In this groundbreaking work of cultural and historical sociology, Melissa Wilde offers a new explanation for this revolutionary transformation of the Church. Drawing on newly available sources—including a collection of interviews with the Council's key bishops and cardinals, and primary documents from the Vatican Secret Archive that have never before been seen by researchers—Wilde demonstrates that the pronouncements of the Council were not merely reflections of papal will, but the product of a dramatic confrontation between progressives and conservatives that began during the first days of the Council. The outcome of this confrontation was determined by a number of factors: the Church's decline in Latin America; its competition and dialogue with other faiths, particularly Protestantism, in northern Europe and North America; and progressive clerics' deep belief in the holiness of compromise and their penchant for consensus building.
Wilde's account will fascinate not only those interested in Vatican II but anyone who wants to understand the social underpinnings of religious change.
In this groundbreaking work of cultural and historical sociology, Melissa Wilde offers a new explanation for this revolutionary transformation of the Church. Drawing on newly available sources—including a collection of interviews with the Council's key bishops and cardinals, and primary documents from the Vatican Secret Archive that have never before been seen by researchers—Wilde demonstrates that the pronouncements of the Council were not merely reflections of papal will, but the product of a dramatic confrontation between progressives and conservatives that began during the first days of the Council. The outcome of this confrontation was determined by a number of factors: the Church's decline in Latin America; its competition and dialogue with other faiths, particularly Protestantism, in northern Europe and North America; and progressive clerics' deep belief in the holiness of compromise and their penchant for consensus building.
Wilde's account will fascinate not only those interested in Vatican II but anyone who wants to understand the social underpinnings of religious change.
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Overview
In this groundbreaking work of cultural and historical sociology, Melissa Wilde offers a new explanation for this revolutionary transformation of the Church. Drawing on newly available sources—including a collection of interviews with the Council's key bishops and cardinals, and primary documents from the Vatican Secret Archive that have never before been seen by researchers—Wilde demonstrates that the pronouncements of the Council were not merely reflections of papal will, but the product of a dramatic confrontation between progressives and conservatives that began during the first days of the Council. The outcome of this confrontation was determined by a number of factors: the Church's decline in Latin America; its competition and dialogue with other faiths, particularly Protestantism, in northern Europe and North America; and progressive clerics' deep belief in the holiness of compromise and their penchant for consensus building.
Wilde's account will fascinate not only those interested in Vatican II but anyone who wants to understand the social underpinnings of religious change.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780691161723 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Princeton University Press |
| Publication date: | 12/01/2013 |
| Edition description: | New Edition |
| Pages: | 224 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.90(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.60(d) |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
Vatican II A Sociological Analysis of Religious Change
By Melissa J. Wilde Princeton University Press
Copyright © 2007 Princeton University Press
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-691-11829-1
Chapter One On November 29, 1964, the first Sunday of Advent, Roman Catholics walked into their parishes around the globe and, for the first time since the fall of the Roman Empire, participated in a mass that was given largely in their native tongue. Not only did parishioners find themselves responding to the priest in words they spoke every day, but they spoke more often than they had at any Catholic service they had ever attended. Many Catholics saw the strange sight of their priest consecrating the Eucharist facing the congregation rather than the crucifix behind the altar, along with other new practices meant to make the mass and liturgy more participatory by incorporating the "people of God."
These were just the first of many changes that came out of the Second Vatican Council of the Roman Catholic Church. Indeed, as the Church was busily figuring out how to incorporate the vernacular language into its services, Roman Catholic leaders around the world prepared for the Fourth (and final) Session of the Council. These preparations were intense and often contentious. Though the liturgical reforms had been approved at the end of the Second Session, many other, even more important reforms remained to be decided.
By the time it was finished, on December 8, 1965, the Council had turned the Church on itshead. To name but a few examples: as a result of the Council, the Roman Catholic Church relinquished its claim to be the one true church, and with it, abdicated claims to power in relation to nation-states, by declaring that the only just form of government was one under which people were free to worship as they pleased. The Council relaxed dietary restrictions and requirements regarding confession and attire for the laity, eliminated the Latin mass, and forever changed the character and identities of Roman Catholic nuns and brothers-and their orders. Most importantly, Vatican II changed the way the Church understood itself, as its identity went from being a hierarchical authority to a church conceived of as the people of God.
