Vatican II as a scapegoat?

[CelticChristian]

How do you respond to the suggestion that Vatican II, modernism etc. are not really to blame for the crisis in Catholicism, and rather the state of modern Catholicism reflects the general decline in religious observance in developed nations?

Certainly where I live, Protestant churches are in an even worse state than the Catholic Church.  The Presbterian church near my house doesn't seem to have a single parishioner without grey hair!  Plus, think of Israel, where most people are nominally Jewish, but in reality is a pretty secular country.  So is Vatican II just a scapegoat for wider societal trends?

[Catholicmilkman]

How do you respond to the suggestion that Vatican II, modernism etc. are not really to blame for the crisis in Catholicism, and rather the state of modern Catholicism reflects the general decline in religious observance in developed nations?

Certainly where I live, Protestant churches are in an even worse state than the Catholic Church.  The Presbterian church near my house doesn't seem to have a single parishioner without grey hair!  Plus, think of Israel, where most people are nominally Jewish, but in reality is a pretty secular country.  So is Vatican II just a scapegoat for wider societal trends?

Well, since Modernism tends "to the utter destruction of ALL religion" I don't think it is a scapegoat but the real and logical cause of the abandonment of belief in anything and everything but especially God by Catholics and non-Catholics. Modernism, as St. Pius X defined, leads directly to Atheism. I believe Vatican II is of a different matter though nonetheless in the same vein, it is not Modernism but a symptom of it. Modernism to me is man making all choices (synthesis of all heresy), that is, man making every possible heresy.

[VetusOrdo]

How do you respond to the suggestion that Vatican II, modernism etc. are not really to blame for the crisis in Catholicism, and rather the state of modern Catholicism reflects the general decline in religious observance in developed nations?

I answer by saying that these people are not seeing the whole picture and that they're unwilling - perhaps due to a misguided sense of obedience - to draw the obvious connection between the reforms Vatican II introduced in the Church and her disastrous downfall ever since.

Certainly where I live, Protestant churches are in an even worse state than the Catholic Church.  The Presbterian church near my house doesn't seem to have a single parishioner without grey hair!  Plus, think of Israel, where most people are nominally Jewish, but in reality is a pretty secular country.  So is Vatican II just a scapegoat for wider societal trends?

The examples you posted are worthless and quite irrelevant to the issue at stake because they all have to do with false religions. False religions come and go as the Devil pleases and God allows, but the Bride of Christ will always thrive no matter what the social trends and beliefs are. It is so because the Church is divine, whereas the others are not.

Therefore, the present crisis in the Church came from within, when certain churchmen let the smoke of Satan enter the Temple of God.

[Catholicmilkman]

The examples you posted are worthless and quite irrelevant to the issue at stake because they all have to do with false religions. False religions come and go as the Devil pleases and God allows, but the Bride of Christ will always thrive no matter what the social trends and beliefs are. It is so because the Church is divine, whereas the others are not.

Therefore, the present crisis in the Church came from within, when certain churchmen let the smoke of Satan enter the Temple of God.

I'm sorry but those who hold erroneous opinions are souls just as you and me and our Lord loves and cares for them just He does for you and me. The Church is also human and in that sense can change, souls can enter; souls can exit. Don't say that heretical, schismatic, etc organizations are irrelevant for "there shall be joy in heaven upon one sinner that do penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance" Lk 15:7.

[JesusFreak84]

Vatican II couldn't have had the effects it did if something wasn't already very....I'm going to say "sick" because the word I wanted to use just flew out of my head, beforehand.  Also, as we all know, a lot of the "Spirit of Vatican II" folks have absolutely nil familiarity with the documents, so how can you blame a document for something when the people who caused the problem never read it?

(And if I get any comments on that that sound like a personal attack, I will ignore it.  I know the view I just espoused will be very unpopular with some on this board.)

