We have what they call ‘opposition’ to the pope. It’s trying to build walls, going backwards — looking to the old liturgy or maybe things before Vatican II. Vatican II is unknown by many of the young generation. So it’s necessary to come back and to see that all the reforms of Pope Francis are rooted in Vatican II.”
– In remarks explaining the purpose of an in camera Chatham House Rule conference of 70 cardinals, bishops and theologians in Chicago, Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga, 80, looks back six decades to the heyday of mindless ecclesiastical vandalism.
G’day CL. You may have discussed this before but what do you think of Vatican II? I didn’t think that many Catholics were critical of it but my understanding of the topic is very limited.
South Americans are unqualified to speak about how the world should work. Particularly anything to do with economics.
Big topic, Petros.
There are basically two ‘conservative’ views: 1) its documents were OK but they were interpreted by vandals in the 1970s in such a way that they drove millions from the Church; or 2) it was a silly, 1960s exercise in placating the secular world and there isn’t anything worthwhile about it.
In some ways, there are also two liberal views of the Council: 1) it was the BEST, man! Change, change, change… endless change! Or 2) it’s not that it failed; it’s that it wasn’t really implemented with enough change-iness at all.
My view is that it was foolishly conceived, maliciously fixed and disastrously introduced. What good there is in the documents has to be discerned and kept – and the worthless detritus abandoned – and that won’t be possible until the Vatican II generation of bishops and apologists die out.
The most dynamic, growing movement in the Church today is mostly young and young-ish people re-discovering and preferring the old Mass and customs. This is an affront to the old guard (like the Cardinal); that’s why Francis overruled his predecessor and prohibited the old Mass. But this movement cannot be stopped. The Vatican II tragics have to learn from it and change. Ironically, then, the men who define themselves by their embrace of novelty are in fact rigid hold-outs who refuse to accept reality.
Why would anyone want to support Pope Francis?
Thanks CL. It’s hard for outsiders like myself to get a grasp of these issues. Let’s hope enough youngsters get interested in the old mass.