THIS WEEK
AT VATICAN II
October 13 - 20, 1962
Fifty Years Later 

SURPRISING UNIVERSALITY AT FIRST MEETINGS

Saturday, October 13 -- the first “working day” (General Congregation) for all the Council Fathers – began at 9:00 am in the Council aula in St. Peter’s Basilica.  It lasted only fifty minutes!

               

             Ten “commissions” had been established to prepare the Council’s final texts:

On Doctrine, Faith and Morals   

On Bishops and Dioceses

On the Oriental Churches

On the Sacraments                        

On the Clergy and Laity                                  

On Religious Men and Women

On the Missions                              

On the Sacred Liturgy

On Seminaries and Schools

On the Lay Apostolate, the Press

                         and Entertainment

At the conclusion of the Saturday morning Mass, each Bishop had at his place three booklets: a booklet with a complete listing of all the Council Fathers; a booklet listing those Bishops who had served on each Commission during the preparatory phase (the so-called “Curial list”); and a booklet with blank spaces for voting, in which each Bishop was asked to list, by hand, sixteen candidates of their choice for each of the ten Commissions.

              The German Bishops, led by Joseph Cardinal Frings of Cologne, had discussed alternative candidates – not from the “Curial list” but nominated from each national episcopal conference.  Achille Cardinal Lienart, president of the French Bishops, agreed – and as the voting procedures that Saturday morning were being explained to all the Bishops, Cardinal Lienart rose to ask that the Council Fathers be given more time to study the qualifications of candidates for the 160 important offices on the ten Commissions.  His motion was seconded by Cardinal Frings.

Prolonged applause followed both interventions.

The Council was adjourned until 9:00 am on the following Tuesday, so that on Sunday and Monday, October 14 and 15, the Bishops could meet in their national or regional conferences. 

                By Tuesday morning, a leaflet was distributed to all the Bishops which contained the names proposed by the various national episcopal conferences as candidates for the Commissions.  The well-organized list of the French, German, Austrian and Swiss Bishops was supported by the Bishops of Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, as well as those of Poland and Yugoslavia. 

The Bishops from Italy agreed on a list which gave wide representation to the different nationalities.  The United States’ Bishops, after meeting at the North American College, had drawn up their own list of candidates, having consulted with various national hierarchies. The Asian and African Bishops also composed their own lists.

                In the Council hall on Tuesday morning, each Bishop voted independently; after three days of counting the hand-written ballots, the members of the Commissions were announced at the 3^rd General Congregation on Saturday, October 20.  Unexpectedly, in the “tumultuous” first days of the Council, the Bishops had elected Commission members international in scope and varied in pastoral experiences -- a step that theologian Fr. Yves Congar called “the first substantive Conciliar action.” African Archbishop (later Cardinal) Bernardin Gantin of Benin said the events of the first days “opened the way to the spirit of collegiality” among the Council Fathers.  Reportedly, Pope John agreed: “You have done right in expressing your thoughts aloud; that is why I have called the Bishops to a Council.” 

                Their next task would be discussion of the schema on the Sacred Liturgy.

( Next Week: The Press at Vatican II )                                                       -- Monsignor John T. Myler

THIS WEEK AT VATICAN II

October 11, 1962 – Fifty Years Later

 

THE GREAT OPENING OF THE COUNCIL

     It was a majestic sight!  Rain had poured down in Rome early in the morning, but then bright sun broke through. 

     And a procession of 2,500 Bishops from 79 countries made its way across the Piazza di S. Pietro, accompanied by the sung Litany of the Saints, then turning to enter the great Basilica.  At the end came Pope John XXIII on the sedia gestatoria, carried so the crowds could see him, joyfully blessing them as the Second Vatican Council opened.

     Thursday, October 11, the feast of the Divine Maternity of the Virgin Mary, was the date chosen by the Pope -- to show continuity back to the Council of Ephesus (431 AD) when Christian belief was upheld in Mary as Theotokos, Mother of God, “Mater Dei” – which upheld Faith in the divinity of her Son, Jesus Christ.

     A young American priest assisting at the Council – Fr. Justin Rigali (later a Bishop, Archbishop and Cardinal) -- would write in perspective that all of what Vatican II endeavored to do was “to speak about Jesus” to the world. 

     Once inside the Basilica, Pope John preached that “the greatest concern of the Ecumenical Council is this: that the sacred deposit of Christian doctrine should be guarded and taught more effectively,” for the Church must never depart “from the sacred patrimony of truth received from the Fathers.” 

