Rev. Ralph Wiltgen: The Rhine Flows Into the Tiber: A History of Vatican II

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THE FOURTH SESSION
September 14 to December 8, 1965

MARRIAGE AND BIRTH CONTROL

One of the tasks before the Council was to re-examine Church legislation on mixed marriages and the prescribed form of marriage. Cardinal Dopfner of Munich called for major changes, but was opposed by Cardinal Spellman of New York, who was supported by over 100 United States bishops, by Archbishop Heenan, supported by all the bishops of England and Wales, by Archbishop Conway of Armagh, Ireland, who spoke for more than eighty bishops of various countries, and by Cardinal Gilroy of Sydney, Australia. All these prelates stressed the benefits derived from the existing legislation, and the harm that might result from the legislation favored by Cardinal Dopfner. Seeing his measure defeated on the Council floor, the Cardinal Moderator after one day’s debate called upon the Council to renounce its right to treat the matter any further, and instead to transmit it immediately to the Pope for appropriate action. The proposal was adopted, at the last business meeting of the third session (November 20, 1964), by a vote of 1592 to 427.

The desired decree, however, did not appear until after the Council, on March 18, 1966, and it was signed by Cardinal Ottaviani. It altered the legislation but not substantially, as Cardinal Dopfner had wished, and it was clearly a victory for the English-speaking bishops. Had they been as well organized throughout the Council as they were on this issue, the Second Vatican Council might have taken an altogether different course.

The doctrinal aspect of marriage was dealt with in the schema on the Church in the modern world, and came up for discussion during the third session. The Moderator, Cardinal Agagianian, announced on October 28, 1964, that some points” had been reserved for the Pope’s special commission on birth control. Those points were, in particular, the progesterone pill, as Archbishop John Dearden of Detroit officially announced on the following day and, in general, “the problem of birth control,” as Cardinal Suenens put it in an intervention a year later. The Council Fathers were free to submit observations on these “points” in writing, and were given the assurance that the Pope’s special commission would give them serious consideration.

On October 29, 1964, the debate opened on Article 21, “The Sanctity of Marriage and the Family.” Cardinal Leger of Montreal said that many theologians believed that the difficulties regarding the doctrine of marriage had their origin in an inadequate exposition of the purposes of marriage, lie advocated that fecundity should be called a duty pertaining to the state of matrimony as a whole, rather than to an individual act. “It is altogether necessary, he said, “for human conjugal love—I speak of human love, which therefore involves soul and body—to be presented as constituting a true purpose of marriage, as something good in itself, having its own needs and laws.”

He was pleased that the schema avoided applying the expressions “primary purpose” to procreation and “secondary purpose” to conjugal love. But the avoidance of words was of little use, he said, if afterwards the schema did not refer to conjugal love except as related to fecundity. The schema should affirm, he maintained, that the intimate marital union also had conjugal love as its true purpose, and that consequently the marriage act was “legitimate even when not directed toward procreation.”

Cardinal Suenens also spoke on the first day of debate, and outlined the doctrinal, ethical and scientific norms which, he said, should be kept in mind by the Pope’s special commission on birth control. That commission, he said, would have to “examine whether we have kept in perfect balance the various aspects of the Church’s doctrine on marriage.” Perhaps, he suggested, so much stress had been placed on the words of Scripture, Be fruitful and multiply," that gradually another phrase, which was also the word of God—“and the two become one flesh”—had been disregarded. Each was a central truth, said the Cardinal, and each was con¬
tained in Scripture. They should therefore serve to clarify one another. One of (he Cardinal’s many proposals was that Pope Paul should reveal the names of the members of his special commission, so that the entire People of God might be able to send them their views on marriage and birth control.

Cardinal Ottaviani spoke on the following day. “I am not pleased,” he said, “with the statement in the text that married couples may determine the number of children they are to have. Never has this been heard of in the Church.” He was the eleventh son in a family of twelve children, he said. “My father was a laborer, and the fear of having many children never entered my parents’ minds, because they trusted in Providence.” He concluded his brief statement by expressing his amazement “that yesterday in the Council it should have been said that there was doubt whether a correct stand had been taken hitherto on the principles governing marriage. Does this mean that the inerrancy of the Church will be called into question? Or was not the Holy Spirit with his Church in past centuries to illumine minds on this point of doctrine?”

Bishop Hervas y Benet of Ciudad Real, Spain, said that the schema spoke “little and much too timidly about supernatural faith and confidence in Divine Providence, about love and acceptance of the Cross, which ought to illumine Christian prudence. We are not here to compose a philosophical and hedonistic document, or one that is merely technical or scientific, but one that is Christian.” He said that the parents of large Christian families should be held in honor, and asked that those who had drafted the schema should keep this in mind in their revision. Nor should they pass over in silence “what the modern sciences of psychology and pedagogy had to say in praise and in favor of large families.” He received a warm round of applause.

Pope Paul VI was so distressed by Cardinal Suenens’ intervention of October 29 that he requested the Cardinal to come to see him. Some days later, on November 7, Cardinal Suenens interrupted the debate on the schema on the missions to deny publicly that he had questioned authentic Church teaching on marriage, and to state that all matters pertaining to the study conducted by the Pope’s special commission on birth control clearly “depended solely upon his supreme authority.”