Together, these changes have had far-reaching effects on the doctrine, practices, and identity of Roman Catholicism. Politically, the Council has been cited as a central factor in the development of liberation theology in Latin America; as an important theological resource for progressive Catholics in the United States; and as a reason why the Church began to engage more actively in public debates over war and peace, capitalism and economic redistribution. Everyday life was affected too: the Council liberalized religious practices as varied as dietary restrictions (Catholics are no longer required to abstain from meat on Fridays), clothing requirements (Catholic women no longer have to wear head coverings during mass), and annulment procedures.
Simply put, Vatican II represents the most significant example of institutionalized religious change since the Reformation. Though sociological opinion is unified in attributing great significance to the Council, few systematic attempts have been made to examine the forces that determined the character and extent of the changes it effected. This is partly because the council was huge. It took four sessions, three years (1962-65), and the leadership of two popes to complete. More than three thousand bishops, cardinals, heads of religious orders, and theologians (for convenience, hereafter all of the Council delegates are referred to as bishops) from all over the world attended. The daily events of the Council could easily fill the pages of this book. However, such a history has been more than adequately told and it is not the intent of this study to tell it again.
My goal is to take the rich and complex history of the Council, and reexamine it through a sociological lens-to discover the factors that explain its outcome and in doing so, identify the factors that determine religious change more generally. Ultimately, the goal of this book is to answer some theoretical questions about cultural change: Why do some religious institutions adapt to cultural change, while others do not? When religious institutions do change, what determines what changes and what remains constant? In essence: When, why, and how do religious institutions, which are arguably the most rigidly structured and codified institutions in the world, adapt as the societies around them march onward?
Though many theories in the sociology of religion make implicit assumptions about institutional change, and though founding sociologists such as Max Weber and Émile Durkheim examined it, there is surprisingly little theory available to explain how, why, or when religious change occurs. This is mainly because the sociology of religion, with a few notable exceptions, has not attempted to explain institutional change but has focused instead on individual participation and its effects, or on religious growth or decline. Such studies, though important, do little to help us understand the organizational resources, forces, and mobilization efforts involved in an event like the Second Vatican Council.
Consequently, though this analysis is informed by these and other important research in the sociology of religion, throughout this book I also draw from theories of historical events, organizational and cultural change, social movements, and even from economic sociology.
Vatican II is an ideal case through which to examine questions about religious change. Change, at least of great magnitude, is not common in Roman Catholic history. Councils are rare events, convened only by the pope, and occur less than once a century on average. Vatican I, the Church's last council before Vatican II, ended prematurely in 1869 as a result of the Franco-Prussian War and did little of note besides declaring the pope to be infallible. Prior to Vatican I, the Church had not held a council since the Council of Trent closed in 1563.
Furthermore, the changes that came from the Council were almost completely unexpected. To appreciate just how remarkable Vatican II was, one must understand that even once the Council had been called, change did not seem likely. The Roman Curia, the men in charge of the Church's administration, who did not favor change, seemed to be at the zenith of their power. For four hundred years, the Curia had determined the pronouncements on theology and doctrine that constituted Roman Catholicism. They frequently used their powers of censorship to curb theologians, ban books, and keep the Church "untarnished" by modern thought. Their vocation was protecting the Church from heresy, something which by all accounts they did quite well. Initially, even the bishops who would rise to the greatest prominence once the Council began expected little more from it than a "rubber-stamp" of the Curia's conservative views.
When Pope John XXIII announced that he was calling a council, he had only been in office for three months, was seventy-seven years old, and was expected to be an "interim" pope-a placeholder who mollified progressives but made conservatives feel secure because of his age and "simple" nature. The resources, power, and confidence of the Roman Curia had perhaps never been greater. Though upset by John's announcement, they had almost complete control over the Council's preparations, proceedings, and agenda.