[littleway]

Dare I suggest that the Church took a little while to catch up on exactly what the thing they called "Modernism" actually was? A historical, cultural and political phenomenon, partly used by the Devil and partly just an inevitable point that human reason (mostly without the aid of sanctfying grace but still a good thing in itself according to Catholic Tradition) had to eventually come to? In other words, "Modernism" is part of the human "trip" - history, culture, politics, philosophy and psychology all played a part in those silly Freemasons getting together in the 19th century and all the Greenies and Emos and feel-good Fideists getting together today.

Of course V2 is partly a scapegoat. And partly a sell-out. And partly the Church. 

[maso]

Holy popes before VII (Leo XIII, Pius IX & X) had a premonition of  the grave crisis the Church is undergoing currently. They warned  against the rise of Modernism but to no avail.
  The stainless optimism of John XIII sweeped all the stuff and he  proceeded with this Council, even prophetizing a springtime , a new  Pentecost for the Church (!!!!)
  Before to die he had time to see the actual Council becoming  uncontrolled since the French Catholic writer Jean Guitton reported the  Pope on his deathbed saying: "Stop the Council, stop it..."
  The Council must not be taken as a scapegoat. Would the Church have  unrooted without pity the Modernist heresy, and placed this Council  under our Lady of Fatima's protection, certainly our Church would be  currently in a much better State.
  The comparison with the current state of other religions, of Christian  Protestantism & Orthodoxy is of no interest in this matter.
 
 
 

[kjvail]

In 1955, the Roman journal Ephemerides Liturgicae (V. LXIX, pages 54-60) published an account in Latin and Italian of how the St. Michael prayer developed. Footnote nine of this account quotes a 1947 article from Fr. Domenico Pechenino who worked at the Vatican during the time of Leo XIII. Writing in 1947 for another Italian journal named La Settimana del Clero, Fr. Pechenino stated the following in Italian:

"I do not remember the exact year. One morning the great Pope Leo XIII had celebrated a Mass and, as usual, was attending a Mass of thanksgiving. Suddenly, we saw him raise his head and stare at something above the celebrant's head. He was staring motionlessly, without batting an eye. His expression was one of horror and awe; the color and look on his face changing rapidly. Something unusual and grave was happening in him.

"Finally, as though coming to his senses, he lightly but firmly tapped his hand and rose to his feet. He headed for his private office. His retinue followed anxiously and solicitously, whispering: 'Holy Father, are you not feeling well? Do you need anything?' He answered: 'Nothing, nothing.' About half an hour later, he called for the Secretary of the Congregation of Rites and, handing him a sheet of paper, requested that it be printed and sent to all the ordinaries around the world. What was that paper? It was the prayer that we recite with the people at the end of every Mass. It is the plea to Mary and the passionate request to the Prince of the heavenly host, [St. Michael: Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle] beseeching God to send Satan back to hell."

Pope Leo XIII

Though the resources are scarce, the above information is reliable and comes from an eye-witness to the day when the prayer was composed. Most notable, however, is that Fr. Pechenino does not describe what Pope Leo saw. It is usually and reasonably presumed that the Pope never told him but is this the case? The available resources are silent. Despite this, enough evidence exists to affirm and reject some things as well as question others.

An oral tradition about Leo's vision became quite popular among Catholics and despite how it may explain some of the terrible events of the 20th century, there is no corroborating evidence for it. Enough questions arise, however, where the story can not be definitively debunked but is highly suspect. The claim goes that Satan approached Jesus and asked for the 20th century in which to make an attempt to destroy the Catholic Church, to which Jesus responded in the affirmative.

Though it varies from web site to web site and person to person, the accounts essentially agree with each other and usually go as follows. Pope Leo XIII was celebrating Holy Mass one day. As he was walking up the steps to the altar (some other accounts say he was actually at the altar), the Pope suddenly stopped, stared fixedly at something in the air and with a terrible look on his face, collapsed to the floor (some accounts say he fell shrieking). The Pope was carried off by those around him to another room where he came around. As one rendition of the story tells it:

"When asked what had happened, he explained that, as he was about to leave the foot of the altar, he suddenly heard voices - two voices, one kind and gentle, the other guttural and harsh. They seemed to come from near the tabernacle. As he listened, he heard the following conversation:

The guttural voice, the voice of Satan in his pride, boasted to Our Lord:

"I can destroy your Church."

