The conference had international appeal and featured
speakers from a number of different countries;
among those present were
Commonweal’s
Peter and Margaret O’Brien Steinfels.
The location was also notable, in that Ireland is geographically
at the junction between continental Europe and North America,
and is undergoing transition from a solidly and proudly Catholic
country to one in which the role of religion and the church has
changed, and not only because of the sex abuse scandal. I left the
conference with three distinct impressions of the current debate
on the role of the Catholic Church in modern society.
Lionel:
It is important to note that like the
Irish Catholic bishops Massimo
Faggioli interprets Vatican
Council II with irrational
Cushingism.He is aware that
Vatican Council II can be
interpreted with Feeneyism.
However this would be
politically incorrect with
the Left, for him.
So doctrine and truth in
the Church is not a priority
for him.Instead his
politically affiliation with
the Left decides how
Vatican Council II must be
interpreted.
______________________________
The first was of the divide between European
Catholicismand North American Catholicism
on perceptions of secularmodernity. Many
Americans, for instance, see as problematic
the unproblematic acceptance of secularity
in European Catholicism since the
mid-20th century. But Europe is more
secular than the United States for a reason,
with EuropeanCatholics viewing secularity
and especially the secular state
as a guarantee against the manipulation of religion for
political purposes and of the church by the state—authentic
concerns after fascism and Nazism. In the United States,
meanwhile, a kind of new political Augustinianism has
taken root, with radical orthodoxy and the recent shift
in the reception of Vatican II undoing the reframing of
the relationship between the temporal and the supernatural
that the council, along with Gaudium et spes, had introduced.
Lionel:
He is still referring to Vatican
Council II interpreted with
the new theology, the Cushingite
theology, in which hypothetical
cases are assumed to be
physically known and visible.
Then it is concluded that
these explicit cases ( of people
in Heaven) are practical
exceptions to the old
ecclesiology and the dogma
EENS (Feeneyite) .
________________________________
The second impression concerns the ecclesiological
consequences of two different visions of modernity.
Lionel:
There are two differnt
ecclesiologies.
One is Feeneyite and the
other is Cushingite.
A Feeneyite interpretation
of EENS would be
a rejection of Massimo Faggioli
and the Commonweal
interpretation of modernity
and reality.
__________________________________
Some presenters spoke in
favor of the possibility
the Church could engage constructively with
secular culture in a pluralist society. Hans Joas
offered an analysis of pluralism (following
Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age) in which
the Church has to work with, learning
what “genuine pluralism” means, in
the sense of taking others seriously.
Lionel:
The Feeneyite interpretation
of Vatican Council II would
be saying that all non Catholics,
including most immigrants,
are on the way to Hell,
without 'faith and baptism'.
This would be going
back to the old ecclesiology
on salvation.So in a pluralist
society we would be
saying that the Catholic
Church teaches in Vatican
Council II ( Feeneyite) that
the ecclesiology of the
Catholic Church
is still exclusivist.
_________________________________
(At the beginning of June, Joas
gave a long
interview to the most important cultural
weekly in Germany,
Die Zeit, in which he
criticized the country’s generous policy
of welcoming immigrants but more
forcefully bemoaned the impossibility
of honest debate on immigration
without being accused of
nationalism or racism.)
Lionel: Die Zeit like other
German publications
interpret Vatican Council
II with Cushingism.
_________________________________
Patrick Riordan (Heythrop College) also
advocated for engagement with
secular society in a paper that presented
an interpretation of Augustine’s
ecclesiology as not necessarily hostile
to “the earthly city.”
Lionel: Heytrop College is
Cushingite .
So the interpretation of
Augustine's ecclesiology
would also be Cushingite.
Augustine can be intepreted
with Feeneyism.He was a
Feeneyite.