Given this situation at the start of the Council, many saw the unexpected and sweeping changes that came from it as nothing short of miraculous. Popular explanations of the miracle focused on one man: Pope John XXIII. In 1962, before any Council reforms had yet been solidified, but after the First Session had already signaled that Vatican II would not rubber-stamp the policies and views of the Curia, Time magazine declared John "Man of the Year," with the following justification:
[1962 saw] the beginning of a revolution in Christianity, the ancient faith whose 900 million adherents make it the world's largest religion. ... It began on Oct. 11 in Rome and was the work of the man of the year, Pope John XXIII, who, by convening ... Vatican II, set in motion ideas and forces that will affect not merely Roman Catholics, not only Christians, but the whole world's ever-expanding population.
In contrast to such explanations of the Council, I do not see the pope as the primary reason why the Council took the turn that it did.
There is no question that Pope John XXIII is an essential part of why Vatican II happened at all; it takes a pope to call a council. Thus, John provided the "political opportunity" necessary for reform to occur. But he died just weeks before the Second Session of the Council was to start, after only one of the hundreds of reforms which would come from it had passed. Thus, the overwhelming progressive outcome of the Council cannot be attributed to John. Furthermore, John's successor, Paul VI, proved to be more conservative than John. In fact, it would become clear that, on a number of issues, the Council was disposed to make much more progressive reforms than Paul desired.
Thus, even though they were certainly necessary, neither of the popes is a sufficient explanation of how and why Vatican II became the watershed event that it was. This in is large part because though there were a number of ways that John and Paul could play a role in the Council, there were few moments when either of them actively intervened. Intervening in the proceedings of the Council was difficult for the pope because the purpose of a council is to call all of the bishops of the world together so they can discuss their views with their colleagues. By definition, if such discussion was not needed, a council would not have been called. Once it was under way, the bishops expected to decide what issues needed to be addressed and how to address them, and anticipated doing so with some autonomy. Thus, though the pope provided the opportunity for change, with rare exceptions the bishops decided the direction and extent of that change. Ultimately, they decided to change a great deal. The purpose of this book is to figure out why.
What Does Not Explain the Council
The Council's overwhelmingly progressive outcome cannot be explained by such traditional sociological factors as power, resources, interests, or even popular pressure. At the beginning of the Council, conservatives had, through the Roman Curia, more formal power than did progressives and more of almost every type of resource we can imagine: money, institutional access, staff, even printing presses. And they had these resources concentrated precisely where the central decisions about the Council would take place, namely, the Vatican. If power and resources could explain the outcome of the Council, nothing much would have come from it.
Interests, at least those associated with money, power, or keeping the laity happy, also cannot explain the outcome of the Council. The Declaration of Religious Freedom, a key reform that came from the Council, abdicated the preferential status the Church had enjoyed in many countries (and the money and power which came with it). It is difficult to envision an interest-based explanation which can account for such a move. Finally, as much as popular accounts of the Council emphasize its focus on the "Church as the People of God," Vatican II is also not a story of a religious institution responding to pressure from below. Many of the reforms that came from the Council were almost entirely irrelevant to lay concerns, and the reform that was the most central to the daily lives of laypersons, birth control, was tabled.
Part I: Explaining the Council
The first part of the book presents my explanation of the Council's outcome through three distinct analytical chapters. Chapter 1 answers a research question which is necessary for all of the later chapters. That is: Given the way things looked at the start of the Council, with the Curia in control, how did any change occur?
The answer to this question lies in key moments of the First Session which helped to eliminate the initial disadvantages progressives faced. These events began on the very first day of the Council, when a few progressive bishops organized and decided to reject the Curia's agenda for that day by refusing to elect members to the conciliar commissions. These progressive leaders argued that they needed more time for deliberations among themselves and within their national conferences. And, to everyone's surprise, they won.
This unanticipated occurrence began a shift in expectations in which many bishops began to believe that real change was possible from the Council. This shift was furthered by the second key moment of the First Session: when it became clear that liturgical reforms-the first issue the Council debated-were supported by the vast majority of the bishops, and that the schema would have an easy passage. Though the issue was not contentious, it demonstrated to everyone that the vast majority of bishops were willing to undertake real changes and do more than rubber-stamp the Curia's opinions.
