Pope John XXIII Opening Address to Vatican II, and Yves Congar, True and False Reform, Conclusion

Today we will learn and reflect on Pope John XXIII address
opening the Second Vatican Council after reviewing Yves Congar’s
conclusion in his book, True and False Reform, reflecting on how
this book influenced the calling of the Council.
When Archbishop Angelo Roncalli, the future Pope John XXIII,
reflected on this book, he asked, “A reform of the church? Is such
a thing really possible?” When he decided to throw open the
windows of the Catholic Church to the modern world by calling
the Second Vatican Council, he did so not to denounce errors, but
to engage the world in a pastoral and loving manner, mirroring
much of what Yves Congar said in this book.

Historically, this urge for reform in the Catholic Church
grew out of the experience of believers surviving the
hostile fascist regimes of World War II, so we will reflect on
a short biography including the wartime experiences of
Pope John XXIII.
At the end of our talk, we will discuss the sources used for
this video. Feel free to follow along in the PowerPoint
script we uploaded to SlideShare. Please, we welcome
interesting questions in the comments. Let us learn and
reflect together!

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Yves Congar, True and False Reform, & Pope John XXIII

This video starts with the summarizing conclusion of Yves Congar on True
and False Reform. Although this can be viewed as a stand-alone video, we
encourage you to view the videos on the first two parts of the book. The
first part strives to prepare the way for reform by reflecting on questions
such as the nature of the church and her sacraments, how the modern
church differs from the ancient church, and that true reform returns us to
the ancient traditions of the church.

The second part reflects on why some reformers
were truly successful, and why some reformers were
divisive. Most importantly, we reflect on how reforms
or exhortations should be shared in a pastoral
manner rather than hurling anathemas in a
condemning tone.

Luther Posting his 95 Theses in 1517, by Ferdinand Pauwels, painted 1872
Part 3. Endless Varieties of Protestantism

PART THREE: THE REFORMATION AND PROTESTANTISM: WITHDRAWN
IN SECOND EDITION. HOW CAN YOU EVEN DEFINE PROTESTANTISM?
This third part was likely a rather long section in the first
version of the book, but after the Second Vatican Council,
the second edition dropped this part entirely, leaving only
the heading. The decrees of Vatican II did emphasize that
the Catholic Church had much to learn from her separated
brethren, the Protestants. But Vatican II did abolish the
belief that Protestants could not be saved and were
subject to damnation if they did not convert to
Catholicism.

This section was likely dropped because there is an
endless variety of denominations in Protestantism.
Personally, I find it more useful to discuss
sacramental Christianity versus evangelical
Christianity rather than try to compare Catholicism
versus Protestantism. This is also problematic, as the
Protestant denominations are on a continuum
between sacramentalism and evangelicalism; some
denominations, like Methodism, are near the
middle.

CONCLUSION: PERSPECTIVES ON THE ATTITUDE TO
TAKE TOWARD CONCRETE REFORM INITIATIVES
Quite often the church is not open to reform
movements, and this is not all bad.

Yves Congar
states, “Before
all else, the
church has to
safeguard its
very being as
well as the
integrity of its
principles,” as
Scriptures
exhort, “Guard
what has been
entrusted to you.
(1 Tim 6:20)”
Conclusion

Yves Congar points out remarkable examples, such
as Pope Innocent III blessing the efforts of St
Francis, and Pope John XXIII opening the windows
of the church with the calling of Vatican II. These
occasions, and eras like the post-Trent centuries
showed an expansion of the church’s mission, and
he includes the post-World War I era following the
initiatives taken by Pope Pius IX, Pope Leo XIII, and
Pope Pius X.

Second Vatican Council, and Pope John XXIII, who called the council.

