Pages

Search for your Topic

Paul VI Did Not Exist: A “Nostalgic” Response to George Weigel on Vatican II

Above: Pope Paul VI with one of his greatest critics, Joseph Ratzinger, whom he appoint bishop and then cardinal in 1977 before his death.

When Vatican II Turned Forty

Twenty years ago, a week before the fortieth anniversary of the opening of Vatican II, Mr George Weigel, a great admirer of that assembly, wrote an assessment of it for, of all publications, the National Catholic Reporter. The basic thrust of his column is simple: a reading of Vatican II as a power struggle within the Church is incorrect. He does not deny that the Church has collectively “got(ten) Vatican II wrong” in many ways, and did so “by thinking of it chiefly in terms of church politics.” But in “the council’s masterwork,” Lumen Gentium, we see that “(t)he universal call to holiness, not the struggle for ecclesiastical power, was the central motif of Vatican II.” This is both true and a good thing to say, especially in a publication so deeply invested in reading Vatican II and its aftermath as a series of power struggles: of bishops against an overcentralized papacy and curia; of heretical theologians against bishops; and ultimately, of Modern Man against the Faith once delivered to the Saints.

Praise the Lord

Read the Whole Article at https://onepeterfive.com/