Archbishop Adrianus Djajasepoetra of Djakarta, Indonesia, speaking on behalf of bishops from many nations, said in the Council hall on November 20, 1964, that the Council did not take adequate account of different cultures. Marriage, he felt, should be described as a sacred and human community of life instituted by God for the founding of a family. Conjugal love should not be given undue primacy, he said, because marriages often took place between persons who hardly knew each other, at the bidding of parents or relatives. In those cases, love was a gradual fruit of the marriage. It should be remembered, he said, that the founding of a new family and the continuation of a particular group was sometimes the primary intention in marriage.

After the third session, the schema was so thoroughly revised that it had to be debated once again. Auxiliary Bishop Kazimierz Majdanski of Wloclawek, speaking on September 29, 1965, at the fourth session, on behalf of the bishops of Poland, said that the modern world “abhors the bloodshed of war, but looks with indifference on the destruction of unborn human life.” Pointing out that the number of abortions annually exceeded the total number of persons killed in World War II, he called for a solemn declaration by the Council on the absolute inviolability of all innocent human life, asking that those practicing abortion be denounced as guilty of homicide.

Another revision was prepared as soon as the debate ended, and was distributed on November 12. This new version could be interpreted as leaving it to the spouses to decide whether or not to use artificial contraceptives to limit the size of their families, provided their ultimate aim was the fostering of conjugal love.

The schema containing this doctrine now totaled 152 pages, and was distributed to the Council Fathers in two sections on Friday and Saturday, November 12 and 13. Thirty-three ballots were to be taken the following Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. With so many momentous issues at stake in this schema, the Council Fathers perhaps should have spent the weekend examining the revised text. Instead, 500 of them left for Florence on chartered buses shortly after midday on Saturday, November 13, for an all-expenses-paid weekend to celebrate the Seventh Centenary of the Birth of Dante, Italy’s renowned poet. Late Sunday night, they returned to Rome and early Monday morning they began voting, some of them frankly admitting that they had had no time to examine the text.

The chapter on marriage as a whole was approved by the general assembly by 1596 votes to 72, and 484 affirmative votes with qualifications.

The subcommission which processed the qualifications on this chapter ignored any major amendments, stating that these would substantially alter a text which had already received more than the required two-thirds majority.

On November 25, Pope Paul took action and through his Secretary of State sent four special amendments on the marriage section to the joint commission. Each commission member was given a copy, but beforehand the periti were asked to leave the room. Tension immediately mounted and Cardinal Leger sprang to his feet in angry protest. When some doubt arose as to the binding character of the amendments, the members were informed by another letter on the following day that they were not free to reject the amendments, but only to determine their phrasing. That day the tension was somewhat relieved when the periti were once again al¬
lowed to attend the meeting.

The first of these amendments called for the insertion of the two words “artificial contraceptives” among the “deformations” detracting from the dignity of conjugal love and family life, like polygamy, divorce, and free love. At the same time, the Pope called for a precise footnote reference to the two pages in Pope Pius XI’s encyclical, Casti Connubii, where the use of artificial contraceptives was condemned. The commission excused itself from introducing “artificial contraceptives,” used instead “illicit practices against human generation,” and omitted the reference to Casti Connubii.

The second called for the deletion of the word “also” from the statement that the procreation of children was “also” a purpose of marriage, because in the context this word made it appear that procreation was a secondary purpose of marriage, and conjugal love a primary purpose. This was the opposite of the Church’s traditional teaching, and the Council had pledged itself to avoid this controversy. The amendment also called for the insertion of the following sentence: “Children are the supreme gift of marriage and contribute very substantially to the welfare of their parents.” The commission adopted both suggestions.

The third called for the substitution of the words “it is not lawful” for the words “should not” in the prohibition to “sons of the Church” to use methods of regulating procreation “which have been or may be found blameworthy by the teaching authority of the Church.” A footnote was to be added here, calling attention both to Casti Connubii and to Pius XII’s allocution to midwives, which reiterated the teaching of that encyclical, stating that the prescription against artificial contraceptives was derived from “natural and divine law.”

The joint commission adopted this third amendment in substance, but failed to refer to the statements of Popes Pius XI and XII as the “two most outstanding documents on this subject,” as Pope Paul wished. It further added a reference of its own, the allocution of Pope Paul VI to the College of Cardinals on June 23, 1964, in which he had given the cardinals a progress report on the work of his special commission on birth control. “Let us now state with all frankness,” he had said at the time, “that we do not yet have a sufficient motive for considering as outdated—and therefore as not binding—the norms laid down by Pope Pius XII in this matter; therefore they must be considered as binding, at least as long as we do not feel obliged in conscience to modify them. . . . And it seems opportune to recommend that no one, for the present, should take it upon himself to make any pronouncement at variance with the norm in force.” By citing this allocution of Pope Paul, the joint commission—and subsequently the entire Council—implicitly confirmed the traditional teaching of the Church in this matter.

The fourth and final amendment proposed by Pope Paul referred to the temptation to married couples to use artificial contraceptives, and even abortion. It called for the insertion of a sentence to the effect that, in order that the spouses might overcome such temptations, it was “altogether necessary that they sincerely practice conjugal chastity.” This amendment was retained in substance, but was inserted in another part of the text.

According to the Pope’s directives, the amended text was submitted to him before being sent to the printer.

