Continuity and Discontinuity, Part 197

CNA reports on an article by Erico Castellucci in L’Osservatore Romano about a meeting of Communio, which is generally held to be more ‘conservative.’ The journal Communio was founded by Hans Urs von Balthasar, Henri de Lubac and Joseph Ratzinger to provide an alternative voice to the more ‘liberal’ journal Concilium. From CNA’s report:

According to theology professor Erio Castellucci, we have two hermeneutics—keys to its interpretation and application—which resulted from Vatican II. “They were defined by the Holy Father in his 2005 Christmas address to the Roman Curia as those ‘of discontinuity and rupture’ and of ‘reform, renewal and continuity.’” …

The second hermeneutic, that of reform and continuity, Pope Benedict told the Curia, doesn’t deny that discontinuity could emerge from within the great themes examined by the Council. But, he observed, “(i)t is precisely in this combination of continuity and discontinuity at different levels that the very nature of true reform consists.”

So, according to the Pope, there can be “discontinuity” within “continuity.” Discuss among yourselves.

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7 responses to “Continuity and Discontinuity, Part 197”

  1. Jeffrey Pinyan

    Here are the poignant quotes from his 2005 address to the Curia:

    It is clear that in all these sectors, which all together form a single problem, some kind of discontinuity might emerge. Indeed, a discontinuity had been revealed but in which, after the various distinctions between concrete historical situations and their requirements had been made, the continuity of principles proved not to have been abandoned. It is easy to miss this fact at a first glance.

    It is precisely in this combination of continuity and discontinuity at different levels that the very nature of true reform consists. In this process of innovation in continuity we must learn to understand more practically than before that the Church’s decisions on contingent matters – for example, certain practical forms of liberalism or a free interpretation of the Bible – should necessarily be contingent themselves, precisely because they refer to a specific reality that is changeable in itself. It was necessary to learn to recognize that in these decisions it is only the principles that express the permanent aspect, since they remain as an undercurrent, motivating decisions from within.

    …

    The Second Vatican Council, with its new definition of the relationship between the faith of the Church and certain essential elements of modern thought, has reviewed or even corrected certain historical decisions, but in this apparent discontinuity it has actually preserved and deepened her inmost nature and true identity.

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  2. Fr. Allan McDonald

    While change always brings about a bit of discontinuity and the Second Vatican Council certainly did that on a number of different levels, it ultimately preserved the true identity of the Church and her relationships with others, those Christians separated from us, those religions which have truth to be found within them, etc. There is discontinuity obviously when the Mass is translated into other languages from its Latin and Greek, but great continuity when the theology and doctrine of the Mass are retained. Even in structural differences from EF to OF, there is continuity in terms of what is accomplished solely by the Grace of God, the salvation of those participating and the nourishment and strengthening of sanctifying grace. And certainly between the various liturgies of the Eastern Rites while there appears to be great discontinuity, in fact there is the hermeneutic of continuity at work in terms of the core actions which take place. Even for those dismayed by the reform of the reform, the discontinuity this has created for those who think the authentic, spirit filled Church was born only after Vatican II in fact will lead them to the continuity the Holy Spirit desires from us at this time. So we can say like our predecessors who promoted the “spirit of Vatican II” that this reform is Spirit-filled and led and thus places us in continuity one with the other.

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  3. Todd Flowerday

    At best, continuity is a peripheral principle when dealing with the Gospel.

    Clearly, the conversion experience is one of discontinuity: a person sets aside old ways to take on the life of Christ. In this context, continuity is not a virtue. Human beings have a tendency to slide back to old habits, old sins. What the Christian experience seeks is not a continuity with the past, but a conformity to Christ.

    That said, the application of the individual faith journey isn’t an exact match for the overall experience of the universal Church. But some of this does and should apply. When old ways of living out the faith grow lukewarm, and a community within the Church (the council bishops, for example) see a better way to embrace conformity to Christ, then continuity is rightly set aside.

    Pope Benedict badly misdiagnosed the situation of the Church in 2005. History tells us a council is always followed by a hermeneutic of obstruction. People don’t want to change. It goes against our human side. But Christ calls us to be transformed, and to change. And he calls the entire Church to greater faithfulness in this regard.

    More accurate would be to say that the post-conciliar Church has many hermeneutics, some of them more in conflict than others. I think it’s important to discern which conform to Christ, and which don’t. Also which obstruct the work of the council and which don’t. And certainly, to examine what methods work and what don’t. It is possible to have the “right’ hermeneutic, but to blunder in applying it.

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  4. Bill deHaas

    Speaking of hermeneutics – read the recent article in Commonweal by John Wilkins on Ratzinger’s book: “Theological Highlights of Vatican II”. It shows in one personality the conflict or evolution (your interpretation) of how Ratzinger the young liberal theologian changed his spots and became conservative in later years. You need to be a subscriber to access the complete article but here is a link to a summary and the first three pages of the article: http://www.catholica.com.au/forum/index.php?id=49314
    Example – “In a useful and workmanlike introduction of this newly released edition, Fr. Thomas Rausch maintains that the author’s views, “with a couple of exceptions, have remained remarkably consistent over the years.” That assessment appears to be the triumph of an ideological opinion over the evidence of the text, which for the most part proves the exact opposite.”
    Example from Paul Kittner, student of Ratzinger at the time of Vatican II: “I am personally and deeply grateful for retrieval of the Josef Ratzinger whom I met and heard as a student of theology at the Gregorian University during the years of the Council. Quoting loosely from memory: “The bishops have on occasion fallen so far from the spirit of the Gospel that it becomes incumbent upon the laity to exercise the prophetic role given to them in Baptism and to resist, even to the point of disobedience. — Ratzinger was talking here not about episcopal collegiality, but the sensus fidelium.”
    So,…

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  5. Bill deHaas

    To continue – have asked a times for David Gibson who wrote a popular biography of Benedict XVI what created the change?
    – you have the Alberigo interpretation of the documents and activity of Vatican II and then you have more recent attempts to redefine or, using history categories, re-write or revisionism
    – some attribute the change to Ratzinger’s experience of the late 1960’s student unrest at his university and in society
    – Gibson seems to reject that as too simplistic
    – Wilkins suggests that it is a complex issue with a number of alternative reasons: he suggests that Ratzinger became a part of the hierarchical institution and that culture impacted his future views, outlook, etc.; he mentions that Ratzinger moved easily and quickly in the Vatican curia- understood Romanita and the politics so much so that this significantly influenced his later papl comments that could be titled “reform of the reform”

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  6. Rita Ferrone

    Thank you, Bill DeHaas, for referencing that very good Commonweal article and David Gibson’s fine book.

    It does seem as though the pope is trying to create a loophole through which the Church’s acceptance, at the council, of key features of modernity can later be revoked. Are we later to repudiate modern scripture scholarship for instance, or the idea of the sovereignty of conscience? Twenty years ago, I’d have said “Never.” Now, I don’t know. At the same time, he clearly doesn’t want to jettison Nostra Aetate, for example — discontinuity claimed, wisely I think, as continuous with what is right and good in our tradition.

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  7. Fr. Philip Sandstrom

    It is — or should be — a commonplace that the Second Vatican Council did not change the Tradition, but rather ‘rearranged the traditions’, changing priorities, and therefore changing the expression and understanding of ecclesiology, liturgy/sacraments, and much else.

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