Thanks to the Franco-Prussian War, the First Vatican Council was suspended in October 1870 and never reconvened. Before its unanticipated end, Vatican I did important work: it defined the universal scope of papal jurisdiction (and thus frustrated the claims of the new nationalists to authority over the Church) while spelling out the precise, limited circumstances in which the Bishop of Rome can teach infallibly on matters of faith and morals.
Nonetheless, the council’s abrupt adjournment led to an imbalance in the Church’s self-understanding: Catholicism was left with a strong theology of the papacy but a weak theology of the episcopate.
As I explain in To Sanctify the World: The Vital Legacy of Vatican II (Basic Books), the Second Vatican Council addressed this imbalance in Lumen Gentium (Light of the Nations), its Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, which made several crucial points: the Church’s bishops are the heirs of the apostles; the “college” of bishops is the contemporary expression of the apostolic “college” of Acts 15; and this episcopal college, with and under its head, the Bishop of Rome, has “supreme and full power over the universal Church” (LG 22).
Among other things, this means that local bishops are genuine vicars of Christ in their local Churches. Ordained to teach, sanctify and govern, the bishops are not mere branch managers of Catholic Church, Inc., executing orders from Roman corporate headquarters. Through their reception of Holy Orders in the highest degree, and because of their communion with the Bishop of Rome, a local bishop is empowered to lead the entire People of God given into his care, such that all the baptized in his diocese are called to mission, equipped for mission and sacramentally supported in their efforts at evangelization.
As then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger put it in a reflection on Vatican II’s achievements, Lumen Gentium “reinserted into the Church as a whole a doctrine of [papal] primacy” that had become “dangerously isolated” from the world episcopate, even as it “integrated into the one mysterium of the Body of Christ a too-isolated concept of the hierarchy.” In these and other ways, Vatican II completed the work of Vatican I by expressing the Church’s self-understanding in a holistic, integrated way that drew on the vast riches of Scripture and tradition. This was no mean accomplishment, and it vindicated a century and a half of serious theological work, often undertaken in difficult circumstances.
Yet the question must be asked: Is Vatican II’s achievement in reaffirming the authority of bishops being undercut by the current preparatory process for the “Synod on Synodality” of 2023 and 2024?
Concerns on this front have been heightened by the release of the Working Document for the “Continental Stage” of Synod preparation: a series of assemblies that follow the local and national “stages” of this lengthy process.
In the Working Document, the bishops are minority participants in continental consultations that must include (in addition to bishops, priests, consecrated religious and active laity) “people living in conditions of poverty or marginalization, and those that have direct contact with these groups and persons; fraternal delegates from other Christian denominations; representatives of other religions and faith traditions; and some people with no religious affiliation.” And what are the bishops to do in these continental assemblies? “They are asked to identity appropriate ways to carry out the task of validating and approving” the “Final Document” of each continental assembly, “ensuring that it is the fruit of an authentically synodal journey, respectful of the process that has taken place and faithful to the diverse voices of the People of God in each continent.”
That is, the bishops are note-takers, not teachers; recording secretaries, not guarantors of orthodoxy; messenger boys, not apostolic leaders.
Serious concerns about this diminishment of the episcopal vocation, which is in striking contrast to Vatican II’s teaching in Lumen Gentium, are further intensified by reports that, in the final Synod assembly in Rome (presumably in 2024), there will be no votes on propositions by the attending bishops — the normal way a Synod expresses its judgments. Rather, reports of the bishops’ discussions will be prepared — by the Synod General Secretariat that designed this process? — and given to the Pope, who will then craft a Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation (the document that completes a Synod’s work) as he pleases.
Thus extreme ultramontanism — a form of papal autocracy that might make Blessed Pius IX blush — is being layered onto the depreciation of the world episcopate.
This has nothing to do with Vatican II. The bishops should make that known while asking for the restoration of their authority in this process.
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In other words, the Catholic Church is being run by the mob, not those in legitimate authority. There’s little difference nowadays between ecclesial life (The City of God) and civic life (The City of Man); both are being run by the mob. This is consistent to one of my favorite sayings these days: All the adults have left the room.