On December 3, 1965, the final revision of the schema was distributed to the Council Fathers. At once there was much agitation behind the scenes because the joint commission, contrary to Pope Paul’s wish, had failed to indicate in a footnote the specific pages of Casti Connubii where artificial contraceptives were condemned. Before the voting started on December 4, a special announcement was made on instructions from the Pope. The Council Fathers were asked to note that the page references in one of the footnotes had been omitted, and that, in voting on the text, they must understand that they were voting on that footnote as well, together with the specific page references. They were also informed that the page references would be indicated in the official text which would be presented for the final and formal vote on December 7.

The chapter on marriage and the family was adopted by 2047 votes to 155 on December 4, and the schema as a whole was formally adopted at the public session on December 7 by a vote of 2309 to 75. It was then promulgated by Pope Paul VI.

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THE FOURTH SESSION

September 14 to December 8, 1965

ATHEISM AND COMMUNISM

On December 3,1963, the day before the second session ended, Archbishop Geraldo Sigaud of Diamantina, Brazil, personally presented to Cardinal Cicognani petitions addressed to Pope Paul and signed by more than 200 Council Fathers from forty-six countries. These called for a special schema in which “the Catholic social doctrine would be set forth with great clarity, and the errors of Marxism, socialism, and communism would be refuted on philosophical, sociological and economic grounds.”

There was no reply from the Pope, but eight months later, on August 6, 1964, he published his first encyclical, Ecclesiam suam. In it he called for dialogue with atheistic communism, even though—as he said—there were reasons enough which compelled him, his predecessors and everyone with religious values at heart, “to condemn the ideological systems which deny God and oppress the Church, systems which are often identified with economic, social and political regimes.”

The German-speaking and Scandinavian bishops immediately reacted to the encyclical, declaring in their official remarks on the Church in the modern world schema, that it was “probably desirable” to have a “more distinct treatment in the schema of the problem of atheism, and of dialogue with it.”

On October 21, 1964, during the third session, the section of the schema dealing with atheism—it carefully avoided the word communism—came up for discussion. Cardinal Suenens, after stating that it did not give lengthy enough treatment to the modern phenomenon of militant atheism in its various forms, called for an investigation on why so many men deny God and attack the faith.

Archbishop Paul Yu Pin of Nanking, China, speaking two days later in the name of 70 Council Fathers, asked for the addition of a new chapter on atheistic communism. The Council must not neglect to discuss it, he said, “because communism is one of the greatest, most evident and most unfortunate of modern phenomena.” It had to be treated in order to satisfy the expectations of all peoples, “especially those who groan under the yoke of communism and are forced to endure indescribable sorrows unjustly.”

Josef Cardinal Beran, exiled archbishop of Prague, residing in Rome, received a Czechoslovakian newspaper clipping which boasted that communists had succeeded in infiltrating every commission at the Vatican Council.

On April 7, 1965, while the schema was being revised. Pope Paul founded a Secretariat for Non-Believers, with the purpose of fostering dialogue with atheists. Cardinal Konig of Vienna, who had frequently served in a liaison capacity for the Vatican with the governments of communist countries, was placed in charge.

By September 14, 1965, the opening date of the fourth session, a revision of the atheism section in the schema on the Church in the modern world was in the hands of the Council Fathers, but once again it contained no explicit reference to communism. The silence prompted the circulation of a letter, dated September 29, 1965, signed by 25 bishops, giving ten reasons why Marxist communism should be treated by the Council. A petition in the form of a written intervention requesting such treatment accompanied the letter, which was widely distributed among the Council Fathers.

The letter maintained that eventual silence by the Council on communism, after the latest Popes and the Holy Office had said so much about it, would be “equivalent to disavowing all that has been said and done up till now.” Just as Pope Pius XII was at present being publicly reprimanded—but unjustly—for having kept silent on the Jews, the letter warned, so one could well imagine that “tomorrow the Council will be reproved—and justly so—for its silence on communism, which will be taken as a sign of cowardice and conniving.” This lengthy letter had been written by Bishop Carli and was distributed by Archbishops Sigaud and Lefebvre, but their names were not included among the 25 signatures. They had purposely withheld them because there was great antagonism against them, both in the liberal camp and in the press.

While making a routine phone call to check out various news sources, I learned from Archbishop Sigaud that 450 Council Fathers had signed this written intervention prepared by the International Group of Fathers.

On October 20, 1965, I distributed a news bulletin on this, and three of Rome’s largest daily newspapers, Il Giornale d’ltalia, Il Messaggero, and Il Tempo, promptly ran front page stories.

The joint commission responsible for the schema on the Church in the modern world distributed its new revision on Saturday, November 13, but again it contained no mention of communism in the text. Furthermore, the interventions signed by the 450 Council Fathers asking for explicit treatment of communism were not referred to in the official report prepared by this commission.

That same day Bishop Carli sent a letter of protest to the Council Presidency, responsible for the enforcement of Council rules, and copies of it to the Cardinal Moderators, General Secretariat and Administrative Tribunal, for their information. He called attention to the fact that “450 Council Fathers,” and himself among them, had presented “a certain amendment to the General Secretariat within the prescribed time,” which the commission in making its revision had completely ignored. After quoting several directives from the Rules of Procedure, he stated that they clearly signified that “all amendments must be printed and communicated to the Council Fathers, so that they can decide by vote whether they wish to admit or reject each one.”