The gentle voice of Our Lord:

'You can? Then go ahead and do so.'

Satan:

'To do so, I need more time and more power.'

Our Lord:

'How much time? How much power?'

Satan:

'75 to 100 years, and a greater power over those

who will give themselves over to my service.'

Our Lord:

'You have the time, you will have the power.

Do with them what you will.'"

Just how did this conversation become known when the resources are silent? Though there is no historical documentation that describes Pope Leo's vision as it is given above (and elsewhere), it is possible that the alleged conversation arose from a statement given by a Cardinal in 1946.

Giacomo Nasalli Cardinal Rocca di Corneliano, Archbishop of Bologna wrote in his Litteris Pastoralibus pro Quadragesima (Pastoral Letters for Lent) that Leo XIII's private secretary, Msgr. Rinaldo Angeli, many times told people that the line in the St. Michael prayer, "...the evil spirits who wander through the world for the ruin of souls" has a historical explanation in Leo's vision. Nasalli writes the story as follows in Italian and quoted in Ephemerides Liturgicae (p.58-9, footnote nine):

"The sentence 'The evil spirits who wander through the world for the ruin of souls' has a historical explanation that was many times repeated by his private secretary, Monsignor Rinaldo Angeli. Leo XIII truly saw, in a vision, demonic spirits who were congregating on the Eternal City (Rome). The prayer that he asked all the Church to recite was the fruit of that experience. He would recite that prayer with strong, powerful voice: we heard it many a time in the Vatican Basilica. Leo XIII also personally wrote an exorcism that is included in the Roman Ritual (1954 edition, XII, C. Ill, p. 863 and following). He recommended that bishops and priests read these exorcisms often in their dioceses and parishes. He himself would recite them often throughout the day."

In the original Italian provided above as well as the shortened English translation, we see in Cardinal Nasalli's statement nothing of a conversation between Jesus and Satan. Instead, we find almost an entirely different story--demons congregating upon the Eternal City as if to attack it somehow and at some time. The question remains, then, how did the vision of Pope Leo come to include a conversation between Jesus and Satan? In short, no one knows but the most likely explanation is that it was a spin-off of Cardinal Nasalli's statement.

One of many changes to the mass in 1970 was to remove the prayer to St. Michael. I've never heard it uttered in a NO church.
You decide.

[VetusOrdo]

]I'm sorry but those who hold erroneous opinions are souls just as you and me and our Lord loves and cares for them just He does for you and me.

I said that false religions are irrelevant for the issue CelticChristian was trying to raise precisely because they are false to begin with. It has nothing to do with God's love towards all men, even towards heretics and heathens. Or are you trying to imply that, for instance, Islam's rise in the world has anything to do with God's supposed love towards Muhammad's cult?

The Church is also human and in that sense can change, souls can enter; souls can exit. Don't say that heretical, schismatic, etc organizations are irrelevant for "there shall be joy in heaven upon one sinner that do penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance" Lk 15:7.

No soul shall enter Heaven other than through Christ and the Church. Heretical, schismatical organizations and cults are irrelevant both to Salvation as well as to the question CelticChristian was trying to raise.

[Catholicmilkman]

I said that false religions are irrelevant for the issue CelticChristian was trying to raise precisely because they are false to begin with. It has nothing to do with God's love towards all men, even towards heretics and heathens.

Yes, their beliefs are false but they themselves are real men.

Or are you trying to imply that, for instance, Islam's rise in the world has anything to do with God's supposed love towards Muhammad's cult?

Not at all. I'm saying it's important to get to know what Islamists believe though so we can refute their errors and prove that Islam is false.

No soul shall enter Heaven other than through Christ and the Church.

This I know and believe otherwise I wouldn't be Catholic.

Heretical, schismatic organizations and cults are irrelevant both to Salvation as well as to the question CelticChristian was trying to raise.

No, they are not irrelevant because they are people and souls just like you and me, who just like you and me can with the grace of God and His Catholic Church inherit heaven. How can they be irrelevant when they just like St. Augustine and so many other converts can convert and have salvation like many Saints.