     Yet, at the same time, the Church “must ever look to the present, to the new conditions and forms of life introduced into the modern world, which have opened new avenues to the Catholic apostolate...”

  “The substance of the ancient doctrine, the Deposit of Faith, is one thing; the way in which it is presented is another.”

     Each in tall miter and white cope, the Bishops listening inside the Council aula were truly “catholic” – meaning “universal”.  38% were European; 31% were from the Americas; 20% came from Asia and Oceania, and 10% from Africa.  Sadly, almost 200 Bishops from the Eastern bloc Communist-controlled countries were not able to attend.

     The Bishops had left their episcopal sees, without clearly knowing when they would return home.  One, the 83 year old missionary Bishop Ashton Chichester, had served since 1929 in Rhodesia (which would later become the country known as Zimbabwe).  The first Archbishop of Salisbury, he had almost reached the main door of St. Peter’s on his way into the Council when he collapsed on the steps leading to the Basilica and died. 

       That night, a brother Bishop remarked on Vatican Radio, how much Bishop Chichester “loved the Holy See.  He longed for a Council, and hoped that he would live to attend one.  Bishop Chichester felt in his heart both the perennial stability and the imperishable youth of the Church”  ...

     ...  like that other octogenarian, John XXIII, who sat in the Chair of St. Peter.

   (NEXT WEEK: THE FIRST WORKING SESSIONS)
   --     Monsignor John T. Myler

THIS WEEK AT VATICAN II

September to October 1962 – Fifty Years Later

 

PHYSICAL PREPARATIONS FOR THE COUNCIL

               For several years, the commission “Fabbrica di S. Pietro” – the group responsible for the building and administering of St. Peter’s Basilica – had been planning the physical location of the aula or “Council Hall.”

               Room was needed for the historic gathering and deliberations of the world’s nearly 2,500 Bishops.

               Inside the Basilica, the huge central nave of St. Peter’s measures 96 meters x 22 meters (351 ft. long and 72 ft. wide) and was to be arranged for both “practicality and comfort”, not only for the Council’s daily sessions but also for sacred ceremonies, including daily Mass.  At the same time, the art and architecture of the Basilica had to be retained.  Pope John insisted that the entrance to Peter’s tomb remain open and also that a dignified area be found where the Book of the Gospels would be enthroned daily – both visible signs of the Biblical and historical roots of the Church.

               Through the summer and fall of 1962, from May 15 to October 10 (the day prior to the Solemn Opening of the Council), the workers of the Fabbrica erected lengthy tiers on both sides of the main nave – long rows of seating and tables on risers to accommodate more than 1,200 Bishops on each side.

The workers installed an additional 42 floodlights for better visibility; 37 microphones in various locations to facilitate the Bishops’ discussions; 4 tape recorders for the Council’s archives (and for the young priest-assistants who would daily transcribe the exact words of the Council deliberations); closed circuit television (so the Pope could follow the proceedings from the papal apartment); a temporary studio for Vatican Radio; telephone lines for communication among the rotating Council “Presidents”; and even data processing equipment – to be used for tabulating the Bishops’ various ballots.

               Sanitary and first aid needs had to be met.  Additionally, places were erected in the Basilica for days when the Council was “in session”, where the Bishops could gather and converse informally at two stations in the aula for coffee and pastries.  Before long, the Bishops gave the “coffee-bars” clever names based on two Gospel figures: the Bar-Jonah (from the Hebrew name for St. Peter) and the Bar-Abbas.   

               As the “opening day” approached, all plans were for a Council lasting three months – a single session with meetings from October to December 1962. 

In the end, the Council would last four sessions, spread over – not three months – but more than three years. 

(NEXT WEEK: THE OPENING OF THE COUNCIL) 

--    Monsignor John T. Myler

THIS WEEK AT VATICAN II

September 1962 – Fifty Years Later

 

MANY TOPICS FOR THE COUNCIL

Prior to 1962, the Bishops of some countries -- especially Germany and France -- gathered to make joint suggestions for topics at the Council.  Individually, the Bishops in the United States sent hundreds of suggestions to the Vatican, including:

Doctrinal Concerns: Christ as the world’s Divine Redeemer; the relationship of Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition (in light of Pius XII’s Divino Afflante Spiritu); the role of the Blessed Virgin

The Church: The Mystical Body of Christ (as Pius XII taught); prospects for reunion with the Orthodox and with Protestants; infants who die without Baptism; Church-State relations; religious freedom.

Role of Bishops: as Magisterium (teachers of Faith); Bishops’ relationship with men/women religious; relationship to Roman Curia;  the role of national episcopal conferences; use of social communications.