But [sarcasm] with Pope Francis leading the mob, what could possibly go wrong?
There is no compromise with evil.
Evil never stops.
Transgenderism is an outgrowth from the tolerance of homosexual sin.
Homosexual acceptance is an outgrowth of the sexual revolution.
The sexual revolution gave us the Holocaust of murder in the womb.
The somnolent bishops have abandoned their flocks.
The apostate pope is rolling them with the ludicrous facade of a sin-nod of sin/nods.
Old Scratch has a morbid sense of humor as he sips on babies blood.
Shawn Marshall, your comment is brilliant because it speaks the objective truth without equivocation. I agree completely, especially with regard to the “somnolent bishops” and the “apostate pope”.
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. Church doctrine should not be determined by popular vote, but rather by what Jesus Christ says and directs. Just because people, many who are not even Catholic in this process want to make their sins go away or easier to circumvent, doesn’t mean the Church should entertain such changes.
Why bother being a bishop?
The utterly corrupted Vatican bureaucracy, headed by the sprawling, corrupt Secretariat of State, undermines any good shepherd among the Bishops.
The utterly corrupted National Bishops Conferences of various countries also operate to undermine any good shepherd among the Bishops.
Among other problems that abound…
[Is] “the authority of bishops being undercut by the current preparatory process for the Synod on Synodality of 2023 and 2024?” (Weigel). Absolutely [said with invincible certitude].
If there’s a nuance of humor in my certitude there’s the firm conviction of our pontiff Francis exerting supreme authority in an unusual, messianic sense leaving bishops, the successors of the Apostles and defenders of the faith as mere laicized like facilitators. Weigel’s take of the Synod Working Document that reduces bishops to “note takers”.
This [is] “extreme ultramontanism a form of papal autocracy that might make Blessed Pius IX blush”. If Pius IX might have blushed, it’s inconceivable that Christ, who instituted the Church with Peter the chief apostle among the apostles, is exactly pleased with a Peronist style grab of authority. A supreme authority that belongs to Christ not the pope.
Bishops assert your authority in the name of Christ.
While the Working Document speaks of the poor, the fact is that “continental” breakfasts are fattening.
Peter. Anomalies exist. Whether like fare [theoretically] is offered all, it’s the greater appetite that consumes the most. Insofar as power the ungainly powerful are voracious disposed to gobble whatever’s at hand. Underlings are reduced to leavings. For example, taking notes.
“The sexual revolution gave us the Holocaust of murder in the womb.”
Well, not quite. The Republicans of the 1960s framed it in terms of decriminalization. They were hardly the standard bearers of sexual revolution, at least not as openly as Mr Trump. Led by NY and CA GOP legislatures and governors (like Ronald Reagan) they advocated and passed abortion-friendly legislation many years before a Republican-packed SCOTUS dropped Roe v Wade.
I think many of us want or hope our political adversaries are in bed with evil, but the truth is that sin is pervasive, and no ideology has a nose in front of any other.
Like in China, Pope Francis wants to take God’s Spiritual Power, Authority and Priesthood, away from Catholic Bishops and place it upon evil secular world powers. In Apocalyptic scriptures, a diadem worn on the forehead indicates the Priesthood.
Sirach 45:12 Praise of Moses
On his turban a diadem of gold…
…For Moses ordained him and anointed him with the holy oil, In a lasting covenant with him and his family, as permanent as the heavens, That he should serve God in the priesthood and bless the people in his name.
In Apocalyptic scriptures, a ‘beast’ is the symbol for secular power. The Revelation 13 ‘First Beast’ gets its ‘diadems’ Priestly power, from the ‘dragon’, “To it the dragon gave its own power and throne, along with great authority.” The Revelation 12 ‘dragon’, wearing diadems on its foreheads, is attacking the Blessed Mother of the Apocalypse, as she tries to give birth to the Revelation 21 ‘New Jerusalem’, and usher in Messianic Reign on free-willed earth. The diadems on the evil dragon’s foreheads indicate the Priesthood.