Yves Congar reflects on the ministry
of St Francis of Assisi, “we cannot
find any criticism of the state of
affairs in the church or churchmen
in the writings of St Francis. Rather,
he expressed a deep respect for the
priesthood, the sacraments, and
the ceremonies of the church.”
St. Francis of Assisi, Philip Fruytiers, 1600's

Yves Congar also reflects on the
ministry of John Wesley, who “only
wanted to be a moral reformer, not
a reformer of abuses in the church.
If the official Anglican Church had
welcomed him rather than
victimizing him, he would have
never seceded from the Anglican
church. John Wesley created a
Methodist Church because the
sclerotic body of the established
church couldn’t find room for a
purely evangelistic ministry.”
Portrait of Wesley, by William Hamilton, 1788

Yves Congar reflects on Luther, who was
“violent and irritable. He knows this about
himself, but he thought that it was helping his
mission and that without it he would not
have achieved the work he had to do.” And
history does confirm that his take-no-
prisoners approach to theology did yield
results. Yves Congar continues, “Luther,
convinced that he was inspired, thought his
impulsiveness and violence were the work of
the Holy Spirit. He needed the violence to
excite him and stir him up. He himself said
that he stirred up up his courage by evoking
the abominations of the papacy.”
Luther at Erfurt, by Joseph Noel Paton, 1861.

Quick Biography of Pope John XXIII

The future Pope John XXIII was born Angelo Roncalli
to sharecropper parents in 1881 in Lombardy, Italy.
He was an excellent student, was ordained a priest,
and the church, seeing his potential, enrolled him in
the best papal colleges, and after graduation he
became a professor. He was a jovial priest, with many
friends, and a born diplomat, biographers describe
him as “benign, patient, full of mercy and goodness.”
During World War I he served as an army medic and
chaplain.

In the interwar years, Congar and Lubac were caught up in the
Modernist crisis, being forbidden to teach and watched closely.
Although he was a progressive, Roncalli was luckier, he chose not to be
outspoken, so he avoided academic persecution. His sermons criticized
aspects of the fascist regime in Italy; some scholars believe that was
part of the reason why he was promoted to the diplomatic corps to
represent the Vatican in Orthodox Bulgaria. He later was also
appointed Apostolic Delegate to Turkey and Greece and ordained as
archbishop of Bulgaria. Roncalli was skilled at symbolic gestures to
smooth his diplomacy, he allayed suspicions when he hung eastern-
style icons and introduced Turkish prayers in the mass held at Istanbul.
His outreaches to the Orthodox Church began in this period, and he
was involved in the ecumenical movement.

Pope John XXIII
Born to humble sharecroppers.
Medic in World War I.
Apostolic Delegate to Bulgaria,
then Turkey and Greece,
Saving many Jews as a
diplomat.
After the War, was appointed
Papal Nuncio to France.

The Vatican remained neutral during both World Wars.
Roncalli’s close relationship with Franz von Papen, German
ambassador to Turkey, helped save the lives of tens of
thousands of Jews, Dr Wikipedia lists how these Jews were
saved. Some of Papen’s associates had lost their lives in Hitler’s
purge, the Night of the Long Knives, Papen resigned as Vice
Chancellor and was exiled as ambassador to Turkey. Also,
during and after the war Roncalli sought to help POWs of both
sides. Shortly before the end of the war he was appointed
papal nuncio for France. Many of the French bishops who were
suspected of collaborating with the Nazis were forcibly retired,
this was a difficult assignment for Roncalli.

Polish prisoners in Dachau toast their liberation.

Papen and Hindenburg were elected along with
Hitler, they made the fatal mistake of believing they
could control and contain Hitler. These pictures give
us a sense of his estrangement from Hitler, which is
why Papen was willing to assist Roncalli in his efforts
to save the Jews.

Reichstag on 12 September 1932 –
Papen (stands, left) demands the floor,
ignored by Speaker Göring (right)
Papen with Hitler on 1 May 1933

These many experiences with the Jewish, Orthodox,
Muslim, and secular French communities gave Roncalli a
broad-minded view of the modern world. In 1952 he was
appointed Patriarch of Venice and was made a cardinal,
and in 1958 he was elected Pope John XXIII after the
death of the wartime Pope Pius XII. His broad-minded
experiences, and the sense that the Catholic Church was
out of step with the new world dominated by liberal
democracies, led him to call the Second Vatican Council
into session.

