#439: After That October Day, America Would Never Be the Same

Last month’s US visit by Pope Francis was the most recent chapter in a story that began 50 years ago this month.

Except for Church insiders and those following the extended reporting of John Cogley in the New York Times or “Xavier Rynne” in the New Yorker, the seismic shift of Vatican II (1962-1965) meant little to Americans, including American Catholics, until the first shockwave reached our shores in the Fall of 1965.

This is the moment when Paul VI broke all tradition and precedent (popes had been, quite literally, “prisoners of the Vatican” for the previous 94 years) by traveling across the Atlantic to deliver his Church’s message to the world. Pope Paul VI, the “Pilgrim Pope,” became the first pope to ever visit the United States.

The scene was the stuff of high theater…

Shortly after Amintore Fanfani, Foreign Minister of Italy and President of the twentieth session of the United Nations General Assembly, had called the meeting to order, he and Secretary General U Thant provided the official escort down the main aisle. Soon, only the slim, white-robed figure stood at the green marble rostrum.

     Pope Paul VI, only hours from his arrival, had already presided over a special service at St. Patrick's Cathedral and met with President Lyndon Johnson at Waldorf Towers under the tightest security precautions ever taken in New York City; that meeting had to be “private” because the U.S. did not yet have diplomatic relations with the Vatican City, so this was not officially a State Visit. Quite a contrast with 2015, when both the White House and the Congress officially welcomed the pope as a visiting Head of State!

Later, Pope Paul would present U Thant with a diamond-studded cross and ring (valued at $115, 000, to be sold to raise funds for alleviating world hunger), meet with a small interfaith group at Holy Family Church on East 47th Street, celebrate Mass before 90,000 people at Yankee Stadium, and visit the Vatican Pavilion at the New York World's Fair to gaze at Michelangelo's Pieta before flying back to Rome.

The Papal Mass Yankee Stadium

But this was moment he had really come for--the moment he had been invited for when planning for a UN conference on "Peace on Earth" began at Santa Barbara's Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions in 1963. Since the Center's inspiration came from John XXIII's encyclical letter Pacem in Terris, it had seemed fitting to invite his successor to address the UN. Now he stood before the General Assembly, the first Pope to visit the New World. He spoke in French.

     Many listeners expected no more than polite and pious boilerplate, but he had not made the trip for nothing. As Drew Middleton of the New York Times reported, "The Pontiff's address, with its emphasis on universality, disarmament and the development of a world authority, went far beyond the simple pleas expected by most of the delegates." In fact, Paul delivered one of the greatest speeches of the 20th century.

Pope Paul Addressing the UN General Assembly

Specifically, Paul appealed to outlaw all nuclear weapons, issued his famous "Jamais plus de guerre!" cry, urged more concerted action on hunger, and, in "the most controversial part of the speech," advised the UN to admit Red China. Most surprising and significant of all, however, were the Pope's extended remarks about his own church and the UN itself. He began by characterizing the trip's importance from the Catholic point of view:

Like a messenger who, after a long journey, finally succeeds in delivering the letter which has been entrusted to him, so we appreciate the good fortune of this moment, however brief, which fulfills a desire nourished in the heart for nearly twenty centuries. For, as you well remember, we are very ancient; we here represent a long history; we here celebrate the epilogue of a weary pilgrimage in search of a conversation with the entire world, ever since the command was given to us: Go and bring the good news to all peoples. .

Next, he challenged the UN to an extraordinarily exalted view of its own mission:

Now, you represent all peoples...The edifice which you have constructed must never fall; it must be perfected and made equal to the needs which world history will present. You mark a stage in the development of mankind from which retreat must never be admitted, but from which it is necessary that advance be made.

The Pope paused. Then, in the measured tones of the career diplomat he was, he sharpened his point by comparing the UN's global mission to Catholicism's:

You are a bridge between peoples. You are a network of relations between states. We would almost say that your chief characteristic is a reflection, as it were, in the temporal field, of what our Catholic church aspires to be in the spiritual field: unique and universal. Your vocation is to make brothers not only of some, but of all people.

Finally, he sought to convince his listeners that his Church's own concern with humanity's spiritual needs should link, rather than separate, the two organizations:

This edifice which you are constructing does not rest upon merely material and earthly foundations, for thus it would be a house built upon sand; above all, it is based on our own consciences. The hour has struck for our "conversion," for personal transformation, for interior renewal. We must get used to thinking of humanity in a new way...With a new manner, too, of conceiving the paths of history and the destiny of the world...The edifice of modern civilization must be built upon spiritual principles which alone can, not only support it, but even illuminate and animate it.

     It was October 8, 1965. Vatican Council II would end just eight weeks later, but until now it had remained a distant blip on most Americans’ radar. Paul had used this speech to announce the Council’s agenda in the most public way imaginable.

Demands on New York's communication system were greater than for the Kennedy funeral and the five Gemini moon shots combined; A.M. Rosenthal, then the Times' metropolitan editor, called it "the saddest professional day in our lives," because a strike kept the paper's papal coverage off the stands.  But millions saw the TV coverage of the pope landing in New York, the pope meeting the President of the United States, the pope before the UN, the Pope saying mass at Yankee Stadium.