He also labeled as illegal the action taken by the joint commission, and charged that “this manner of admitting or rejecting amendments of the Council Fathers—and, in our case, even without giving reasons for doing so—turns a commission of no more than 30 persons into a judicial body against which there is no appeal.” And although the Council Fathers together with the Supreme Pontiff were in reality the true judges, for all practical purposes they were merely being asked by the commission to state whether or not they were pleased with the decisions taken by the commission. This made it appear, he said, that “the commission members, rather than the Council Fathers, constitute the Council.”

As a result of this formal protest, Cardinal Tisserant launched an official investigation.

Since the joint commission had ignored the interventions with the 450 signatures of Council Fathers representing 86 countries, the International Group of Fathers hastily prepared the same amendment in the form of a qualification, since submitting affirmative votes with qualifications would be the last opportunity to amend the text. By letter, dated Saturday, November 13, Council Fathers were invited to sign and submit the qualification during the voting on Monday, November 15. The qualification did not ask for a new condemnation of communism, as the press reported, but only for “a solemn reaffirmation by the Council of the long-standing doctrine of the Church on this matter.”

Distribution of the qualification, however, was severely handicapped, since this was the weekend on which 500 Council Fathers journeyed to Florence in chartered buses to participate in the Dante celebration.

On November 15, while the Council Fathers were voting on the atheism section, I distributed to the press a news release explaining that the 450 signed interventions had disappeared and therefore the International Group of Fathers was making a new try at having its voice heard by submitting a qualification, that morning, nearly identical to the intervention.

Immediately after the morning meeting Father Roberto Tucci, S.J., one of the periti on the joint commission, gave his usual briefing to the Italian reporters and was asked by them what had happened to the written interventions supported by 450 Council Fathers. “I can confirm the fact that the amendment on communism did not reach either the members of the commission or us periti who are part of the commission,” he replied. “There is no intrigue here of any sort; perhaps the petition ran into a red light along the way and was stopped.” Father Tucci’s remark made my story, distributed only an hour earlier, all the more topical, and within 24 hours it appeared on the front pages of Il Giornale d’ltalia, Il Messaggero, Il Tempo, Il Popolo, Il Secolo, Momento-Sera, and L’Avvenire d’Italia, and on the inside pages of Il Giorno, La Stampa, Paese Sera, Corriere della Sera, and Il Unita (communist daily).

On November 16, Air. Gian Franco Svidercoschi, using the pseudonym Helveticus, reported in Il Tempo that a “prelate” who was an “official” of the joint commission had stated that the communism intervention had arrived late, and consequently had not been taken into consideration. This conformed to the story given to the press by Father Tucci, and made the International Group of Fathers responsible for the negligence, since it apparently had not transmitted the signed interventions to the General Secretariat on time.

On November 17, Archbishop Sigaud released a statement to the press, stating that he and Archbishop Lefebvre had personally delivered the signed interventions to the General Secretariat at noon on October 9, within the prescribed time limit. This now shifted the responsibility to the General Secretariat.

On November 18, further details were published in Il Tempo by Mr. Svidercoschi, who meanwhile had done some checking. He reported that the General Secretariat had received the interventions within the time limit on Saturday, October 9, had at once telephoned the secretary of the joint commission to inform him that the amendments had arrived, but stated that they would be held over by the General Secretariat until Monday so that the numerous signatures could be checked. This placed responsibility back on the joint commission, and specifically on its secretariat, since—as Mr. Svidercoschi pointed out—the excuse originally given by that secretariat about the interventions having arrived “late” was no longer valid.

Cardinal Tisserant had in the meantime conducted his own investigation and brought his findings to the attention of Pope Paul.

Prom four different sources I learned that the person who had withheld the interventions from the members of the joint commission was the commission’s secretary, Monsignor Achille Glorieux, of Lille, France, who held nearly half a dozen Vatican positions and had once worked on the staff of L’Osservatore Romano. He was secretary likewise of the Commission on the Apostolate of the Laity.

Someone else on the joint commission later admitted that this commission had tabled other interventions as well, but that it had been stupid” to sidetrack these on communism.

On November 23, at noon, I issued a news release describing Monsignor Glorieux’s role in the matter and personally delivered copies of it to the reporters at the Vatican Press Office. As was to be expected, it came to the attention of Vatican authorities.

That afternoon at five o’clock Pope Paul VI received in audience the bishops of Latin America on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the Episcopal Council of Latin America (CELAM) and delivered an address in which he called attention to “Marxist atheism" He identified it as a dangerous, prevalent and most harmful infiltrating force in the economic and social life of Latin America, and stated that it considered “violent revolution as the only means for solving problems.”

On November 24, the morning newspapers ran front page stories on the French prelate who had acted as a “red light” for the interventions on communism, and that same morning the Pope sent the joint commission an order to insert a footnote on the Church’s teaching on communism. The commission acceded and cited the encyclicals of Pius XI, Pius XII, John XXIII, and Paul VI; and the words, “just as it has already done,” were inserted in the schema as follows: “In her loyal devotion to God and men, the Church cannot cease repudiating, just as it has already done, sorrowfully but as firmly as possible, those poisonous doctrines and actions which contradict reason and the common experience of humanity, and dethrone man from his native excellence.” The added words, as the joint commission explicitly stated in its official report to the general assembly, were introduced in order to allude “to the condemnations of communism and Marxism made by the Supreme Pontiffs.”

