Peter W. Keenan: 60 years Since the End of Vatican 11…
December 8th will mark sixty years since the formal end to Vatican II, described by the late Fr Gabriel Daly (an Augustinian, like the new pope) as ‘a massive surgical operation carried out without anaesthetic on a patient who thought she was in the best of health’.
The “patient” is now in terminal decline, largely the result of institutional Catholicism’s culpable failure to address honestly and courageously three issues identified by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin SJ, as far back as the 1950s:
1. Forms of governance lacking democratic accountability.
2. A static view of revelation, with particular regard to the reluctance to examine doctrines in the light of the findings of the social and natural sciences.
3. The imperative to afford women an equal role in all matters pertaining to ministry and church polity.
If Pope Leo does not soon adopt a radical approach to reading ‘the signs of the times’ (Gaudium et Spes – December 7, 1965, the last working day of Vatican II), future historians will judge his pontificate to have marked a key stage in Catholicism’s demise.
The consequences of inaction will render it the prey of bigoted fundamentalists and sectarian populists, and Catholicism’s public voice will become little more than ‘a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal’ (1 Cor. 13:1).
Peter W. Keenan
author of The Resurrection of Jesus the Jew: Midrash and the First Easter
So well said, Peter.
Great man, Teihard de Chardin, yet only 11, I believe, attended his funeral, same as Karl Marx.
The 3 unstable foundational stones our church rests on and that Teilhard de Chardin refers to were initially brought to my attention by Tony Flannery, another modern day prophet.
I am wondering as I write this if John Henry Newman’s essay on The Development of Doctrine, which I struggled to complete sometime ago,
changes in any way the static view of revelation de Chardin referred to.
Beautiful analysis/metaphor by Gabriel Daly, such a wonderful influence when it was most needed during the dark ages, so eloquently described by Brendan Hoban in his excellent book, “Holding out for a Hero”.
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and Gabriel are now gone to a better place, we hope.
But there are still great men and women left.
But what happens when they are all gone. Will we be left only with the new young generation of right-wing, zealot priests?
Depressing thought!!
Perhaps the Francis and Leo experience will lead to “more normal young men entering seminary training” as my old friend Keith O’Brien would often express a wish for during our many discussions on this very topic.
God rest them all.