I imagine I will comment more, at length, soon. However, in the meantime, I was struck by this (and again, it is a footnote) which seemed to me to encapsulate so much of those heady days:
In response to the puzzlement of some Fathers at the adoption of the prayer in Hippolytus for the ordination of bishops and to the claim that this prayer displays an impoverished theology that does not do justice to Vatican ll, Father Lécuyer gave a learned, extempore defense of the text, eliciting prolonged applause from the entire gathering.We have, of course, no idea of what Father Lécuyer actually said. It may indeed have been wise and learned, and fully answered the concerns of the puzzled fathers. But then again, it may not.
What is clear is that the Church's traditional mode of operation, whereby a change of this magnitude (we are talking about the ordination of bishops!) would have been (and I would argue should be) subject to rigorous theological scrutiny (should it be attempted at all, which again is at least open to question) was in fact decided on the strength of Father Lécuyer's rhetoric.
It was, after all, the 1960s.
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3 comments:
This is also a useful corrective to the idea that "it was all Bugnini's fault". There were lots of them.
Yes indeed! And I don't exclude Pope Paul from that list, either, despite my post of a few days ago, describing how he may have tried to apply the brakes. I will post more on this later.
Surely the most interesting question is "Why did it happen this way?" Niether "It was all Bugnini's fault" nor "It was, after all, the 1960's" seem to me to be sufficient answers.
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