Priests, Deacons, Religious:  promoting vocations; restoration of permanent diaconate, extended to married men; a year of pastoral ministry for seminarians; a rediscovery of religious’ charisms.

The Laity: offer encouragement to the Lay Apostolate; the nature of the Christian family;  providing laypeople with opportunities to study along with the clergy dogma, philosophy, history and morality.

Liturgical Reform: study of the twentieth-century Liturgical Movement; increased use of local languages, while retaining some Latin in liturgy and Church’s daily life; a reform of the Breviary.

Moral Questions:  the need for obedience to legitimate authority; clearer teaching on the ends of marriage; the relationship between morality and psychiatry; the problem of birth control.

Modern War and Peace: the ethics of nuclear weapons; conscientious objection; theory of “just war”;  international relations; the threat of communism as an obstacle to world peace.

Social Justice: expand teaching of Rerum Novarum and Quadragesima Anno; improve race relations; the poor and elderly; growing materialism; atheism; new  challenges from scientific/technological progress.

While several Bishops had replied they had “nothing to propose”,  others were as specific as “defense of the family farm”; as theoretical as “what do to if the enemies of the Church used an atomic bomb to kill all the Cardinal-electors of the Pope”; and as speculative as salvation for “creatures on other planets.” 

            The Council’s Preparatory Commission – under the leadership of Msgr. Pericle Felici -- worked diligently, categorizing the tens of thousands of recommendations from around the world, as one American Bishop suggested, “rejecting both the stubbornness of the antiquarians and the rashness of the innovators.”  Vatican II was to be a reform Council certainly, yet a Council in continuity with the enduring teaching of Jesus Christ and His Church.

 (NEXT WEEK: PHYSICAL PREPARATIONS FOR THE COUNCIL)                                          --       Monsignor John T. Myler

THIS WEEK AT VATICAN II

 September 1962 – Fifty Years Later

 

PREPARING FOR A COUNCIL

               “Bishops, come to Rome!”  Pope John XXIII joyfully called out in the fall of 1962.

               Since January 1959 – when the Pope startlingly announced an Ecumenical (“Universal”) Council for the whole Church – Rome and the Vatican had been getting ready for 3,000 “temporary residents”.  The Catholic Bishops from around the world, their “periti” (expert theologians, specialists in Sacred Scripture, Patristics, Canon Law, Dogma, Moral Theology, Church History and even the Social Sciences) and the officially-invited Auditors and Observers, had all been preparing for the convening of the Second Vatican Council.

               An ecumenical, or general, Council is a solemn assembly of the Bishops of the Catholic world, called by the Pope,  to consider and decide under the presidency of the Pope matters concerning the expression of the Catholic Faith.  In the time of the Apostles, as recounted in the New Testament,  around the year 48 A.D. a conflict arose in Antioch (cf. Gal. 2:4), and the community there sent Paul and Barnabas to consult Peter, the Apostles and Elders of Jerusalem (cf. Acts 15:31).
             In the long history of Christ’s Church, Vatican II would be the 21^st and largest Council – 2,540 Council Fathers would participate. 
            The first world-wide Ecumenical Council was held in 325 A.D. at Nicea, where 318 Church leaders gathered; the most recent Council had been Vatican I (from 1869-70), where 744 took part.  The most widely-known act of Vatican I was its definition of papal infallibility. 
             Pope Pius XI had considered a Council in the 1930’s and Pope Pius XII had done the same in the 1950’s.  Pope John’s Council would focus on the role of Bishops and the pastoral ministry of the whole Church: an aggiornamento for the Church “today”, in the modern world – the Church “ever ancient, ever new.” 
             Pope John foresaw a “new Pentecost.”  On every continent, clergy, religious and laity were praying to the Holy Spirit for the success of the upcoming Council: 

Grant that your labors and your work, toward which the eyes of all peoples and the hopes of the entire world are turned, may abundantly fulfill the aspirations of all.  Look down benignly upon the pastors of Thy Church. May the light of Thy supernal grace aid them … Graciously hear the prayers which we pour forth to Thee in unanimity of faith, of voice and of mind.  O Mary, Help of Christians, dispose all things for a happy and propitious outcome.   

The prayer was being offered in parish churches, schools, homes, monasteries, convents and cloisters.

Meanwhile, the thousands of Bishops, along with certain faculties from various theological universities, were suggesting subjects for discussion at Vatican II and forwarding them to the Preparatory Commission for the Council.

(NEXT WEEK: PREPARING TOPICS FOR VATICAN II)

                                                       --  Monsignor John T. Myler