#476: Why Notre-Dame de Paris Matters

A simple building fire provokes world-wide grief.

Mere minutes after the spire of Notre-Dame toppled in flames, a TV journalist asks a by-standing historian about the importance of the cathedral’s treasures.  During her reply he suddenly interrupts: “We’re just getting some sobering news.  The firefighters now say they may not be able to save the cathedral.”

“What?!?” Is the stunned reply.

He repeats himself; what follows is deep long silence.  The eyewitness is literally struck dumb by the prospect of losing Notre-Dame de Paris.

In the end, the building was saved after the roof was lost.  And no one died. 

Objectively, this was not the worst tragedy of recent days.  The Sri Lanka Easter Sunday attacks, the Christchurch mosque shootings--these cost human lives.  France’s Yellow Vests even protested the idea of spending one billion Euros to rebuild Notre-Dame while they struggled to pay their monthly bills in an unequal society.  One commentator even complained about people “whining over an old church.”

This begs a basic question: why such an outpouring of grief over this fire?  Why so many Facebook posts proclaiming a broken heart?

It has taken me more than a week to name why.  The answer is less objective but no less real. Global communications frequently gives us horrific images of tragedies happening halfway round the world, but that suffering and loss--even the deaths--mainly touch those who know the people or places involved.

Notre-Dame is different:  as a simple matter of fact, millions of people took it personally. They took the fire itself as a personal emergency, took the prospect of losing the whole building as a personal tragedy, and took the building’s final rescue as a personal existential relief.  And even so, for millions the sight of the smoking ruins remains heartbreaking. As one American Paris resident put it: “I felt as if I were losing a loved one, member of my family.”

Such global personal reactions are rare.  In my memory, only a sudden shocking loss of life has triggered such widespread heartache:  The assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy, and Martin Luther King, Jr.  The death of Princess Diana.  The collapse of the twin towers on 9/11—not because the buildings were destroyed, but because of horror for the people inside.

How could a simple “building fire” have a similarly profound emotional impact on millions?  What is this building’s power?  Why did its threatened loss provoke such personal grief?

For French Catholics, of course, the answer is obvious: Notre-Dame is the center of their nation’s faith life.  For other French, the cathedral represents their national identity across centuries--no other building rivals it.  For others, the reasons are more varied.  No one visits Paris without visiting Notre-Dame.  Few people return to Paris without returning to it. It attracts some by its history, others by its symbolic power, still others by its sheer beauty. For some it is an expression of faith, and for others a marvel of medieval construction and creativity.  As one observer said: “No one encounters Notre-Dame and walks away in different.”

For me too, the fire caused a heartsick reaction echoed by only a few moments in my life.  But in my case a personal attachment to the cathedral is easier to explain.  As a student in France, Notre-Dame de Paris became my home church (it was a ten-minute walk from my school) and it has left me with a parade of personal memories. 

My first Mass in Paris was at Notre Dame, a 6:00 p.m. liturgy following a concert by the world-renowned organist Pierre Cochereau. His playing drew a near-capacity crowd, and I was chagrined when, after the music, most people promptly exited to avoid Mass. I suddenly found myself surrounded by a scattered remnant of worshippers, mostly little old ladies in black. Not only that, the Mass itself was in French (the recent fruit of Vatican II’s liturgical reforms)—I still did not know how to worship in French.

Overall, this first visit reinforced my sense of shifting values: the Church was become more pluralized, and the culture was becoming more secular. I also saw that church beauty was not limited to the white-steeple, plain-glass Protestant churches I grew up with in New England.

My second visit was an entirely different matter, an affair of state. My landlady was a WWII widow, and in October she received an invitation to celebrate the Solemn Mass and Te Deum marking the 50th anniversary of the 1918 Armistice with President Charles De Gaulle on November 11. Since she planned to spend the holiday at her sister's in Caen, she gave me the invite, and I invited a classmate along.

We entered Notre Dame by the south transept door, walked entirely around the backside of the altar, and squeezed into a spot on the other side, against the main column at the intersection of the transept and the sanctuary (one of the four columns bearing the weight of the spire that collapsed!).

There happened to be a spare wooden barrier leaning against the column, and I climbed atop it so see over the masses assembled for the Mass.

When De Gaulle arrived up the nave through the arched swords of the Garde Républicaine, he was enthroned against the column diagonally opposite us.  Several moments during the ceremony, de Gaulle, who faced us squarely, was looking directly at me—a young student perched on a barrier mere weeks after the protesting students’ barriers had been removed from the streets of the Quartier Latin! He did not look amused.

