Planning the Council: A Confidential Memo from Cardinal Suenens to Pope John XXIII

Posted on September 25, 2012 by Deacon Eric Stoltz

The account of Cardinal Léon-Josef Suenens, archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels, of his famous memo to Pope John XXIII which led to the basic structure and approach of the Council. The Cardinal also provides the actual text of the memo.

During an audience with the Pope in March 1962, I complained to John XXIII about the number of schemata prepared for discussion at the forthcoming Council, which seemed quite excessive. There were, I believe, seventy-two of them, very uneven in value, and in any case so overwhelming in volume that a priori they prevented fruitful and worthwhile work at the Council itself. John XXIII asked me to clear the ground and submit to him a plan based on the prepared schemata.

Cardinal Leon-Josef Suenens, archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels

After studying these documents, I sent him a preliminary note designed to cut out a lot of dead wood and set the Council on a truly pastoral course. The note was both negative and positive: idem nolle as well as idem velle were both needed as a basis for more detailed work to follow. This note is given below as Appendix I. John XXIII approved this verbally to me; and it then paved the way for future work. Continue reading →

Pope Issues Rules, Procedures for Council

Posted on September 5, 2012 by Deacon Eric Stoltz

Pope John XXIII has put the finishing touches on preparations for the Second Vatican Council by appointing the council’s major officers and spelling out its rules and procedures.

He did so only five weeks before the council’s opening by issuing a motu proprio—the technical name for a document drawn up and signed by the Pope on his own initiative.

One of the Pope’s acts was to name a presiding council of 10 cardinals who will take turns in presiding over plenary sessions of the ecumenical council in the Pope’s name when he is not present. The 10 are from nine nations. Among them is Francis Cardinal Spellman, Archbishop of New York.
With the release (Sept. 5) of the motu proprio, the Pope also:

Named cardinals of the Roman Curia to head 10 council commissions which in general parallel the preparatory commissions he set up for the council two years ago.
Appointed Amleto Cardinal Cicognani, his Secretary of State and former Apostolic Delegate to the United States, president of a Secretariat for Extraordinary Affairs which will deal with any unforeseen problems. Among its seven other members is Albert Cardinal Meyer, Archbishop of Chicago.
Required a two-thirds majority—plus his own approval—for enactment of decrees of the council.
Stated that non-Catholic delegate observers may attend not only the solemn public sessions of the council, but also the working sessions in which all the Catholic bishops take part.

Continue reading →

The City of Rome Prepares

Posted on August 24, 2012 by Deacon Eric Stoltz

From the Eternal City, Michael Novak reports on the general atmosphere as the time for the Council gets closer:

Rome sweltering hot this summer. Stepping out from the cool interior of St. Peter’s, one meets rolling waves of dry heat and a blinding glare from the Piazza. Rome is quiet now too. The great work of preparation for the Council has been concluded. Summaries have been sent out to the bishops of the world, and now, in the summer heat, Rome is settling down to wait for October. Continue reading →

Laymen Must Teach

Posted on July 14, 2012 by Maurice Timothy Reidy

From the July 14, 1962 issue of America, a prescient call for the laity to take a greater role in church life:

As Catholic school enrollment in the United States moves toward the six-million mark, and public school students in Confraternity of Christian Doctrine classes move toward a four-million record, we realize more keenly than ever how necessary it is to draw more of the laity into religious education.

Necessity imposed by numbers, however, is only approximate reason for turning to the laity. The command of our Lord—”Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations” (Matt. 28:19)—has always included the laity. St. Peter made that clear when he told the people: “You . . . are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a purchased people, that you may proclaim the perfections of Him who has called you out of darkness . . . ” (I Pet. 2:9).

From St. Peter to Pope John XXIII the teaching remains the same. And today Pope John has put it into very practical terminology. Cardinal Cicognani, papal legate to the Inter-American CCD Congress in Dallas, last year, revealed that the Pope had explicitly instructed him to urge increased participation of the laity in their Christ-given mission with this motto: “The Confraternity of Christian Doctrine in every parish.” The CCD, as its constitution declares, is essentially a work of the laity, and the motto that Pope John gave was, in fact, a reminder of a law that has been on the books for some time (ever since the codification of Canon Law in 1918)—in Canon 711, par. 2. Continue reading →

Enough is Enough

Quote

Posted on May 21, 2012 by Deacon Eric Stoltz

The time has come to put an end to this nonsense. Either the Biblical Commission will bestir itself, do some proper work and by its suggestions to the Holy Father make a useful contribution to the needs of the present time, or it would be better to abolish it and let the Supreme Authority replace it in the Lord by something else.—John XXIII to Cardinal Amleto Giovanni Cicognani

Angry at the backward, literalistic views of the Biblical Commission and its attacks against Cardinal Agustin Bea, rector of the Pontifical Biblical Institute, where progressive approaches to biblical scholarship were favored. From John XXIII: Pope of the Century by Peter Hebblethewaite (p. 211).