The possibilities for the Council were finally cemented during the contentious debate on the sources of revelation. In a very close vote, a majority, but not the needed two-thirds majority, voted to reject the conservative schema. Though it looked like the Curia was going to triumph, Pope John intervened and mandated that the schema be sent back to committee because such a large majority of the bishops rejected it. This act was interpreted by many as legitimating the power of the bishops' votes over the procedural rules and regulations established by the Curia.
Together, these occurrences are an essential part of explaining why, even though they had greater resources and power at its start, conservatives were not able to dictate the agenda or outcome of the Council. However, though the shift that occurred during the First Session is crucial to understanding why any change occurred at the Council, it is also true that Vatican II did not change everything it might have. Indeed, in the end it would become clear that the Council left some very important but difficult issues alone, in particular, birth control, priestly celibacy, and the ordination of women. And thus, a crucial question arises: Once the opportunity was present, what explains why some things changed and others did not? This is the comparative question which motivates the remainder of the book and is addressed by a very simple, but necessary, preliminary question in chapter 2. That is, who wanted what, and why?
When we examine the various priorities of the bishops at the Council, four distinct groups of bishops emerge: those from European Catholic monopolies such as Italy and Spain, who wanted no change; those from non-monopolistic countries (meaning either non-Catholic countries or Catholic countries with a formal separation of church and state) in Europe and North America, who prioritized ecumenism (or bettering relations with Protestants); those from Latin America, who prioritized economic justice and reaching the poor and unchurched in their countries; and those from Africa and Asia, who had a full range of ecumenical outreach and social-justice concerns oriented toward helping the Church grow in their missionary countries. Comparisons between these four groups of bishops allow us to isolate the factors that directed the bishops' priorities at the Council, and ultimately understand the factors that affect religious leaders today.
The fact that bishops from Italy and Spain steadfastly fought against any accommodation with the modern world is consistent with current theories in the sociology of religion, which argue that religious diversity creates more accomodationist religious organizations by creating competition. The complete lack of diversity left bishops from monopolistic countries unconcerned about losing constituents and unwilling to engage in changing their institution.
Though it initially seems difficult to explain within current theories, the fact that bishops from Latin America were overwhelmingly progressive despite the seemingly monopolistic situation of the Church in Latin America can be explained by the key difference between the Church in Latin America and the Church in Italy and Spain. The Latin American Church was in decline, their monopoly was unstable. Leaders of unstable monopolies make every attempt to staunch the flow of their losses and become much more open to change than their counterparts in stable monopolies.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Vatican II by Melissa J. Wilde
Copyright © 2007 by Princeton University Press. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
List of Tables and Figures xi
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction 1
What Does Not Explain the Council 4
Explaining the Council 5
The Case Studies 8
The Data 9
Explaining the Council 11
Collective Effervescence and the Holy Spirit: The Eventful First Session 13
Eventful Sociology and Vatican II 14
Trying to Ensure a Rubber-Stamp Council: The Curia on the Eve of Vatican II 16
The Chain of Occurrences 17
The Effects: Collective Effervescence and the Holy Spirit 22
Conservatives: Waiting for the Holy Spirit 26
Conclusion: The Transformation of Structures 27
Who Wanted What and Why at the Second Vatican Council? Toward a Theory of Religious Change 29
Measuring Organizational Strategies 30
The Four Groups of Bishops and Their Votes 32
Theories of Religious Competition 42
Theories of Institutional Legitimacy and Organizational Change 45
Combining Theories 47
The Ecumenical Movement 51
Conclusion: Competition from the Perspective of the Competitors 55
How Culture Mattered atVatican II: Collegiality Trumps Authority in the Council's "Social Movement Organizations" 57
Organizational Effectiveness and Culture at Vatican II 58
Competing Views of Authority in the Roman Catholic Church 59
