How Did Vatican 2 Change The Catholic Church

Thousands of faithful Catholics comport torches in a procession in St. Peter's Square in Vatican city on Oct. 11, 1962, the opening day of the historic Second Vatican Council. Over a iii-year period, more than 2,000 bishops from around the earth issued 16 landmark documents, which championed a more inclusive, less hierarchical and open church. Girolamo Di Majo/AP hibernate caption

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Girolamo Di Majo/AP

Thousands of faithful Catholics behave torches in a procession in St. Peter's Square in Vatican city on Oct. xi, 1962, the opening twenty-four hours of the historic Second Vatican Council. Over a iii-year flow, more than 2,000 bishops from around the globe issued 16 landmark documents, which championed a more than inclusive, less hierarchical and open church building.

Girolamo Di Majo/AP

At Rome's Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls, 50 years agone this week, the newly elected pontiff stunned the earth past calling the kickoff Catholic Church building Council in nearly a century — the Second Vatican Council, or what's known equally Vatican II.

Pope John XXIII called for the institution's renewal and more interaction with the modern world.

Every bit a outcome of Vatican II, the Cosmic Church opened its windows onto the mod earth, updated the liturgy, gave a larger part to laypeople, introduced the concept of religious freedom and started a dialogue with other religions.

"It was a time of a new hope, when everybody was proud that we are able to convoke such a council, and having a existent renewal of the Catholic Church," says Hans Kung, who was the youngest theologian at Vatican II.

Pope John XXIII waves a hand in blessing during the opening day of Vatican Two, on Oct. 11, 1962. The newly elected pope surprised many Catholics past convening the gathering, the first of its kind in almost a century. Raoul Fornezza/AP hide caption

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Raoul Fornezza/AP

Pope John XXIII waves a mitt in blessing during the opening mean solar day of Vatican Two, on Oct. 11, 1962. The newly elected pope surprised many Catholics by convening the gathering, the first of its kind in nearly a century.

Raoul Fornezza/AP

Just the changes provoked a backlash, and many Catholics today say the council's renewal momentum has been stopped in its tracks.

Opening The Church

Over a three-twelvemonth menstruum, more than 2,000 bishops from all over the world, assisted by thousands of advisers, issued sixteen landmark documents.

No new dogma was issued, but the quango transformed the church building from an sectional to an inclusive institution. Earlier the Second Vatican Quango, altars were turned so the priests celebrated Mass with their backs facing the congregation.

Vatican II decreed that altars should be turned around, and priests faced the newly recognized people of God — that is, the entire customs of Catholic believers, not merely the clergy or church hierarchy.

"For my generation, Vatican Council II was really a revolution," recalls Vatican annotator Marco Politi, who was in loftier schoolhouse at the time. "There was a new way to have relationships with the Jews. At that place was a new fashion to look at the other Christian confessions. There was a new style to handle the relationship with Islam. And there was a new liturgy."

Robert Mickens, Vatican correspondent for the British Catholic weekly The Tablet, says the liturgical changes had a deep impact on churchgoers.

"I retrieve my grandmother being and so happy that the Mass was in English language considering she could understand it," he says. "She grew up with the Latin."

The Second Vatican Council allowed priests to celebrate Mass in the local language, thus making a key sacrament more accessible in the gimmicky world.

At the time of Vatican II, the Rev. Thomas Reese was studying at a seminary and so isolated from the globe that students were unaware the council was taking place. But its effects, he says, were abrupt.

"One week, if you lot swallow meat on Fri, you're going to become to hell. The following week, you can have meat on Friday," he says. "The church changed."

The Backlash Begins

Not all issues could be discussed at the quango -– for instance, priestly celibacy and the role of women remained off-limits.

However, Vatican 2 gave bishops a sense of empowerment. They spoke candidly, and many openly criticized the Vatican ban on artificial birth control.

Mickens of The Tablet says the bishops' assertiveness shocked the hierarchy.

Pope John XXIII is carried on a portable throne down the aisle in St. Peter's Basilica on October. 11, 1962. Despite the pontiff's call for openness, sure issues — such every bit priestly celibacy — remained off-limits. Jim Pringle/AP hide explanation

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Jim Pringle/AP

"This caused much concern among the conservatives, that this was undermining unity in the church, undermining the power and the voice of the pope," he says, "then slowly there was a clawing dorsum."

Pope John's successors, Pope John Paul II, who was from Poland, and Pope Benedict XVI, of Frg, were both nowadays at the council and were amidst those who felt its effects went too far.

Every bit pope, John Paul, with so-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger — now Bridegroom — by his side, introduced what's known as the restoration and appointed bishops loyal to the Vatican. The major casualty of this restoration was collegiality, the concept that bishops had a function in the determination-making procedure.

Kung, the Swiss theologian, was disciplined past John Paul for being too liberal. Withal, Kung says, the two popes were not able to suppress everything that came out of the quango. But, he adds, the conservative backfire has been considerable.

"They are over again complaining that the church is too much adjusted to the times and to modernistic society," Kung says. "Another key word was dialogue. Today nosotros accept again inquisition against theologians, against American sisters and a [renunciation] of freedom of teaching and conscience in the church."

Spirit Of Vatican Ii Persists

In the aftermath of the council, says Mickens, the Vatican correspondent, the church lost the opportunity to come up to terms with its longstanding nemesis – the liberal ideas ushered in by the French Revolution.

"We really haven't made our peace equally a Cosmic Church, every bit an establishment, with the Enlightenment," Mickens says. "The Vatican is a great example. It's an accented monarchy. The Enlightenment got rid of all that."

The Rev. Reese, who is now a senior fellow at Georgetown University's Woodstock Theological Heart, says the electric current church is unable to communicate with the world around it.

"Now there is this tremendous carve up between theologians and the hierarchy. This has had a very bad impact on the church. It's like a big company, where management and the research division are not on speaking terms," Reese says. "This is a company that's headed toward bankruptcy."

Today, the church building bureaucracy is withal reeling from clerical sexual practice corruption scandals across the world. At that place'south a shortage of priests, and in Europe churches are empty. In Latin America, Catholicism is losing true-blue to other Christian religions.

Polls evidence that large numbers of Catholics — even majorities in some countries — no longer follow the pope's strict pronouncements on obedience and sexual morality.

But many analysts say that despite Vatican retrenchment, the spirit of the council is still very much alive among the people of God.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2012/10/11/162594956/vatican-ii-a-half-century-later-a-mixed-legacy

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