Even then, however, few observers realized that the agenda Paul proclaimed simply as his Church’s “weary pilgrimage in search of a conversation” had already put this vast and ancient organization on a collision course with its own past.

The stated intention at Vatican II was not “collision’” of course; it was “renewal.” Even so, anything new in an institution so old, any move from point A to point B, held the risk of disrupting long-accepted ways.

Francis in America

Vatican II set a course correction for the world’s largest organization, and 50 years later that course is still disputed. But the recent visit by Francis has made 2 things perfectly clear. First, the place of the Catholic Church in American life is more public and powerful than ever before. Second, Francis intends to steer that Church back onto the course intended by Vatican II, especially by his insistent focus on the twin “north stars” of Mercy and Justice.

And thus our Church continues that “conversation with the entire world” that Paul VI began 50 years ago.

Bernard F. Swain PhD 2015

#396: The Providential Summer of ‘63

Fifty summers ago, dramatic events brought one of those tectonic shifts that alters the landscape for generations...

This summer brings many significant 50^th anniversaries, since the summer of 1963 brought so many significant events. Civil rights leader Medgar Evers was assassinated; Alabama Governor George Wallace stood in a doorway to block access by blacks to the University of Alabama; President John Kennedy delivered three important speeches: on civil rights (to mark the centennial of the Battle of Gettysburg), on freedom for the Soviet bloc, and—on June 26—he stood before the Berlin wall and delivered the famous lines “Ich bin ein Berliner.”

For Catholics, June 1963 and the weeks that followed were particularly dramatic.  And 50 years later, with the benefit of hindsight, we can say that the drama unfolding that summer was no doubt of divine inspiration.

It all began with the death of Pope John XXIII (Angelo Roncalli), who will soon become Saint John XXIII.  

John XXIII lying in state, June 1963

 John had opened Vatican Council II in October 1962, had publicly intervened to help resolve the Cuban missile crisis that same month, and was made Time Magazine’s man of the year in January 1963.  But even then, he knew he was dying.  At his death

on June 3, the world mourned the loss of the most beloved pope in memory.  Because of his achievements, Catholics do not observe his feast day on his death date (as is standard for saints and venerated people of the Church) but on October 11, the opening date of Vatican II.

But June 3 brought crisis, for John’s death created an immediate vacuum that threatened chaos.

When Vatican II began as the largest meeting in history and the first general council since 1871, the conservatives hoped (and many more expected) that it would adjourn quickly after rubber-stamping Catholicism’s status quo.

Instead, the world’s bishops rejected the boilerplate drafts offered by Vatican officials and committed the Council to a full-scale reflection on the nature of Catholicism in its place in the modern world.  This commitment would transform Vatican II into the most important religious event of the 20th century--and one of the three or four most important watersheds in Catholic history.  But it also meant that, by the end of the Council’s first session in December 1962, almost nothing had been finished yet. 

John’s death suspended all plans for a second session, expected in fall 1963.  The next pope’s name was unknown until an election could be held.  Whoever he was, he would be under no obligation to reconvene the council, or--if he did--to continue with John’s (and now the bishops’) agenda. 

So questions abounded: Who will be pope?  Will he continue the Council?  What will he have the Council do?  In a word, all bets were off.

It all ended well.  The next pope, Paul VI (G.B. Montini),

Pope Paul VI

decided to reconvene the Council, and in his opening address he quoted John’s 1962 opening address to confirm that Vatican II was to be nothing less than a “new Pentecost”—a rebirth—of the Catholic Church. Thus the summer of ’63 included serious preparations of the new, more substantive drafts that would ultimately become known as “The Documents of Vatican II.”

But hindsight tells us that none of this happy outcome, none of this surprisingly smooth transition from pope to pope (and from first Council session to second session) was really an accident, or a matter of good fortune.  Looking back upon facts that have emerged over the last 50 years, we can now say that the events of summer 1963 appear to be the result of a plan--a plan not of human design.  In other words, summer 1963 witnessed an act of divine Providence.

The providential pattern leading to the successful continuation of Vatican II was composed of three main elements:

The young Roncalli

A Long Friendship.  As far back as the 1920s, Angelo Roncalli (later John XXIII) and Giovanni Montini (later Paul VI) were friends.  In 1925 Pope Pius XI appointed Roncalli apostolic visitor to Bulgaria.  Roncalli was devastated to be sent out of Italy. But Montini (who worked at the Vatican’s Secretariat of State) encouraged him, saying he would now have opportunities to encounter the Orthodox churches of the east and the Muslim tradition.  This mattered to both men, since both wanted to promote a reconciliation with other faiths.

The young Montini

When, after later serving as Vatican apostolic delegate to Turkey and Greece, Roncalli was made papal nuncio to France in 1945, it was Montini who signed the letter of his appointment. 

