s nature; and 4) Why a Church at all.
I – THE NEW ORIENTATIONS SEEING HISTORY AND THE WORLD IN A DIFFERENT LIGHT
’The traditional doctrinal formulations were forged in the light of a general world-view that has by now become obsolete; an unconditional allegiance to any single view of the universe, such as the Christian, seems to demand, impresses the modern mind as fanatical and unscientific… The claim that some privileged source… contains the totality of saving truth is likewise distasteful… The assertion that divine revelation was complete in the first century of our era seems completely antic to the modern concept of progress.’
Avery Dulles, S.J., Doctrines do Grow.
Founded on a 'rock’, the Church has always been considered as a monolithic, stable and unchanging institution – one that existed and functioned in saecula saeculorum, that is, throughout all ages past, present and future. She saw herself as a 'perfect society’, as a divine institution established by Christ. Distinguishing this Church from the inevitable failings of its members (for who of us can live up to Christ?) there was neither need for change, nor room for improvement.
The Church has always been happy to use the discoveries of science for good ends, and indeed, many of these are the result of Catholic efforts. She is not against 'progress’ if by this one means better mouse traps and ice boxes. But progress as usually understood, implies that man himself is improving, becoming more civilized, more intelligent and more advanced with each passing generation. This kind of progress is an illusion which the Church has always eschewed. The idea that man himself can and has progressed is the very negation of his celestial origin and destiny. It denies that his intrinsic nature is fixed, that he is made in the image of God and that he has sustained the wound of Adam’s sin. It further denies the perfection of the Patriarchs, the Holy Family and the saints. As for evolution, she has always held that creation ex nihilo was de fide. In the words of Vatican I: 'if anyone does not admit the world and everything it , both spiritual and material, have been produced in their entire substance by God out of nothing -ex nihilo – let him be anathema.’ But evolution as a biological possibility is one thing; evolution as applied to mankind or truth is quite another. As Pope Pius XII said some 35 years ago: 'these false evolutionary notions with their denial of all that is fixed or abiding in human experience, have paved the way for a new philosophy of error’ (Humani generis). The traditional outlook saw these two pseudo-concepts of 'progress’ and 'evolution’ as the 'opiates of the people,’ always promising them an unrealizable utopia in the future while deflecting their attention from the present. No longer the command to 'be ye perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect’, but rather the illusion that progress and evolution, thanks to science, will produce a world so perfect that man will no longer have to strive to be good.
Gaudium et Spes starts with a long tale of changes affecting mankind, the perpetual justification for innovation. Everything changes, the world, time, but especially man who is described as participating in a perpetual 'progression’. John XXIII believed there had been 'a real progress of humankind’s collective moral awareness through always deeper discovery of its dignity… and that divine providence was leading us to a new order of human relations… ’ Vatican II proceeded to make this principle magisterial. 'The human race has passed from a rather static concept of reality to a more dynamic, evolutionary one… Historical studies make a signal contribution to bringing men to see things in their changeable and evolutionary aspects… Man’s social nature makes it evident that the progress of the human person and the advance of society itself hinge on each other… Citizens have the right and duty… to contribute to the true progress of their community… Developing nations should strongly desire to seek the complete human fulfillment of their citizens in the explicit and fixed goal of progress… May the faithful therefore, live in very close union with the men of their time. Let them strive to understand perfectly their way of thinking and feeling, as expressed in their culture. Let them blend modern science and its theories and the understanding of the most recent discoveries with Christian morality and doctrine. Thus their religious practice and morality can keep pace with their scientific knowledge and with an ever-advancing technology.’ (All from Ch. or Eccl.) For those who may still doubt, let me quote from John Paul II’s speech at Puebla: 'In these past ten years (since the Council) how much progress humanity has made, and with humanity and at its service, how much progress the Church has made…’
Not only progress, but evolution. John Paul II has magisterially told us that 'all the observations concerning the development of life lead to a conclusion: the evolution of living beings of which science seeks to determine the stages and to determine the mechanism, presents an internal finality… a finality which directs beings in a direction for which they are not responsible or in charge…’ An editorial in the L’Osservatore Romano attributed to John Paul II was even more specific. 'no one today any longer believes in tradition, but rather in rational progress. tradition today appears as something that has been bypassed by history. Progress on the other hand presents itself as an authentic promise inborn in the very soul of man.’
