Church and Society: The Laurence J. McGinley Lectures, 1988-2007

23. The Papacy for a Global Church: March 22, 2000

23 The Papacy for a Global Church March ,  U ntil the late nineteenth century, the Catholic Church was predominantly geared to traditional societies that were stable and agrarian. To be a Catholic, in most cases, meant to be the heir of longstanding traditions that had been handed down from generation to generation in local communities. As a result of urbanization, which was intensified by the Industrial Revolution, all of this began to change. In increasing numbers, Catholics flocked to the cities and became involved in industries and professions. With better means of travel, they began to migrate to new countries where the Catholic faith had not as yet taken root. The Catholic Church came to need institutional structures that would guarantee its stability and unity in a changing and diversified world. Vatican I and Vatican II The popes, about the time that they lost the Papal States, awakened to their planetary responsibilities and in so doing made the papacy a more potent symbol of unity and continuity for Catholics all over the world. The decrees of the First Vatican Council (1869–70), followed by the Code of Canon Law of 1917, gave the pope practically unlimited authority over the development of doctrine and ecclesiastical legislation throughout the world. The pope came to be recognized, more than ever before, as the vicar of Christ. Through its diplomatic corps, the Holy See was morally present in a multitude of nations, overseeing the affairs of the Church and 318 The Papacy for a Global Church 兩 319 interacting with secular governments. By means of nuncios and apostolic delegates, Rome controlled the appointment of bishops everywhere. The progressive centering of the Church on Rome was sometimes resented at the periphery. Historically minded theologians cherished the memory of a remote past when local and regional churches enjoyed a large measure of autonomy, managed their own affairs, and dealt with Rome only as a court of final appeal. Already in the mid-nineteenth century , Newman wrote nostalgically of the Middle Ages, when, as he put it, ‘‘a question was first debated in a University, then in one University against another, or by one order of Friars against another;—and then perhaps it came before a theological faculty; then it went to the Metropolitan ; and so, by various stages and through many examinations and judgments, it came before the Holy See. But now,’’ Newman complained, ‘‘all courts are superseded because the bishops refer every case immediately to Rome, which makes a prompt decision, often on grounds of expediency.’’1 The Protestant Prince Otto von Bismarck, the chancellor of the new German Empire, interpreted Vatican I as having made the pope in effect the bishop of every diocese in the world. The German bishops formulated a vigorous denial, which was approved on two occasions by Pius IX. The bishops remained true pastors of their flocks and were not demoted to being pawns of the pope. At the Second Vatican Council (1962–65), bishops from Western Europe (France, Belgium, Holland, and Germany), together with their theological advisers, were intent on removing every semblance of justification for Bismarck’s critique. They spearheaded a program of reform that sought to restore the dignity and rights of individual bishops and give real though limited autonomy to regional churches. This program was welcomed by the missionary bishops of Asia and Africa, who were anxious to insert the Catholic faith more deeply into the lives of believers who were strangers to the cultures of Italy and Western Europe. Romanization and Europeanization were regarded as obstacles to the necessary adaptation and inculturation. Vatican II, however, did not undo the accomplishments of Vatican I. While giving new powers to the bishops and the local churches, it kept intact the prerogatives of the papacy, as previously defined. It even ampli- fied papal supremacy by the attention it devoted to the pope’s ordinary teaching power. 320 兩 Church and Society Among the achievements of Vatican II we may note, first of all, the stimulus it gave to inculturation. The council clearly taught that the expression and practice of the faith in different regions should be adapted to the natural gifts, traditions, and customs of the people, always keeping in mind the dangers of syncretism and separatism. Connected with this diversified catholicity was a second principle: the retrieval of the local or regional church as having its own pastoral and theological integrity. With...