Roncalli in France

 Later, it was Montini who also asked him if he were willing to become patriarch of Venice. They corresponded frequently over the years, well beyond the demands of protocol, and one biographer says that Montini became Roncalli’s “Roman confidant.”

When John XXIII observed his 80^th birthday in 1961, it was Montini who celebrated the Mass.  And when John lay dying in June 1963, it was Montini who arranged to fly in his family from Milan to be at his old friend’s bedside.

A Close Partnership. When Pope Pius XII died in 1958,

Pius XII

Montini (now Archbishop of Milan) was a favorite to succeed him--but he was not yet a cardinal and was thought a bit young. Since Pius had ruled for 19 years, the College of Cardinals preferred a shorter interim papacy, and thus an older man.  So they elected 76-year-old Roncalli to be a caretaker of the papal seat.  They expected a brief, uneventful papacy.

When John XXIII shattered expectations by calling for the first council of bishops in a century, even Montini was surprised.  “This holy old boy,” he said, “doesn’t seem to realize what a hornet’s nest he is stirring up.”

Nonetheless Montini began advising John as early as 1961 on the best approach to a successful Council.  And he offered public support in a pastoral letter to the people of Milan in which he said “It is the whole Church that expresses itself in the Council…And we are the Church.”

Montini as Archbishop of Milan

In June 1962, only weeks before the opening of the council, John sent Montini to the final meeting of the central committee preparing for the Council.  Montini delivered the pope’s message: the Council was not to concentrate on condemnations and anathemas (like many previous councils), but was to emphasize mercy and love.  Cardinal Ottaviani, the Grand Inquisitor, spoke for many of the “intransigenti” (church officials opposed to reform) when he said, “I pray God that I may die before the Council’s end.  That way I can die a Catholic”!

We now know that that during Vatican II’s first session in the fall of 1962, John invited his friend Montini (and no one else) to reside in the papal apartments.  John did not attend council meetings himself, so he relied on Montini to keep him abreast of the mood among the bishops.  We also know that Montini led the progressive bishops in overcoming the resistance of the intransigenti.  This ensured that the council would not be brief and unproductive, but would last four years and transform Catholicism.

When John was made pope, the first man he chose to become a new cardinal was Montini.  And after the dying John receive the last rites on June 1, 1963, he told those around him that he guessed Montini would be his successor.  Three weeks later, his prediction came true, and his close partner and old friend) took over the reins of Vatican Council II.

Thus, when the College of Cardinals elected Montini himself as John’s successor 50 years ago on June 21, 1963, the cardinals were uniting two friends in one office.

A Shared Vision.  As preparations for the second session of the Council proceeded during the summer of 1963, the partnership these two friends had forged began to bear fruit in an inspired vision of how the Council could renew the Church and its mission in the world

Both men were francophiles influenced by the “new theology” of Jesuits Henri de Lubac and Jean Daniélou and Dominicans like Yves Congar and Marie-Dominique Chenu.  Both shared an optimistic view of modern life and a critical view of clerical church customs and structures.  Both believed that the wisdom of Catholicism was a key to steering the power of modern technology, science, and culture toward good rather than the evil--and they were both convinced that only a transformed Church could accomplish this. Both saw this transformation as the Council’s purpose and agenda.

When John addressed the Council’s opening session on October 11 1962 he called for a “New Pentecost.”  And when Montini became Pope Paul VI in the summer of 1963, he made that rebirth his own top priority.  As summer ended and the Council reconvened, Paul repeated John’s call for a “new Pentecost” and made it clear that John’s vision of a renewed and updated Church was now in the capable hands of his former friend and partner.

Two years later Paul addressed the United Nations just as the Council was finishing its work.  Here is how he described himself and the Church he represented:

Like a messenger who, after a long journey, finally succeeds in delivering the letter which has been entrusted to him, so we appreciate the good fortune of this moment, however brief, which fulfills a desire nourished in the heart for nearly twenty centuries. For, as you well remember, we are very ancient; we here represent a long history; we here celebrate the epilogue of a weary pilgrimage in search of a conversation with the entire world, ever since the command was given to us: Go and bring the good news to all peoples.

Paul VI addressing the UN General Assembly

And here is how he described the historic, even heroic vision that had inspired both him and John:

The hour has struck for our "conversion," for personal transformation, for interior renewal. We must get used to thinking of humanity in a new way...With a new manner, too, of conceiving the paths of history and the destiny of the world...The edifice of modern civilization must be built upon spiritual principles which alone can, not only support it, but even illuminate and animate it.

Looking back, we can only marvel.  The troubling questions that were provoked by John’s death in June 1963 were answered by summer’s end--but only later have we realized that the answers were engraved by the wisdom of divine Providence in the hearts of two men whose paths had converged 40 years earlier and whose shared accomplishment still touches us deeply, 50 summers later.

  © Bernard   F. Swain PhD 2013

#372 10 Ways to Remember John XXIII

Even if most Catholics have forgotten about Vatican II, or are simply too young to remember it, now is the time to recall the hero behind the Council.