At ceremony’s end dignitaries recessed beneath the arched Garde swords. I noticed the sanctuary gates to the nave remained open, so I led my classmate across the sanctuary to the head of the nave and WE passed under the arched swords to the amazed stares of many lesser dignitaries still in their seats.

Needless to say, the experience left a permanent mark, and 11-11 remains a significant date for me. I regret not making it making it to Notre Dame this past November for the 100th anniversary--but I regret more that the US now observes "Veterans Day" as a generic honoring of soldiers, rather than observing the historic moment, on "the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month” in 1918, when the world began to think that the real enemy is war itself. What was begun as a day to reject war has become, for us, a day to praise warriors. Which makes this memory that much more precious: for me, November 11 will always be about the ending of war. And my lasting image will always be of Notre-Dame on November 11, 50 years ago.

Over the years I have returned many times, often for the pleasure of introducing Notre Dame to those close to me. I brought Anne there during Christmas break 1971-1972. In 2003 we brought our son Tim into the city during his birthday break from studies in Barcelona. Exiting the metro station I deliberately chose the stairway that made the facade of Notre-Dame his first sight of Paris. He never forgot that moment, nor the tour we made around and inside, and he recently returned with his own girlfriend to share his pleasure as I had shared mine.

In 2005 I brought my brother Jay and his wife Janice there. Later Jay said he found Paris more charming than expected (high praise from someone then working in Venice!), in no small part thanks to Notre-Dame.

In 2010 I organized a reunion of Paris classmates, and my visit ended with dinner on the Ile Saint-Louis with the widow of my old school’s director. Walking away afterward, Anne and I found ourselves directly behind Notre-Dame. The photo conveys some of the cathedral's contagious glow.

In 2011 I returned for November 11, but instead of the traditional Armistice ceremonies, I found the cathedral jam-packed for the annual Paris celebration in honor of the French overseas dioceses of Antigua, Martinique, and Guadalupe. The congregation was largely black, mostly women, and many in the bright colors of traditional tribal garb. This was the first time this Mass was celebrated at Notre Dame, and the Archbishop of Paris presided.

The main area was blocked off, so tourists could only pass around the side aisles. I made my way up the aisle with the tourist flow, circled counter-clockwise round behind the altar, and stopped on the far edge facing back across the sanctuary to the nave.

It was exactly the spot I had occupied on November 11, 1968!

The entire Mass was punctuated by the loud, rhythmic, drum-driven music of a large choir singing upbeat multi-part hymns in both French and the creoles of their respective countries.  Most of the hymns were high energy island melodies, with the exception of a gloriously harmonized Creole lyric set to the tune of “Amazing Grace.” The “honor guard” consisted of women bearing breads and fruits typical of their native lands.

The tourists flowing around the side aisles looked puzzled and even a bit stunned to witness the cathedral full, and in active use, and literally vibrating with the pulse and clapping of this “world music” version of folk Mass

As Mass ended, three bishops rose to briefly address the crowd.  The first drew loud applause and warm laughter by noting that, without doubt, this was the first time a black bishop had spoken to his people from the sanctuary of “This beautiful cathedral of Notre Dame of Paris.”

As I listened to these bishops—just minutes after holding black hands on both sides of me during the Our Father, exchanging signs of peace with these French Africans, and filing up with them to receive Communion in this great monument to Catholic faith—I found the moment almost unbearably moving. This cathedral is no museum—it is a living house of faith!

This cathedral is, after all, the crowning product of medieval Christendom, an era when Catholic tradition achieved a remarkable integration of imperial customs (inherited from the Roman Empire) and popular culture.  The resulting Gothic architecture created spaces that soar heavenward with impossibly “light” stoneworks in which walls and pillars are but bit players supporting the real stars: the fragile, flamboyant stained glass windows covering most surfaces. Notre Dame and its sister cathedrals across Europe are thus among the chief glories of Latin Christendom.

On this day I got to witness something new: a vibrant liturgical celebration from three third world cultures--here, in this bosom of Christendom!  Far from violating the wondrous gothic beauty of Notre Dame Cathedral, this heartfelt celebration lifted hearts much as the flying buttresses lift the stone--and the brilliant bright costumes seemed fitting reflections of the brilliant blues and reds, yellows and greens of the cathedral’s great rose windows.

Imagine: this space, built eight centuries ago, embracing anew these resurgent people still crafting a home-grown expression of their faith in the 21st century. In all its years Notre Dame of Paris had never witnessed anything quite like this. 

