The event that brought new hope and joy to the Church

Nearly 50 years ago, the world’s bishops sat in St Peter’s basilica in the Vatican, to deliberate, discuss and decide on the documents that would change the Catholic Church in a way that would give the People of God a new direction  rooted in joy and hope, as the constitution Gaudium et Spes put it.

The Second Vatican Council, which ran from 1962-65, changed the Church in many profound ways, and it changed the way the Catholic Church relates to the world.

Dominican Father Albert Nolan was a postgraduate student in Rome during the first session of Vatican II in 1962. As a young priest, Fr Nolan experienced the council as a profound act of faith in the Holy Spirit, instead of the usual reliance on bureaucracy.

Fr Nolan said Vatican II was a fearless opening of the windows of the Church to let in some fresh air and an escape from our self-imposed captivity behind Church walls. It was a very exciting and hopeful time.

Fr Harry Wilkinson of Rosebank’s Immaculate Conception parish in Johannesburg similarly described the time of the council as wonderful and exciting.

Fr Wilkinson was a seminarian when Pope John XXIII made the startling call to the worlds bishops to convene an ecumenical council.

By the time the council was underway, Fr Wilkinson had become the secretary to Archbishop Joseph McGeough, the apostolic delegate in South Africa.

I was invited to the opening of the second session of the council with the archbishop, Fr Wilkinson recalled. However, the young priest left his full habit at home and needed to borrow a winter coat as the Italian winter was in full swing.

I was given the archbishops overcoat which kept me warm  but it also identified me as an archbishop! The young Fr Wilkinson was given the respect of an archbishop and was ushered to some of the best seats in the house. I was seated within 20 feet of the pope when he said the opening Mass, he recalled.

The exciting event and his experience of being present at the council profoundly influences his vocation to this day.

For Fr Wilkinson, the highlight of Vatican II came after its conclusion in 1965: being in South Africa as the regions priests were educated on how to implement the Vatican II changes into Church life.

Bishop Fritz Lobinger, then Fr Lobinger, was made responsible for holding workshops for priests. I went to two of these workshops and it was exciting to see the changes being put into practice.

Fr Wilkinson said the most exciting thing about Vatican II was the wonderful experience of being able to share with the laity.

This profound change was noticed by everyone. Cardinal Wilfrid Napier of Durban said in a country like South Africa, the change in the relationships between priests and laity is most notable. There is nothing like working closely together for getting people to form deeper and more lasting relationships, he said.

Fr Nolan said Vatican II was a bold attempt to return to the Gospel of Jesus  the Good News  and it did this by involving the laity.

Immaculate Heart of Mary Sister Judith Coyle, now a lecturer at St Augustines College, was undergoing her religious formation at the time of Vatican II.

I was old enough at 17 or 18 to have experienced the old Church, but when Vatican IIs acts were implemented there was a profound freeing effect.

She said the council opened up new possibilities and new hopes. The liturgy and vernacular were just two of the very big changes, Sr Coyle said.

People really wanted these changes, she recalled. This could be seen when the Vatican could barely keep up with applications from countries around the world wanting translations of the liturgy in their local languages. This was one of the reasons the translations were so hasty people wanted the changes!

Michael Shackleton, former editor of The Southern Cross, was also present at Vatican II.

Then a young priest, he was private secretary to Cardinal McCann of Cape Town and in that capacity accompanied his superior to the council.

The council intended to change the way the Church looked at the modern world, Mr Shackleton said. He said Cardinal McCann was most interested in the desire of many of the worlds bishops to move away from a western-centred perspective.

Vatican II was necessary because the world realised the Church was not Europe, Mr Shackleton said. The whole Church is a huge organisation and what happened at Vatican II was an attempt to open up the world.

Sr Coyle said the council answered the call to modernise the Church to reflect the way the world and society were changing.

It responded to the interaction society and science were having on the Church. Vatican II was like the Storming of the Bastille in that all sorts of possibilities emerged from the event. Vatican II gave us hope that we could do anything.

Mr Shackleton said it was exciting to see the changes take place. I was desperately keen to speak English at Mass. And people were relieved when Mass was said in a language they understood. They knew what was happening!

Fr Wilkinson said the Church adopted a profound change not only in the liturgy, but also in Catholic thought. The effort by the bishops to bring the Church into the 21st Century brought with it tremendous hope. He said the shift in thinking to involve the laity made a vast difference to the way the laity experienced their faith.

But, Fr Wilkinson said there is still some distance to travel to improve the Church. We should be putting the thoughts and actions of the laity into every level of the way the Church operates, he said, adding that this is the spirit of Vatican II.

Sr Coyle said the possibilities Vatican II presented still exist today.

During Vatican II the Church discovered a history. The perception was that the Church had always been the same. But at Vatican II, scholars and theologians found different models of Church and that history continues today.

She said the intention of the council was not to simply end in 1965: That history, spirit and possibility continues today.

Sr Coyle said some things that were instituted during the council will never be unchanged, which she said is good. Some things cant be undone, but others need to be carried further.

Sr Coyle said this is the very thing that represents hope in the Church: the possibilities which Vatican II offers Catholics.

For Cardinal Napier, the Church in its renewed form is able to bring hope into peoples lives in particular by presenting our faith more as a journey undertaken with Jesus walking alongside, rather than him there in the distance leading us forward. The joy, he added, is visible in the interaction between the different parts of the Church.

Being human, the Church will always have problems, Mr Shackelton said. But Vatican II allowed the Church to have pride in itself because it was now doing what it was supposed to be doing to be ecumenical, interactive and understandable.

These, he said, are the elements that Catholics are able to embrace today and the very fact that Vatican II took place represented hope for further developments in the deepening of faith.

Fr Nolan said in the 50 years since the Church was rocked by the changes of Vatican II, some of the hope and joy has faded even as there have been some important gains that continue to grow and develop, including liturgy and spirituality.

But we have very much further to go and hopefully there will be much more to come in the future.

This is the first in our year-long series of articles on Hope&Joy. Next week Fr Anthony Egan SJ will look at how Vatican II became such a revolutionary moment in the Church.