When making his official report to the general assembly in the name of the joint commission. Archbishop Garrone of Toulouse was obliged by Council authorities to make a public admission of negligence for the sake of setting straight the record. He stated that the interventions on communism had “indeed reached the offices of our commission within the proper time, but were not examined when they should have been, because unintentionally they had not been transmitted to the commission members.”

However, there was immediately evident a confusion of numbers in the various reports prepared by the joint commission. Archbishop Garrone said that 332 interventions had arrived on time. Another report set the total figure at 334, but stated that only 297 of them had arrived on time. When Archbishop Sigaud went to the Council archivist to check the signatures personally, since he had 435 of the 450 names on file, he was told that the original documents were not yet available and that the published figures were to be considered official. But the joint commission had published conflicting figures, and there was no indication which of these were “official.”

Although pleased over the addition of the new words in the body of the text, and over the citation of all the important encyclicals concerning communism in the footnote. Archbishop Sigaud said: “There is a difference between carrying a hat in your pocket, and wearing it on your head.”

On December 3, the International Group of Fathers distributed one last letter to the 800 Council Fathers on its mailing list. The letter gave five reasons why the sections of the Church in the modern world schema touching communism, marriage and war were still unsatisfactory, and closed with an appeal for a negative vote on the entire schema, because it was “no longer possible to obtain partial amendments.”

The drive, however, drew little response, and only 131 Council Fathers cast negative votes on the atheism section. But the International Group of Fathers remained steadfast, and was largely responsible for the 75 negative votes cast against the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern, World during the final and formal vote of December 7th.

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THE FOURTH SESSION

September 14 to December 8, 1965

WAR AND NUCLEAR WEAPONS

War and nuclear weapons were treated in Articles 84 and 85 of the revised schema on the Church in the modern world, which was distributed to the Council Fathers on November 12, 1965, late in the fourth session. Archbishop Philip M. Hannan, of New Orleans, Louisiana, was dissatisfied with the two articles and began to prepare amendments. He charged that the section on war was “immature and full of errors,” and claimed that, if the text were to be published in its present form, it would become “an object of ridicule in the world’s halls of political and military science.”

Article 84 was incorrect, he said, when it stated that “any use” of nuclear weapons was “absolutely illicit,” since there were several nuclear weapons with a very precise and limited field of destruction. The schema also erred in this article, he said, when it declared that it was “unreasonable to consider war as an apt means of restoring violated rights.” Since a military invasion violates the rights of a nation, and since the only means of repelling such an invasion is through the use of arms by war, it therefore followed that war was “an apt and necessary means of restoring violated rights.”

Article 85 erred, he said, in that it condemned a nation “for possessing nuclear weapons,” and it further erred in stating that “the production and possession of nuclear arms aggravates the causes of war.” The causes of war were injustice and unjust aspirations, “not the possession of nuclear arms, which under proper control can prevent injustice and aggression.” The same article ignored the fact that “the possession of nuclear arms by some nations had protected extensive areas of the world from possible aggression.” Archbishop Hannan had called these items to the attention of the joint commission a year earlier, but his minority opinion had been ignored.

On November 22, 1965, he discussed with Cardinal Shehan, of Baltimore, Maryland, the contents of a letter which he was preparing on Articles 84 and 85, and which he planned to send to all Council Fathers. Cardinal Shehan inquired about the stand of the German hierarchy in the matter, but Archbishop Hannan was not aware of it. In the days that followed, the Archbishop’s letter was signed by the following prelates: Cardinals Spellman and Shehan; the archbishops of Washington, D. C., Mexico City, Durban, Hobart, and Parana; the Maronite archbishop of Tyr, Lebanon; and the Franciscan bishop of Tlalnepantla, Mexico.

On December 2, the latest revision of the schema was distributed to the Council Fathers, containing the final qualifications introduced by the joint commission, and the vote was announced for Saturday, two days later. That night, a dozen nuns printed and folded the circular letters and stuffed them into envelopes until 1:00 a.m. There were French, Italian and Spanish translations of the English letter, and the envelopes, already addressed and divided by streets, were individually marked to indicate what language edition was to be inserted. These same nuns had repeatedly assisted with similar drives in the course of the Council.

At 7:30 a.m. on Friday, December 3 , a fleet of six cars began delivering copies of the letter to the residences of more than 2000 Council Fathers. The nuns drove one of the cars, and eight other nuns delivered letters on foot to areas where parking space was not available. By 4130 that afternoon the work was done.

Archbishop Hannan’s letter invited the Council Fathers to cast a negative vote on December 4 on the chapter about war and nuclear weapons, and suggested that the entire schema as well should receive a negative vote, if the “errors” described in his letter were not corrected. He proposed that the document, if rejected, should be transferred to the Synod of Bishops for further study, correction and promulgation.

The Archbishop objected to Article 80 (formerly 84), which stated that “those who possess modern nuclear weapons are provided with a kind of occasion for perpetrating just such abominations” as “the indiscriminate destruction of entire cities or extensive areas along with their population.” He also objected to Article 81 (formerly 85), which bluntly stated that, because of the accumulation of nuclear arms, “the causes of war, instead of being eliminated, threaten to become gradually worse.”