In 2013 I toured the cathedral with my daughter Melissa and in 2017 with Anne, her sister Patti and her boyfriend Fred. I planned our walking tour so we turned a street corner to suddenly reveal the cathedral in full sunlight.

Patti gasped with sheer pleasure, and Fred marveled (from his longtime work in construction) that such a building could even exist before steel girders and iron frames. After their tour, over dinner, he proposed marriage.

No surprise that for all these people, and for millions of others, the sight of Notre-dame in flames provoked rare pain. For them, Notre-dame matters—and the matter is personal.

© Bernard F. Swain PhD 2019

#445: “Ad Multos Annnos !” for Francis —and for HIS Council

The traditional Latin birthday toast “Ad Multos Annos !” (to many years!) had double (or even triple) meaning the last two weeks.

#441: An All Souls’ Souvenir

I’ve chosen to share a personal “souvenir” from one All Souls’ Day past. 

I am writing this on All Souls’ Day--a sort of poor stepchild among Catholic feasts.  All Saints’ Day on November 1 has long been a day of required worship for Catholics, whereas All Souls’ Day on November 2 is not.  And now that Halloween has emerged as a major commercial event even for grownups, All Souls’ Day ends up as the invisible tail-end of this 3-day observance. But for me, the tail wags the dog.

All Saints’ is of course dedicated to the honoring of Catholicism’s Hall of Fame: those whose heroic lives made them memorable for future generations.  And All Hallows’ Eve became the popular way of remembering that no one gets to heaven (or hell) without dying first.  But if All Saints’ was about the elites and Halloween was about the buried, All Souls’ was about the ordinary folks who had gone before us and whose prayers we both offered and sought.  In that sense, All Souls’ was the day we venerated, not our heroes, but our ordinary ancestors. It was the people’s feastday.

During the visit of Pope Francis to New York City in September, the television cameras panned over the newly renovated St. Patrick’s Cathedral while media commentators giddily detailed its décor, including the numerous side altars where, in former days, multiple priests would say private Masses simultaneously.  In fact, on All Souls’ Day, priests were allowed the exceptional privilege of saying three masses in one day--often three private masses in a row!

One of the Side Altars

And so the pope’s first visit to New York City reminded me of my own first visit to New York at the age of 14.  I had arrived the day before, November 1, with my father, who was attending an important union conference, and when we woke up in our hotel he announced we were going to All Souls’ Day Mass at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral.

But my father did not intend to be a simple tourist, nor even an ordinary pew-dweller.  His plan was to fulfill an old altar boy’s lifelong dream: to serve Mass in New York’s great gothic cathedral.  As we entered there were perhaps 20 priests saying private masses at the side altars while the main altar remained empty.  First he installed me at one side altar where a priest was just beginning Mass, then he went off to find a Mass of his own. 

I had been trained in the “old Latin Mass,” and made my way fairly routinely through the call-and-response typical of that liturgical form.  This priest moved through the Mass fairly rapidly, and within 20 minutes or so he was returning back down from the altar for what were customarily the final prayers in English.

 Old-Style private Latin Mass at a side altar

But then he caught me by surprise, because he began in Latin the “Prayers at the Foot of the Altar” that begin the Mass.  I suddenly realized that he was starting over!  The immediate sensation was of being trapped: if this man planned to say three consecutive Masses, I could be stuck here for some time.

But as the priest moved back up to the altar to begin the first readings, I saw movement out of the corner of my eye.  Turning my head, I saw my father beckoning me to come.  I assumed this meant I had permission to leave, so with some relief I got up and walked to him, thinking it was time for breakfast.

Instead, my father’s glowing eyes hinted at a different message, as his arm reached out and pointed toward the main altar.

“There is a priest getting ready to say Mass at the main altar!” he whispered.  “This is your chance!  Go!” His urgent command was clearly non-negotiable.

And so it was that, on my very first visit to New York City, on my very first morning in New York City, I found myself serving Mass in Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in the very spot where, just one month ago this year, Pope Francis presided.

Main Altar in 1960

Vatican Council II was underway, but its reforms were yet to be announced. So aside from the venue, the Mass felt just like any other weekday Mass: an intimate sort of exchange between the priest and the altar boy, with the other worshippers invisible and silent behind us.  I did not even know how many there were.  So I quickly relaxed into the familiar routine until the moment approached when I prepared to ring the altar bells for the first time.