Pope Pius XII celebrates Mass in the Vatican.

Pope John XXIII Opening Address VaticanII

POPE JOHN XXIII ADDRESS OPENING THE SECOND VATICAN COUNCIL
Now we will reflect on Pope John XXIII opening
address for the Second Vatican Council, and the
themes it has in common with Yves Congar’s book,
True and False Reform.

Pope John Paul XXIII opens his speech with:
“A positive proof of the Catholic Church's
vitality is furnished by every single council
held in the long course of the centuries.”
“And now the Church must once more
reaffirm that teaching authority of hers which
never fails but will endure until the end of
time.”
This echoes Congar’s sentiments that true
reform must rediscover the ancient traditions
of the church, that the moral teachings never
change, but history itself does change, and
the church must change with history.

Informally, when asked who came up with the
idea to call the Council, Pope John XXIII always
credited the Holy Spirit. In this speech he declares,
“The decision to hold an ecumenical council came
to us in the first instance in a sudden flash of
inspiration. After he communicated this decision,”
“the response was immediate. It was as though
some ray of supernatural light had entered the
minds of all present: it was reflected in their faces;
it shone from their eyes. At once the world was
swept by a wave of enthusiasm, and men
everywhere began to wait eagerly for the
celebration of this Council.”
Heavenly and Earthly Trinities, by
Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, 1682

There was indeed a groundswell of enthusiasm from the bishops
about this council, many thought that the Catholic Church was
on the wrong side of history. The conservative cardinals in the
Curia sought a council that would rubber-stamp the decrees
drafted by the Preparatory Commission, but that expectation
was quickly dashed when the bishops, when they met in council,
enthusiastically debated the decrees, insisting on rewriting most
of them from scratch, eagerly attending lectures on the new
theology by Yves Congar and Henri de Lubac, and other
theologians, including the close associates Joseph Ratzinger and
Hans Kung.

A procession of
Cardinals enters St.
Peter's in Rome,
opening the Second
Vatican Council.
Painting by Franklin
McMahon

Pope John XXIII declared that rather than
dwell and be depressed over the many
challenges facing the church, that instead
there was “A Basis For Optimism.”
“Present indications are that the human
family is on the threshold of a new era.
We must recognize here the hand of God,
who, as the years roll by, is ever directing
men’s efforts, whether they realize it or
not, towards the fulfillment of the
inscrutable designs of His providence,
wisely arranging everything, even adverse
human fortune, for the Church's good.”

Much of Catholic ecclesiology had developed over
the millennia assuming the existence of monarchial
Catholic states that would support and promote the
Catholic faith, though this ideal had been
compromised by events like the French Revolution,
which led the church to believe that democracy was
the enemy of the church, and the Protestant
Reformation. Then came the unfortunate experience
of the martyrdom of millions in the Communist
Revolution,

Storming the Bastille,
1789, anonymous
painter
This event truly
sparked the start of
the French Revolution

Lenin speaking, Bolshevik Revolution, 1930

then the Spanish Civil War, where the communists
massacred the clergy, which deluded the church into
viewing fascism as a friend of the church. The fascist
dictator Mussolini, who negotiated the Lateran Treaty
with Pope Pius XI establishing Vatican City, was indeed a
friend of the church for close to two decades, until he
went full Nazi shortly before the start of World War II and
started persecuting the Jews. And many French bishops
and the Vichy regime officials collaborated with the Nazis.
And we know who won the war, the democracies of
America and England.

https://youtu.be/yYpNrhpmsYw
https://youtu.be/QP9UR8fqfvs
https://youtu.be/LvNynEdZFuM
https://youtu.be/ozEioe6yyY8

We also have a video exploring the question:

But many leading Catholic churchmen could not
stomach this enthusiasm for democracy and the love
of democracies for freedom of religion, their
memory was how the French Revolutionaries had
executed clerics and confiscated church properties
some centuries before. These debates on the
Vatican II Decree on Religious Freedom caused a
split in the church. The French Cardinal Lefebvre
formed the breakaway Society of Pope Pius X, which
has since reconciled an uneasy truce.