In his letter he maintained that these sentences ignored the fact that the possession of nuclear arms had preserved freedom for “a very large portion of the world.” This defense from aggression he said, was “not a crime, but a great service.” It was as illogical to say that nuclear arms were a cause of war and dissension, he said, “as to say that the law and police force in a city cause the crime and disorder in a city.” The letter warned that “the inclusion of these sentences and thoughts in the schema” would certainly hurt “the cause of freedom in the world,” and emphasized that they contradicted that part of the address of Pope Paul VI to the United Nations, in which he affirmed a nation’s right of self-defense. According to Archbishop Hannan, there was “no adequate self-defense for the largest nations in today’s world,” unless they possessed nuclear weapons.

On Saturday, December 4, the Council Fathers were asked to indicate whether they were pleased with the way in which the joint commission had handled the qualifications on war and nuclear weapons. That same morning word was spread in the Council hall that Cardinal Shehan had signed the letter “without reading it,” and that he would not cast a negative vote as requested in the letter. Although the first part of the rumor was false, he actually had changed his mind about how to vote.

Two priests had assisted Archbishop Hannan, and they now suggested that if there were several hundred votes that morning against the chapter on war and nuclear weapons, he would be in an advantageous position and could go directly to the Holy Father, point out the great dissatisfaction among the Council Fathers, and propose how the text might be altered before the over-all vote scheduled for Monday morning. But as it happened, the returns on the chapter were not announced until Monday, so this plan fell through.

On December 4, still another rumor began making the rounds. This one claimed that Pope Paul had sent Cardinal Spellman a telegram, asking him to do his best to stop the campaign launched by Archbishop Hannan, and to withdraw his support.

On Sunday, December 5, the joint commission published a letter signed by Bishop Joseph Schroffer, of Eichstatt, Germany, chairman of the subcommission responsible for the chapter on war and nuclear arms, and by Archbishop Garrone, who in the Council hall had read the report on the schema in the name of the joint commission. Their letter stated that the reasons given in “a page signed by Cardinal Spellman and nine other Council Fathers” for casting negative votes against the schema section dealing with war were not valid, because they were based on “an erroneous interpretation of the text.”

Archbishop Hannan, taking into account the impression conveyed to the average reader, for whom the pastoral constitution was intended, had stated that in the schema “the possession of nuclear arms is condemned as immoral.” The rebuttal of Bishop Schroffer and Archbishop Garrone claimed that “nowhere in Articles 80 and 81 is the possession of nuclear arms condemned as immoral.” The words of the text were selected with a purpose, they said, and must be accurately understood. Nor was it denied that freedom could be temporarily preserved through the possession and accumulation of nuclear weapons. It was only denied that the arms race was “a safe way to preserve lasting peace.” Nor was it stated that nuclear arms were “causes of war,” The letter went on to say that the schema did not contradict “the right, affirmed in the context, of some nation defending itself with violence against unjust aggression . . .”

In addition to the interpretation given by the joint commission in this letter, there was the official comment contained in the reports to the general assembly. These now stated that Article 81 did not intend “to condemn nuclear weapons indiscriminately,” and that the text in no way intended to impose “an obligation of unilateral destruction of atomic weapons.” These statements, and mention of the right to self-defense, were due to a large extent to the campaign conducted by Archbishop Hannan.

The rumor about the Pope’s sending Cardinal Spellman a telegram was still circulating among the Council Fathers on Sunday, so that evening I telephoned Archbishop Hannan to ask if it was true. “I spoke with Cardinal Spellman today,” he replied, “and he gave me no indication that he had changed his mind. If he did receive such a telegram, I should think that I would be the first one to learn about it.”

Late that Sunday night a Curia cardinal informed some bishops that “over 400 negative votes” had been cast against the chapter on war and nuclear weapons in the voting on Saturday. The same cardinal stated that Cardinal Cicognani was telling members of the Roman Curia to advise as many Council Fathers as possible to vote against the schema on the following day.

The vote on the schema as a whole took place on Monday, December 6. Before the ballot was taken, it was announced that the chapter on war and nuclear weapons had received 483 negative votes on Saturday. Considering themselves beaten, many of those who had voted against the chapter now voted in favor of the schema as a whole, and the text was accepted by a vote of 2111 to 251.

As the Council Fathers poured out of St. Peter’s that morning, I waited at the exit used by the cardinals. After Cardinal Spellman was helped into his car, I went up to his secretary and asked, “Is it true that His Eminence received a telegram from the Pope, asking him to withdraw support from Archbishop Hannan’s proposal?” Unhesitatingly he replied, “No, it is not true at all.”

When L’Osservatore Romano appeared on the newsstand several hours later, it carried word that Pope Paul had already decided that the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World merited his approval, and would be voted on and promulgated at the Public Session on the following day, December 7.

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THE FOURTH SESSION
September 14 to December 8, 1965

INVITATION TO REDISCOVER GOD


It was Pope Paul Vi’s special wish that there should be, before the end of the Council, an evening prayer service for promoting Christian unity, attended by the Council Fathers and the observer delegates. The time and place decided upon was Saturday, December 4, 1965, in the basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls. The Pope conducted the service himself; psalms were sung, and there were Scripture readings by a French Catholic, an American Methodist and a Greek Orthodox.

In his address, Pope Paul said, “Your departure saddens us now, and creates a solitude which we did not experience before the Council. We would like to see you with us always.” There were more prayers at the tomb of St. Paul, and then Pope Paul held a reception for the observer delegates in the adjacent Benedictine monastery, where his predecessor had made the first announcement of the Council.