____________________________________________
Similarly, Bryan Hehir—who could not be
at the conference but whose paper, “Church
State and Church World: The Narrative
Since Vatican II” was one of the best—
defended the intuitions of John Courtney
Murray and Vatican II, and Gaudium et
spes, which he believes is still valid
in facing the pluralism of today.
Lionel:
The narrative of John Courtney
Murray was Cushingism. He was
accompanied by Cardinal Richard
Cushing,at Vatican Council II, in implementing the
objective error in the second
part of the Letter of the Holy
Office 1949 to the Archbishop
of Boston.
_______________________________________
But the most impressive contribution
came from Cardinal Reinhard Marx
(archbishop of Munich and Freising,
president of the German bishops’
conference, and member of the council
of nine cardinals created by Pope Francis
in April 2013). Cardinal Marx said, among
other things, that it “is not possible to
imagine the future of the church without
reference to the history of freedom.” He
stated that the encounter of the church
with secularity is inevitable: “The state
must be secular. Middle Eastern Christians
tell us: the future is a secular state.”
Lionel:
With Vatican Council II ( Feeneyite)
we are back to the old ecclesiology
and the old interpretation of the
dogma EENS.
It was upon this old ecclesiology,
that it was postulated that all
political laws must have as its
center Jesus Christ as known in
the Catholic Church. So there
was no separation of Church and
State.
With Vatican Council II
( Feeneyite) the narrative
can change. We can call for
a separation of secularism
and State.
_______________________________________
He emphasized that the debate on freedom
and pluralism is passé: “In this world, the
present political challenge is not about
freedom, but identity and security.” The
church cannot give up the effort to be a
public church—it “cannot be like a castle
looking at what the world is doing.”
The third impression is related to Brexit
and concerns the historical-theological
trajectory of Catholicism. The simultaneity
of the Dublin conference and Brexit made
me think about the tight relationship
between development of Catholic theology
(especially ecclesiology) in the 20th century
Lionels: He is referring to the
new theology which emerged
with the objective error
made in the second part
of the Letter of the Holy
Office 1949 and the error being
accepted by the magisterium.
________________________________________
and the development of Catholicism
from multinational to truly
internationalist/globalist.
Lionel:
With Cushingism, the dogma
EENS and the old ecclesiology
was made obsolete.
_________________________________________
Catholic support for the European project
after World War II (from Pius XII to the
most important politicians of the
Christian-Democratic parties governing
Europe after 1945) was part of the
transition from the nationalist, romantic
roots of the theological ressourcement
between the mid-19th century and the
1920s and ’30s. At Vatican II, Catholic
theology internationalized what had
been born as expressions of national
movements during the previous century
(adoption of the vernacular; the new
role of national bishops’ conferences;
anti- Curia sentiment; anti-capitalist,
anti-democratic, and anti-liberal
Catholic social movements, etc.).
Lionel:
The new Catholic theology was
based on hypothetical cases
being objectively known.
We can avoid this error.
We are then back to the old
ecclesiology.
______________________________________
The internationalist quality of Pacem in
terris and Gaudium et spes was a turning
point in doctrine concerning the state
and government in Catholic theology,
and also a response to the most powerful
internationalism of the second half
of the century, Communism. At Vatican
II, Catholicism became an advocate
of globalization, which John XXIII had
called in the opening speech of the
council in 1962 “a new order of human relations.”
Lionel: Catholicism is still
the same when the Cushingite
mistake in theology
is avoided today.
____________________________________
Now, it all depends what kind of globalization
we are talking about—that is, what kind of
relationship there is between the globalization
/modernization of the Catholic church at
Vatican II and the technocratic globalization
of capitalism that came after Vatican II.
Lionel:
Vatican Council II ( Feeneyite)
would be a kind of Brexit.
It would be calling for an
exit from Vatican Council
II(Cushingite).