Looking down to my side, I saw no bells.  There was a stick with a large white felt ball stuck to its end.  There was also a brass-colored, metal-dome-shaped something, standing on a 1-foot tall white marble pedestal.  Thinking it might be a bell, I tried to lift it, but it was attached to the pedestal.  Thinking next that there might be some way to ring it in place, I reached as discreetly as I could underneath to feel for a clapper.  But I felt no clapper.  In fact, I could feel no moving parts at all.

With about three minutes to go before bell-ringing time, a slow panic began to set in.  How could I ring the bells without a bell?  How could this thing with no moving parts supply the sound that I was supposed to make?

That slow panic kept rising within me for the next two minutes when, with about a minute to go, the corner of my eye saved me again. 

For off in the periphery of my vision was someone who appeared to be a younger priest, dressed in a white robe, gesturing with his eyes locked on me.  I turned my head, and looked directly at him.  His right arm swung out to the right, his palm out in an underhanded gesture, and then his arm swung back rapidly to a position directly in front of him.  He repeated this gesture three more times before I realized what I was seeing: he was imitating someone sharply hitting the side of the brass thing in front of me with the stick. 

I had no idea who this man really was, or if he knew what he was gesturing about, but I was desperate enough to trust him.  What else could I do?  Do nothing, and risk humiliating myself at the main altar of Saint Patrick’s Cathedral when the priest celebrating Mass would swing around, glaring at me for the silence I had committed?

No way.  Instead, I picked up the stick, and when the moment came, I swung out to my right arm and brought it sharply back onto the side of the brass thing next to my knees.

For one instant, I felt my effort had been futile.  For one instant, nothing happened.  Then, softly, almost stealthily, a steady tone began to emanate from the brass thing.  As the volume of this single tone grew, I realized what I had done: I had rung, not a bell, but a gong!

Success!  I thought.  But then I realized that tone had not ended.  Far from it.  In fact, it was growing in volume to fill a wider and wider area of the cathedral’s space.  No bell-ringing I had ever done in all my career as an altar boy had ever made such a long, ever-louder noise!

Was I supposed to stop it?  Put my hand on it?  Put the stick on it?  Was it really supposed to get louder and louder for so long?

I turned my head again, and saw the young priest quietly nodding his head and smiling with satisfaction.  The message was unmistakable: this is exactly what is supposed to be happening right now

So I was suddenly able to relax, and for the first time I appreciated what I had done and why.  Ordinary hand bells, I realized, would sound distant in the cathedral no matter how large and loud.  But this gong was sending its single tone to the furthest reaches of the cathedral. 

THIS was the unmistakable sound of the main altar at the high point of the Mass.  THIS was the sound that would command the attention of all the worshipers and tourists and even all of the priests saying their private masses at their private altars.  It was the Big Gong that made THIS Mass, on this altar, the center of the cathedral’s universe--and I was the one who had rung it!

Over the next few minutes I got to repeat my feat several times. But 30 minutes later the Mass was over, and the priest graciously and generously thanked me-- expressing some surprise that his altar server was a Bostonian, not a New Yorker. 

My father soon joined me and, as he congratulated me, I felt a father’s love in a special way.  For while he was delighted that I had had this opportunity, I knew without doubt that he had sacrificed his own opportunity by giving it to me. He had realized his dream of serving Mass in Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, and that was a memory he would always treasure.  But perhaps the memory he would treasure more was witnessing his young son, on his first New York visit, kneeling to ring the Big Gong at Saint Patrick’s main altar.

So while All Souls’ Day may remain a poor stepchild in the three-day observance October 31 – November 2, for me it will always remain a special memory of a special place, a special opportunity, and a special man.

© Bernard F. Swain PhD 2015

# 154: Spooked by the Season

My reflections on the place of Christmas in our culture have become a nearly annual tradition in CrossCurrents, so during the Advent season I am re-issuing several pieces from past years before posting my latest thoughts. This first selection is from 2006:

Christmas …has evolved: what began as a pagan feast was later “baptized” and adapted to a Christian world view, giving new meaning to the observance while obscuring its non-Christian origins. But a third stage has now emerged, whereby “baptized” celebrations get “commercialized” by consumer/capitalist culture in a way that obliterates both their pagan roots and their Christian meaning.

Like much of pagan religion, the original observance celebrated a seasonal fact – namely, the winter solstice. Thus the Roman feast of “Sol Invictus” (the invincible sun) marked the late-December phenomenon of days beginning to grow longer, celebrating their promise of spring and renewed life.