Revelation 13:1 The First Beast.
Then I saw a beast come out of the sea with ten horns and seven heads; on its horns were ten diadems, and on its heads blasphemous name[s]. The beast I saw was like a leopard, but it had feet like a bear’s, and its mouth was like the mouth of a lion. To it the dragon gave its own power and throne, along with great authority. I saw that one of its heads seemed to have been mortally wounded, but this mortal wound was healed. Fascinated, the whole world followed after the beast. They worshiped the dragon because it gave its authority to the beast; they also worshiped the beast and said, “Who can compare with the beast or who can fight against it?”
In the Book of Revelation, Jesus refers to His Catholic Bishops as ‘angels’ (morning stars). Revelation 2:1 “To the angel of the church in Ephesus, write this:” At the Revelation 19 Battle of Armageddon, King of kings, Jesus Christ, is wearing ‘on his head were many diadems’. The armies of heaven, riding behind Jesus, ‘wearing clean white linen’, are Christ’s great, Combat Angels of the Apocalypse/Catholic Bishops, who have repented of all their sins and washed their robes in Jesus’ Gifts of Divine Mercy, the Sacrament of Reconciliation, and ready to do battle with the Dragon wearing diadems, who is Satan. The ‘diadems’ worn in the Crown of our King Jesus Christ, on the Battlefield of Armageddon, are the diadems of our Faithful to Jesus Christ, Catholic Bishops, who follow Jesus into battle against the evil Catholic Bishops who wear their diadems of the foreheads of the dragon who is Satan.
Revelation 19:11 The King of kings.
Then I saw the heavens opened, and there was a white horse; its rider was [called] “Faithful and True.” He judges and wages war in righteousness. His eyes were [like] a fiery flame, and on his head were many diadems. He had a name inscribed that no one knows except himself…
…The armies of heaven followed him, mounted on white horses and wearing clean white linen.
What we are looking at in the ‘Synodal Way’, is the separating out of which Catholic Bishops/angels will align themselves with the dragon who is Satan, and which Catholic Bishops/angels will place their diadems and allegiance in the Crown of Jesus Christ, on the near future Battle of Armageddon.
Battle of the Angels! The Revelation 12 fallen angels, with their diadems on the forehead of the dragon, are killing the good ‘morning stars’ angels protecting the Blessed Mother of the Apocalypse, and fighting under her Command, to usher in Messianic Reign on free-willed earth. In the book of Revelation, Jesus refers to His ‘morning star’ Catholic Bishops as ‘angels’
.
Daniel 12:1
“At that time there shall arise Michael, the great prince, guardian of your people; It shall be a time unsurpassed in distress since the nation began until that time. At that time your people shall escape, everyone who is found written in the book. Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake; Some to everlasting life, others to reproach and everlasting disgrace. But those with insight shall shine brightly like the splendor of the firmament, And those who lead the many to justice shall be like the stars forever.
Revelation 12:7
Then war broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels battled against the dragon. The dragon and its angels fought back, but they did not prevail and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. The huge dragon, the ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, who deceived the whole world, was thrown down to earth, and its angels were thrown down with it.
Revelation 11:15
Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet. There were loud voices in heaven, saying, “The kingdom of the world now belongs to our Lord and to his Anointed, and he will reign forever and ever.”
Pray for our courageous good Catholic Bishops/Angels of the Apocalypse, who wear their diadems in the Crown of, King of kings, Jesus Christ.
http://www.apocalypseangel.com/married.html
Thank you.
I’m gratified to see Weigel taking alarm at the “synodalization” of Church “governance” (i.e., the “Peronization” of the Vatican, by the dictator Pope).
But, please Let’s be done with these scurrilous recriminations against VI, ultramontanism, papolatry, integralism.
So, we’ve got a rogue Pope. Let’s just leave it that.
And God help us.
No, the truth needs to be spoken clearly as Shawn Marshall has here. The “recriminations against Vatican II, ultramontanism, papolatry, integralism” are exactly what need to be proclaimed from the housetops.
Very bold, analytic, truthful assessment