______________________________________
In this sense, Brexit can be seen as a subset
of the debate on Vatican II and the post-Vatican
II period, at least among Catholics. It’s no secret
that Catholics and the Catholic bishops of Britain
were deeply divided over Brexit, and that for
many conservative Catholics in Britain
opposition to the EU and to Vatican II
has similar roots.
Lionel:
Catholic bishops in England
interpet Vatican Council II
and EENS with Cushingism.
This is their liberal position.
They support the Left.
_____________________________________
Traditionalist Catholics who today reject
“the new order”—in terms of economic
and social exclusion, as well as of the
dominance of what Francis in Laudato
si’ called “the technocratic paradigm”
—tend to put Vatican II and the EU
together in one category of
internationalization and globalization;
Lionel:
This would be true only if
Vatican Council II and EENS
are interpreted with
Cushingism.
The traditionalists, and
all Catholics, can affirm
the exclusivist eccclesiolgy
and also accept Vatican
Council II and EENS.This is
the Catholic Faith before
and after Vatican Council II.
They can live this traditional
theology, traditional
Catholicism, even in a
new order.They can continue
to work for the Social Reign
of Christ the King based on
Vatican Council II and EENS
being Feeneyite.
____________________________________
they choose a traditional, pre-global church
and a nation-state (even though this fallback
on the nation-state is for them theologically
not unproblematic)
Lionel:
With Vatican Council II and
EENS being Feeneyite there
is no change in Church
ecclesiology before and
after Vatican Council II.
_____________________________________
as opposed to the larger framework of a
globalized ecclesial context and a European
political union.
Lionel:
In the 'globalised ecclesial
context' Catholics would still
be saying all non Catholics
are on the way to Hell
( AG 7, LG 14,CCC 846 etc) and outside
the Church there is no
salvation, as was taught by
the 16th century missionaries.
___________________________________
It is an opposition to a much more complex
world, politically and theologically, and to the
modern, globalized attitudes toward
vulnerable life, marriage, family, subsidiarity,
immigration, war, and peace.
Lionel:It would be responding
to the world with traditional
Catholicsm,with no compromise
in theology and doctrines.
_________________________________
It is an opposition that puts back into question
the Catholic perception of political power, and
in particular the church’s perception of the
sovereignty of the nation-state and of
international/supranational institutions.
Lionel:
In a nation-state or/and with
supranation institutions the
ecclesiology of the Church
would still support the Social
Reign of Christ the King and
the non separation of
Church State in a nation
state framework or a global
poltical concept.This
would be the theological
understanding of Church
with magisterial
documents interpreted
with Feeneyism
and not Cushingism as
a theology.
___________________________________
Brexit will have an impact on how European
Catholicism engages the European project.
(This is not so different from how American
Catholics—at different levels, with different
responsibilities—may or may not engage
with Donald Trump as the GOP’s probable
presidential nominee.)
Lionel:
Catholics could demand for an
exit from the Leftist concept of
Vatican Council II supported by
Commonweal, since now they
have a choice. The choice
is a rational interpretation
of Vatican Council II.
________________________________
The current crisis in the EU exposes a theological
crisis within Catholicism, which not long
ago—between World War II and
Vatican II—accepted and contributed
significantly to the legitimacy of both
the nation-state and of
international/global institutions.
Lionel:
The theological crisis began
when a new innovative
theology, based on philophical
subjectivism was introduced
into the Church by the
magisterium.
It was then made the
dominant reasoning
in Vatican Council II.
There are passages
in Vatican Council II which
appear ambigous,
since they are Cushingite
passages.
We only have to interpret
these Cushingite passages
assuming hypothetical cases
are not explicit exceptions
to EENS( Feeneyite).
We are then back to
the old ecclesiology.
____________________________________
Socialist-communist internationalism is
dead, but it is not clear how Catholic
internationalism will be able to challenge
the globalism of the technocratic paradigm.
Lionel:
Catholic internationalism
based upon an ecclesiology
which is the same before
and after Vatican Council II.
-Lionel Andrades
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