Christians chose December 25th to celebrate the birthday of Jesus, not because they had some historical record of the actual date of his birth (they did not), but because it seemed a perfect substitute: in place of “the invincible son,” Christians offered “the eternal Son of God.”

Of course, it’s no secret that modern America has totally transformed formed Christmas into the major commercial event of the year. Our culture has become so dependent on the “holidays” spending orgy that our economy would collapse without it.

…

This is one more example of the dumbing down of our popular culture: something that was rich in historical and human symbols has been reduced now mainly to one more spending spree. Could it be history’s revenge: what Christianity once did to paganism, Capitalism has now done to Christianity?

When I started out in Church work, troubled by the trend to commercialize Christmas, I wrote an article for parish catechists proposing that we “Give Christmas Back to the Pagans.” Now I think it’s too late for that, because I don’t think Christians really control Christmas anymore.

Perhaps it’s time for Christians to acknowledge that we no longer control the symbols of popular culture. If so, we must face up to the responsibility of celebrating our own symbols as a richer, more meaningful alternative to the newly dominant ones.

© Bernard F. Swain PhD 2006

#367 Ten Ways Catholic Life is Better

Today’s tough times shouldn’t blind us to how much renewal we have already accomplished…

In these days of sex-scandal fatigue, declining numbers, fractured fellowship and polarized politics it is tempting to wallow in discouragement.  These are hard times.  We long for the “good old days.”

But there is another view.  As I observe my 40th anniversary in parish work (I began at St. Mary’s in Laurel, Maryland in the summer of 1972) I prefer to think of our present situation as a short-term stumbling block on the long-term path of Catholic renewal.

As someone who lived through Vatican II, I see our Church in the light of the Council’s call for a “Second Pentecost” to give new life and vitality to our ancient tradition.

But while Vatican II’s four years were my four high school years, my childhood was spent in an earlier version of Catholicism.  So my perspective filters through a life lived in three parts: (1) a pre-council childhood, (2) a conciliar adolescence, and (3) a post-council adulthood spent working in the Church.  From this vantage point, I see many ways the Church now is dramatically better off.

1. Catholic Identity.  Gone are the days when Catholicism shaped our identity mainly by giving us rules to follow.  Nowadays everyone I work with knows that being “Catholic” means to embrace a personal faith descended from 20 centuries of believers and shared with 100s of millions worldwide.  By now Catholics cannot remember the days when “personal faith” was an alien concept among Catholics.  Yes, the “good old days” had its share of “devout” Catholics--but for most the “Catholic faith” was merely a set of propositions one accepted and rules one obeyed.  The idea that God is love, and we are to be disciples of His incarnate Son, too often got lost in the shopping list of Catholic Do’s and Don’ts.  Those days are gone, and good riddance.

2. Liturgy.  Gone too are the days of unheard mumbled prayers and passive people in the pews.  Gone are full pews at Communion time (only 15% of Mass-goers received communion in the 1950s), rosaries at Mass, the “elites” who possessed their own missals and the skill to navigate among their many multicolored bookmark-ribbons.

Now people come to Mass for the right reason - - the Eucharist itself.  They participate in its celebration: hearing the readings, responding to the priest, praying together the Kyrie and Gloria and Psalms and Sanctus and the Our Father, greeting each other in peace, and coming forward en masse to receive Communion. 

3. Sacramental life.  I still remember when Baptism meant merely “washing original sin from the soul” of babies (and mothers were excluded), when Confirmation made “soldiers of Christ” of kids too old for Christian initiation but too young to take any mature responsibility.  I remember when funerals were morbid black reminders of death’s grip and God’s wrath.  I remember when the Eucharist was merely an annual duty-call for most Catholics.

Today our sacramental system, while far from perfect, has been restored to firmer foundations.  Baptism makes us members of the Body of Christ, and its fullest form is the restored Baptism of adult catechumens at the Easter Vigil.  Confirmation now comes between Baptism and First Communion, or else is conferred on youth old enough to seriously renew their own baptismal vows.  Funerals are now bright with color, alleluias, the Paschal Candle, and the hope of Resurrection.  And the Eucharist is once again the center of all, the way we come together as one body.  Even Reconciliation, though underutilized, is now humane rather than mechanical, healing without being clinical.