If Evolution and Progress are true, if, as the Council teaches, 'the human race has passed from a rather static concept of reality to a more dynamic and evolutionary one’, then it follows that the world has changed since the time of Christ, and logically, if the Church is to survive, it must also change. Paul VI in discussing the Council expressed this clearly.’if the world changes religion should also change. …the order to which Christianity tends is not static, but an order in continual evolution towards a higher form’ (Dialogues, Reflections on God and Man). If the Church is evolving, so also are her doctrines. And so the Council teaches that 'as the centuries succeed one another, the Church constantly moves forward towards the fullness of divine truth until the words of God reach their fulfillment in her…’ Elsewhere she assures us that 'new roads to truth are opened.’ The statement is quite extraordinary in so far as the Church has always taught that the revelation given us by Christ and the Apostles was final and definitive, and to that body of revealed truth nothing has been, or ever will be added. One must of course distinguish between the legitimate development of a doctrine – its being made more explicit and explained in clearer ways – and the evolution of a doctrine – which implies some form of transformation or change in its intrinsic nature. Thus, as we will show, the doctrine on Religious Liberty as taught by Vatican II can never be considered a 'development’ of previous teaching, but only as an 'evolution’ into something new. a kind of 'ongoing revelation.’ And as innumerable post-Conciliar theologians have noted, the Council, while not using the phrase, embraced the concept in principle. And why not when Paul VI teaches: The new Church 'seeks to adapt itself to the languages, to the customs and to the inclinations of the men of our times, men completely engrossed in the rapidity of material evolution and similar necessities of their individual circumstances. This 'openness’ is of the very essence of the [new] Church.. The restrictions of orthodoxy do not coincide with pastoral charity’.(Talk given in Milan when he was a Cardinal).
All this involved a new orientation towards the world itself. The traditional Church taught us to be in the world, but not to 'conform ourselves to it’. The Apostle John instructed us: 'Love not the world nor the things that are in the world. If any man love the world the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh and the concupiscence of the eyes and the pride of life, which is not of the Father but is of the world. And the world passeth away.’ What thinking person does not realize that the world – the modern world – has walked away from all the Church has ever stood for. What then is the attitude of the new Church? John Paul II gives us the answer: 'the Second Vatican Council laid the foundations for a substantially new relationship between the Church and world, between the Church and modern culture’ (College, Dec. 22, 1980) Paul VI was more specific: 'we must never forget that the fundamental attitude of Catholics who wish to convert the world must be, first of all, to love the world, to love our times, to love our civilization, our technical achievements, and above all, to love the world… the Council puts before us, a panoramic vision of the world; how can the Church, how can we, do other than behold this world and love it. The Council is a solemn act of love for mankind, love for men of today, whoever and wherever they may be, love for all'(Bodart, La Biologie et l’avenire de l’homme).
John Paul II, following in the steps of his 'spiritual father’ (Paul VI), confirms this commitment. 'The contemporary Church’, he tells us, 'has a particular sensibility towards history, and wishes to be in every extension of the term, 'the Church of the contemporary world”(Talk to the Roman Curia, Dec 22, 1980).
Thus the Church of all times has been changed into the Church of our times. A static Church has been changed into an evolutionary and progressive Church. It has even been given new titles – Paul VI called it 'the Church of the Council’ and Cardinal Benini 'the post-Conciliar Church’. A true Council would have spoken of the role of the Church IN the modern world. Vatican II created the Church OF the modern world. John XXIII referred to the result as a 'New Pentecost’, Paul VI called it an Epiphany and John Paul II speaks of a 'New Advent’. – 'We find ourselves in a certain way in the midst of a new Advent, a time of expectation…’ Vatican II provides 'the foundation for ever more achievements of the people of God’s march towards the Promised Land in this state of history…’ (Redemptor Hominis). Progress of course is never fixed, and so, once the Church accepts the principle of adapting itself to the modern world, it has committed itself to a perpetual state of flux. This is what Aggiornamento is all about. This is why the Grand Mufti in Paris invited Catholics who wished to be part of an unchanging religion to become Moslems.
This new orientation resulted in the need for the Church to accept a host of ideas it once considered inimical. The ideology of the modern world is not only evolutionary and progressive; it is also Anthropocentric and secular. It envisions itself as dialectically passing from its present condition towards some utopian state in which all men will be united in a socialist structure where there will no longer be any suffering or want. Thus the new Church gladly witnesses to the 'birth of a new humanism’, and welcomes 'today’s social movements, especially in an evolution towards unity, a process of wholesome socialization’ (Ch.42). Indeed, she considers herself the 'instrument’ and 'sacramental sign of this unity’. She is even willing to make her most precious possession – the Blessed Eucharist – a symbol of this unity.
But the world the Church wishes to embrace has no use for her. It had long ago deserted the bosom of the Father and gone off 'into a far country’ to seek its own fortune. It has no interest in being 'saved’, much less in building up the Kingship of Christ. A Church which seeks to embrace the world’s values and to find a place for itself in the milieu of an 'anti-Christian’ society, must redefine itself in terms that are meaningful to that society. Paul VI gave us some idea of how this was to be achieved. 'From the start the Council has propagated a wave of serenity and of optimism, a Christianity that is exciting and positive, loving life, mankind and earthly values… an intention of making Christianity acceptable and lovable, indulgent and open, free of mediaeval rigorism and of pessimistic understanding of man and his customs…’ (Doc. Cath. No. 1538). But the Church went farther than this. She not only wished to make herself lovable, she wished to become the 'servant of the world’. Having abdicated her spiritual leadership, she had no choice but to declare her desire to be of use 'in service and fellowship’. Let us see how she does this.