Rt. Rev. Dr. John Moorman, leader of the Anglican delegation, addressed the Pope on behalf of the observer delegates and guests, whose number had risen to 103 at the fourth session. “Never once in the four years,” he said, “have we felt any resentment at our presence. On the contrary, we have always been led to suppose that our presence has, in more ways than one, contributed to the success of the Council in the great task of reform to which it has set its hand.” And he added, “We believe that the days of mutual fear, of rigid exclusiveness and of arrogant self-sufficiency on either side are passing away. The road to unity will indeed be long and difficult; but it may be of comfort to Your Holiness to know that, as a result of our presence here as observers, you will have a company of more than 100 men . . . who, as they go all over the world, will try to carry to the Churches something of the spirit of friendship and tolerance which they have seen in the hall of St. Peter’s. Our work as observers is not done. I would like you, dear Holy Father, to think of us as your friends—and indeed as your messengers—as we go our respective ways.”

The Pope expressed his joy and consolation at these words. “They give us hope,” he said, “that, God willing, we shall meet again. And our meeting will always be in Christ our Lord.” As a remembrance of the Council, he gave each observer a tiny bronze bell and a Latin certificate. After being introduced to each of the observers and guests by Cardinal Bea, the Pope returned to the Vatican.

On Monday, December 6, each Council Father received from the Pope a simple gold ring symbolizing the close bonds of charity existing between the Pope and the bishops. Each also received a Latin certificate attesting that he had taken part in the Council. 

That same morning the Secretary General read a Bull issued by Pope Paul, proclaiming an extraordinary Jubilee to extend from January 1 to May 29, Pentecost Sunday, 1966. Then the Secretary General expressed his thanks in Latin verse for the cooperation he had received from the Council Fathers. Cardinal Suenens, as Moderator for the day, expressed the Council’s thanks to all officials at different levels who had in any way contributed to the organization and conduct of the numerous meetings. When he mentioned Archbishop Felici, the applause was exceptionally prolonged. More than any other official, the Secretary General had won the hearts of the Council Fathers. Despite the weight of administrative work resting on his shoulders, his wit and Latin verse had repeatedly enlivened the meetings of the general assembly, and his witticisms were often repeated by the Council Fathers.

That afternoon, L’ Osservatore Romano published the long-awaited decree of Pope Paul VI on the reorganization of the Roman Curia. “There is no doubt,” read the decree, “that the reorganization must begin with the Congregation of the Holy Office, since the most important business of the Roman Curia is given to it, namely, whatever concerns the doctrine of faith and morals, and other matters intimately connected with this doctrine.” The name of the Holy Office was changed to “Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith,” and numerous other changes were indicated, including the abolition of a special section in the Sacred Congregation responsible for censoring books.

On December 7, at the public session, Pope Paul delivered a long address. He said that “perhaps never before, so much as on this occasion, has the Church felt the need to know, to draw near to, to understand, to penetrate, to serve and to evangelize the society in which it lives . . . Errors were condemned indeed, because charity demanded this no less than did truth. But for the persons themselves there was only warning, respect and love.” The ultimate religious meaning of the Council, he said, might be summed up as “a pressing and friendly invitation to mankind of today to rediscover God in fraternal love.”

That morning, on the 544th and last ballot, the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World was approved by a vote of 2309 to 75. It thus became the sixteenth and last Council document to be officially approved and promulgated by the Second Vatican Council. The documents on religious freedom, missionary activity, and the ministry and life of priests were also approved and promulgated that morning.

The closing ceremonies took place on the following day, December 8, 1965, on the expansive front steps of St. Peter’s, where special scaffolding and seats had been erected for the occasion.

The three-hour proceedings began with Mass celebrated alone by the Holy Father. Then gifts from him totalling $90,000 were announced for charitable institutions in Palestine, Argentina, India, Pakistan and Cambodia. The Pope also blessed the cornerstone of a church to be erected in Rome as a memorial to the Council, to be called “Mary, Mother of the Church.”

Joseph Cardinal Cardijn, founder of the movement of the Young Christian Workers in Belgium in 1925, had proposed earlier in the fourth session that a special paragraph on youth, another on workers and still another on die people of developing nations should be included in the opening pages of the pastoral constitution on the Church in the modern world. Much earlier, on January 4, 1964, Bishop Hengsbach of Essen had stated in America that he would consider it extremely important “that the basic results of the Council be summed up in perhaps four or five messages.” One of those messages, he said, “might perhaps be addressed to those who rule, who bear the highest responsibility for men’s destiny.”

The ideas of these two Council Fathers were partially fulfilled in a series of eight special messages read on the closing day of the Council. The first one, read by Pope Paul himself, was directed to the Council Fathers: “The hour of departure and separation has sounded. In a few moments you will leave the Council assembly and go out to meet mankind and bring the good news of the Gospel of Christ and of the renewal of his Church, at which we have been working together for four years.”

After his message, seven Council Fathers approached the microphone in turn and read messages in French to rulers, intellectuals, laborers, artists, women, youth, and the sick and poor. A representative from each group went up to the papal throne to receive from Pope Paul the text of the message after it was read. The text that had been read for “the poor, the sick and all those who suffer” was handed to a blind man, Mr. Francesco Politi, who mounted the steps with his seeing-eye dog.