The DM's Belief in Collegiality 61
The CIP's Suspicions about Collegiality 62
The Domus Mariae 63
The Coetus Internationalis Patrum 68
Tactics in Common: Petitions, Votes, and the Modi 74
Conclusion: Institutional Rules, Models of Authority, Semi-Marginality, and Organizational Effectiveness 77
The Case Studies 83
The Declaration on Religious Freedom: Ceding Power, Gaining Legitimacy 85
Critiques of Hypocrisy: Illegitimacy before the Council 86
Roman Catholic Reactions 88
The Story of Reform 91
Conclusion: The Power of Legitimacy 100
The Blessed Virgin Mary: The Toughest Fight of the Council 102
Catholic and Protestant Views of Mary 103
The First Session 104
The Second Session: The Closest Vote of the Council 105
The Third Session and More Controversy 110
Conclusion: Mary's Deaccentuation 114
The Council's Failure to Liberalize Birth Control: Lackluster Progressive Effort Meets a Hesitant Pope 116
Christianity's Varied Stances on Birth Control 117
Pressure to Change 119
Deliberations on Birth Control during the Council 121
Conclusion: The Cost to Religious Authority 124
Rethinking the Council 126
Abbreviations of Primary Sources 129
Methodological Information 131
Votes from the Second Vatican Council 131
Caporale's Sample 132
Members of the Domus Mariae 133
The Dutch Documentation Center (DOC) 136
Analysis of the Ecumenical Review 137
Communism and the Council 137
Timeline of the Second Vatican Council 140
Notes 143
References 175
Index 191
What People are Saying About This
This exciting book is poised to make a big splash in scholarly circles and beyond. Advancing a clear conceptual framework, it is unique in looking at Catholicism through the lens of the diverse national environments that affect the interests and organizational behavior of religious leaders.
— Peter McDonough, author of "Men Astutely Trained: A History of the Jesuits in the American Century"
Wilde's big-picture analysis of huge institutional religious change exemplifies a kind of scholarship that is so valuable yet all too rare in contemporary sociology of religion. Ambitious, creative, careful, and fascinating, Vatican II makes a major contribution.
— Christian Smith, University of Notre Dame
Using a fascinating array of archival materials, Melissa Wilde here presents an innovative, behind-the-scenes, and groundbreaking analysis of the deliberations of Vatican II. And, importantly, she employs vital concepts from diverse areas of sociology to make sense of the rich empirical data at her disposal.
— Michele Dillon, author of "Catholic Identity: Balancing Reason, Faith, and Power"
Wilde has written the first serious sociological study of the dynamics of the Second Vatican Council. The men who organized the 'progressive' faction were not, as is often claimed, theologians who were manipulating bishops, but bishops from the countries where the church was engaged with modernity, especially from South America. Nor did they view their efforts as anything less than a dramatic change from the past. They were great men who accomplished great deeds. After this book, no one will be able to dismiss them.
— Andrew Greeley, author of "The Catholic Revolution"
"Wilde has written the first serious sociological study of the dynamics of the Second Vatican Council. The men who organized the 'progressive' faction were not, as is often claimed, theologians who were manipulating bishops, but bishops from the countries where the church was engaged with modernity, especially from South America. Nor did they view their efforts as anything less than a dramatic change from the past. They were great men who accomplished great deeds. After this book, no one will be able to dismiss them."—Andrew Greeley, author of The Catholic Revolution"Wilde's big-picture analysis of huge institutional religious change exemplifies a kind of scholarship that is so valuable yet all too rare in contemporary sociology of religion. Ambitious, creative, careful, and fascinating, Vatican II makes a major contribution."—Christian Smith, University of Notre Dame"Using a fascinating array of archival materials, Melissa Wilde here presents an innovative, behind-the-scenes, and groundbreaking analysis of the deliberations of Vatican II. And, importantly, she employs vital concepts from diverse areas of sociology to make sense of the rich empirical data at her disposal."—Michele Dillon, author of Catholic Identity: Balancing Reason, Faith, and Power"This exciting book is poised to make a big splash in scholarly circles and beyond. Advancing a clear conceptual framework, it is unique in looking at Catholicism through the lens of the diverse national environments that affect the interests and organizational behavior of religious leaders."—Peter McDonough, author of Men Astutely Trained: A History of the Jesuits in the American Century