In December 2005, Pope Benedict XVI devoted part of his Christmas talk to the Roman Curia to the interpretation, or hermeneutics, of the Second Vatican Council. His remarks, and especially his counter-posing of a “hermeneutics of rupture or discontinuity” to a “hermeneutics of reform,” were widely seen as a criticism of the so-called Bologna School and the five-volume History of Vatican II prepared by a team led by Giuseppe Alberigo. As a member of that international team, a contributor to two of the volumes, and editor of the English-language edition of the work, I took a special interest in the Pope’s remarks. Close analysis of the talk and in particular of his use of the Council’s teaching on religious freedom to illustrate the “hermeneutics of reform” convinced me that the Pope’s principal interest was not in rejecting the mythical Scuola bolognese, but in making an appeal to the followers of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre for whom the Council’s text on religious freedom represented an unacceptable departure from the Church’s teaching on the matter. Here is the article in which I made this case:
July 23, 2017
Vatican II as an “Event”
In the continuing debate about the interpretation and evaluation of the Second Vatican Council, whether and, if so, in what sense, it can be said to have been an “event.” The debate often is a dialogue of the deaf because people often mean different things by “event” and differ also as to whether it should be understood in a theological or an historical sense. Here are two essays in which I explore the historiographical implications of seeing the Council as an “event” and argue against purely or even primarily theological notions of the matter.
Interpreting Vatican II Leuven 2010
November 25, 2014
June 26, 2014
The Synod of 1985
The extraordinary assembly of the Synod of Bishops was convoked by Pope John Paul II to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the close of the Second Vatican Council. I attended the Synod and wrote a couple of pieces afterwards. One appeared in French as the Introduction to a volume that gathered a great deal of documentation about the event. The original English can be found here: Introduction to Synode Extraordinaire
Another article appeared in Chicago Studies and can be found here: Notion of the Church at Synod 1985
November 21, 2013
Vatican II and the new Code of Canon Law
In 1981, while the new Code was being drafted, I wrote an essay on how a draft of it would treat the faithful.
After the Code was promulgated, I published another essay
http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/assr_0335-5985_1986_num_62_1_2405
October 17, 2013
Ecclesiology of Vatican II
Below are two essays I published on Vatican II’s vision of the Church. You will see that they somewhat overlap.
August 26, 2013
US proposals for the Council’s agenda
The first implementation of Pope John’s announcement of his intention to convoke an ecumenical council (January 25, 1959) was the invitation sent to all the bishops of the world to submit suggestions (vota) for the conciliar agenda. A good number of studies have been published about the proposals sent in by various episcopates throughout the world. Two decades ago, I did a study of the vota submitted by the U.S. bishops as they could be found in the official Acta of the ante-preparatory period. In a few cases I was able to find documentation about how the proposals of certain bishops were prepared, but the great majority of them I knew only from their published form. If anyone is looking for a good topic for a doctoral dissertation, I can suggest that he complete (and no doubt correct) my investigations which can be found here: JAK US Bishops vota
July 27, 2013
Draft of a dogmatic constitution on the Church
Here below you can find the eleven chapters of the draft De Ecclesia elaborated by the preparatory Theological Commission for Vatican II. The “2013” in the file name is there only to remind me of when I made the last revisions to my translation.
Alan Aversa has kindly sent me all eleven chapters as a single file, and I will put that first, followed by the single chapters in case someone wants to use only one of them.
The Latin text of this schema can be found in two places: in the volume distributed to the Council Fathers during the first session: Schemata Constitutionum et Decretorum de quibus disceptabitur in Concilii sessionibus. Series secunda: De Ecclesia et de B. Maria Virgine (Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis, 1962) 7-90; and in the official acta of the first session: Acta Synodalia Sacrosancti Concilii Oecumenici Vaticani II, Vol. I, Pars IV (Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis, 1971), 12-122.
The official Acta are still for sale, I believe, but not the original volume distributed sub secreto at the Council.
If you make use of these translations, please acknowledge the source.
April 23, 2013
Interpreting Gaudium et spes
Here is an essay which discusses the last stages of the redaction of Gaudium et spes and the constrasting interpretations and evaluations of it that were offered right after the Council by three theologians who belonged to the “progressive” group at the Council. It was an effort both to show that the conciliar dynamics are not accurately analyzed as a battle between Cowboys and Indians and to explain in part the split that occurred among the conciliar majority after Vatican II.
February 10, 2013
Thomism and Vatican II
Here is an essay on what role St. Thomas and his thought played at the Second Vatican Council:
"In verbo veritatis" (2 Cor 6:7) 