Seated at the right hand of the Pope during the ceremony was Cardinal Ottaviani. Early in the Council he had called himself a watchdog who by profession had to guard the truth. His task was greater now, because he had new truths to guard in addition to the old ones. As he looked back over the Council, he could not but remember the abuse that had been heaped upon his head in the Council hall and in the press. But there were also brighter moments, like the day in early October during the fourth session when he was applauded loudly and long for proposing that “from among all nations of the world there be formed one World Republic, in which there would no longer be found that strife which exists among nations. Instead, the whole world would be at peace . . .”

Also seated near the Pope were the four Cardinal Moderators. Each of them had conducted the meetings an average of 34 times. There were those who thought that they had gone too fast, and there were those who thought that they had gone too slow. There were some who had suspected them of partiality, and of using their authority for the promotion of their own views. Being Moderators had not been an easy task. But, except for them, and except for their determination to move ahead, the Second Vatican Council could not have ended on this day.

Almost no one in the vast assembly, after the Pope, had been more influential in the passage of Council legislation than Cardinal Frings. Except for the organization which he had inspired and led, the Council might never have operated efficiently at all. He had leaned heavily upon the theologian Father Rahner; but by the end of the Council, he had come to be more cautious in accepting his proposals. Father Ratzinger, the personal theologian of Cardinal Frings and former student of Father Rahner, had seemed to give an almost unquestioning support to the views of his former teacher during the Council. But as it was drawing to a close, he admitted that he disagreed on various points, and said he would begin to assert himself more after the Council was over.

Finally, the Pope presented Archbishop Felici with the papal Brief formally closing the Second Vatican Council. A photographer caught for posterity the radiant smile which covered the features of the Supreme Pontilf at that moment. The tears and heartaches were over. Archbishop Felici went to the microphone a few steps in front and to the left of the Pope, facing the Council Fathers and the crowds in St. Peter’s square, and read the official document: “The Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, assembled in the Holy Spirit and under the protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary, whom we have declared Mother of the Church, and of St. Joseph, her glorious spouse, and of the Apostles SS. Peter and Paul, must be numbered without doubt among the greatest events of the Church. . . . We decide moreover that all that has been established by the Council is to be religiously observed by all the faithful, for the glory of God and the dignity of the Church and for the tranquillity and peace of all men.”

Later, recalling this moment, Archbishop Felici said that many memories sprang to his mind. There was Pope Paul VI, “in the center of this great assembly, joyful over the happy outcome, decreeing the close of the Council. And there was John XXIII, the originator and first inspirer of this great Council, smilingly giving his blessing from heaven.”

Immediately after the reading of the papal Brief, Pope Paul VI rose to give his blessing to the Council Fathers and to the crowds. Throwing both arms high in the air, he cried out, “In the name of Our Lord Jesus Christ, go in peace!” The Council was over, and the Council Fathers rose to their feet to clap and cheer.

Then the bells of St. Peter’s began to ring.

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APPENDIX

The total cost to the Vatican for the Council and its preparatory work was $7,250,000. Since 2860 Council Fathers attended all or part of the four sessions, which stretched over 281 days, the average outlay was $2530 per Council Father, or $9 per day. These costs, however, did not include the expenses borne by the Council Fathers themselves; sixty-seven per cent of them paid their own transportation costs, and fifty-three per cent paid for their own lodging. Of the total spent by the Vatican, thirty-three per cent was used for lodging; thirty per cent for transportation; nine per cent for furnishing the Council hall, eight per cent for the electronic computer, Council Press Office, printing jobs and telephone installations, and twenty per cent for other costs.

Sickness, old age, or restrictions imposed by governments prevented 274 Council Fathers from attending. Between the opening and closing dates, 253 Council Fathers died, and 296 new ones were added. Of the 98 cardinals who took part, eleven died before the Council was over; the only cardinal not in attendance was Josef Cardinal Mindszenty of Hungary. The average age of the Council Fathers was sixty. Two thirds belonged to the secular clergy, and the rest were members of religious orders.

The General Secretariat, praised by Pope Paul as a “model” to be imitated in perfecting the services of the Roman Curia, has made use of the most modern techniques to preserve for posterity a complete theological, organizational, and administrative record of the Council. Two hundred large volumes contain alphabetical lists of Council Fathers, indicating how each one voted on all 544 ballots. Through a photo-copying process the complete archive has been reproduced a number of times, so that it may be used for study at various locations. It may be a generation or more before the archive will be thrown open to the public.

In addition to having all documents on file, the archive contains a complete magnetic tape recording of all 168 General Congregations, filling 712 reels, each 1300 feet long, which run for 542 hours. Making transcriptions of these recordings, and translating all Council documents into fourteen languages, were two of the most time-consuming tasks supervised by Monsignor Emilio Governatori, the archivist of Vatican II.

On January 3, 1966, Pope Paul by an Apostolic Letter created five Post Conciliar Commissions. Such commissions had originally been suggested to him by the European and world alliances, because they feared that progressive measures adopted by the Council might be blocked by conservative forces near the Pope once the Council Fathers had all returned home. The task of the new Post-Conciliar Commissions—on Religious,Missions, Christian Education, Apostolate of the Laity, and Bishops and the Government of Dioceses—was to prepare an “Instruction” which would indicate, concretely, how the Council documents were to be implemented.

These bodies were to have no legislative authority, but merely interpretive powers, and in preparing their “Instruction” were to adhere closely to the tenor of the solemnly approved and promulgated documents. Upon publication of their norms, the Post-Conciliar Commissions were to be automatically dissolved.