Perhaps it is with this history in mind that Pope
John XXIII, in this speech, says “if we are to
achieve God's purpose in our regard, we have a
twofold obligation: as citizens of earth, and as
citizens of heaven,” which calls for a “fresh
approach.”
Here the jovial optimism of Pope John XXIII
shines through, “What is needed at the present
time is a new enthusiasm, a new joy and serenity
of mind in the unreserved acceptance by all of
the entire Christian faith, without forfeiting that
accuracy and precision in its presentation which
characterized the proceedings of the Council of
Trent and the First Vatican Council.”

Specifically, our beloved pope emphasized that the
Second Vatican Council would not abrogate the
decrees of Tent, but would rather reaffirm the
decrees of Trent, and indeed, the Trent decrees are
cited often both in the Vatican II Decrees and in the
Catholic Catechism.

Pope John XXIII continues, “What is
needed, and what everyone
imbued with a truly Christian,
Catholic and apostolic spirit craves
today, is that this doctrine shall be
more widely known, more deeply
understood, and more penetrating
in its effects on men's moral lives.
What is needed is that this certain
and immutable doctrine, to which
the faithful owe obedience, be
studied afresh and reformulated in
contemporary terms.” El Buen Pastor, Vicent López Portaña, painted 1800

His speech also mirrors Congar when he speaks
of “the right way to suppress errors:” “Human
ideologies change. Successive generations give
rise to varying errors, and these often vanish as
quickly as they came, like mist before the sun.”
“The Church has always opposed these errors,
and often condemned them with the utmost
severity.” But a new PASTORAL APPROACH is
needed. “Today, however, Christ's Bride prefers
the balm of mercy to the arm of severity. She
believes that present needs are best served by
explaining more fully the purport of her
doctrines, rather than by publishing
condemnations.” And Vatican II restates much of
Catholic doctrine in a pastoral manner, this
pastoral approach was a major theme for Congar.

Pope John XXIII reaffirms the personal
dignity that is at the heart of the
Catholic Social Justice doctrine, “It is
more and more widely understood that
personal dignity and true self-realization
are of vital importance and worth every
effort to achieve.” Condemning fascist
and communist totalitarianism: “More
important still, experience has at long
last taught men that physical violence,
armed might, and political domination
are no help at all in providing a happy
solution to the serious problems which
affect them.” Pope John XXIII, by Giuseppe Frascaroli, 2014

The Catholic Church of Pope John XXIII
seeks to be “A Loving Mother,” “The
great desire, therefore, of the Catholic
Church in raising aloft at this Council the
torch of truth, is to show herself to the
world as the loving mother of all
mankind; gentle, patient, and full of
tenderness and sympathy for her
separated children,” referring to
Protestants and Orthodox, and he also
reaches out to “members of various non-
Christian religions.”
Iveron Theotokos, Iviron Monastery, Mount Athos, 900's

Pope John XXIII ends the speech,
“For with the opening of this
Council a new day is dawning on
the Church, bathing her in radiant
splendor. It is yet the dawn, but
the sun in its rising has already set
our hearts aglow. All around is the
fragrance of holiness and joy.”
The Resurrection, by Matthias
Grünewald, 1515

DISCUSSION OF THE SOURCES
We found True and False Reform to be very readable, but you need some patience
and dedication, Yves Congar was not writing for a mass audience, but was writing
for fellow priests and academics.
For our biography of Pope John XXIII, we listened to a series of lectures by Learn25,
formerly Now You Know Media.
We will also have a video exploring the wartime experiences of the leading
theologians in the Second Vatican Council, using as on of our sources, David
Kertzer’s books, the Pope and Mussolini, and the Pope at War, which draw from the
Vatican archives for Pope Pius XI and XII, among many other sources.
We also have a book review video on our sources for our videos on the history and
decrees of Vatican II.

To find the source of any direct
quotes in this blog, please type in
the phrase to the search box in
my blog to see the referenced
footnote.
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Pope John XXIII Opening Address to Vatican II, and Yves Congar, True and False Reform, Conclusion

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