4. The Bible.  Many of us remember when “Bible” referred merely to that big coffee table book where families recorded baptisms and weddings.  But few Catholics remember that we never heard the Old Testament or the letters of Paul at Church.  Only the Gospel was read aloud and in English.  Now nearly the entire body of the Old and New Testaments is proclaimed aloud at Mass over a three year cycle.  And we’ve fairly well dispensed with the old-time “sermons” on whatever topic crossed Father’s mind, in favor of genuine homilies that unpack, interpret, and apply the scripture readings for the congregation.

Moreover Bible study has become part of many adult education programs and faith-sharing groups, and is built into every single school-age religious education curriculum.    So the Bible is now at the center of Catholic life in a way unknown to our grandparents.

5. The Laity. “Laity” means “people,” and the day is long gone when they were content to “pray, pay, and obey.” For 40 years or more, lay volunteers have assumed leadership in ministry as lectors, Eucharistic ministers, in baptismal and marriage preparation, in the RCIA, and as parish councilors and small group leaders.  And since 2005, lay professionals now make up the majority of parish staffs. 

Laypeople are no longer helpless children in the church, totally dependent on “Father” to care for them.  Such infantile docility enabled the cover-up of sexual abuse for decades, but Vatican II’s call for an “adult” laity finally doomed clergy corruption.  The Church of silence is gone for good.

6. The Workforce.  Gone are the days when parishes were run by a drill-squad of priests, alike in uniforms, training, tasks, and lifestyle.  Now parish leadership resembles a ball-club: role players with distinct jobs, different training, and specialized skills.  Before my arrival, the St. Mary’s staff consisted of three priests.  Today St. Mary’s lists more than 12 staff people on its website. Typically, large parish staffs are now loaded with laypeople. Instead of marching in lockstep, they must work like a team--which means their diverse gifts build up the Body of Christ, just as St. Paul described, in a way the old workforce never did.

 7. Women’s roles. Even as numbers of women religious fell, women rose to new prominence in our Church.  Nuns headed diocesan departments, became parish pastoral associates, and lay women as well flooded into parish ministries, until today women make up nearly 80% of all parish staffs.  Our grandfathers could never have imagined this transformation of Catholicism’s patriarchy--but maybe our grandmothers dreamt it!

8. Collaboration.  John-Paul II said “Collaboration is the act proper to solidarity,” and our unity as Church today is manifested by our deep commitment to a collegial approach at all levels.  Following the model of Vatican II itself, we now see Catholic life shaped by gatherings of the US Bishops, diocesan councils, parish pastoral and finance councils and a myriad of parish committees and small groups. 

I used to joke that Vatican II gave us lots of documents, lots of changes, and lots of meetings--and for the last 30 years I’ve made my livelihood going to those meetings.  The Church’s business no longer follows the Charles Lindbergh “flying solo” model, but instead uses the model Saint Paul had in mind when he addressed his letters to “My Co-workers.”

9. Ecumenism.  Who still remembers the “good old days” when Catholics were prohibited from any dealings with Protestant churches?  As teenagers, my older sisters were even kept from YWCA dances because the Y was a “Protestant” organization.  For my parents, Catholics were “devout” but Protestants were always “staunch.”

Over the last 40 to 50 years the landscape has completely changed.  We still have differences with our separated Christian brothers and sisters, but we no longer fear “the other” or shun them.  Indeed, many progressive Catholics now find they share much perspective with progressive Protestants, just as many conservative Catholics feel allied to conservative Protestants.  Such conversations across the ecumenical boundaries were unthinkable 50 years ago, but a commonplace now--and that has revised hope for a future when Christians will again be united.

10. The End of Quarantine.  At all levels, Catholicism has ditched its old isolationist posture in favor of dialogue with the outside world.  That world remains toxic in many ways, but rather than hide away from fear of infection our Church now opts for immunizing its people with a faith strong enough to engage those of others faiths and even those of no faith.  So our popes travel the world and address the UN, our bishops blog and issue pastoral letters on public policy and voter education, our schools teach a broad range of students from different backgrounds, and even our liturgies embrace facets of contemporary culture (folk music, photography, dance) that enrich our life as Catholics, living a global faith in the global world.

-----

During my high school years, as the Council progressed, my father once speculated on the outcome: “What if priests get just as good at mumbling English as they ever were at mumbling Latin?” The operative word, of course, was “mumble”--and he was right in part.  We still mumble along, trying to perfect renewal and sometimes stumbling on an obstacle in our path.  None of the 10 points above is perfectly realized. They are works in progress.  

But there is no doubting this: these 10 points have already restored an authentic practice of our ancient tradition that seemed impossible 50 years ago. They have made us a better Church.

© Bernard F. Swain PhD 2012