When Cardinal Ottaviani squared off with Cardinal Bea on Religious Freedom/Tolerance

Two years after the title for Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity was invented and promptly given to Venerable Pius XII’s confessor Cardinal Bea, a battle of two conflicting understandings of the church’s teaching on the Religious Toleration/Religious Freedom came to ahead.  The story is related in Roberto de Mattei’s  book The Second Vatican Council: An Unwritten Story:

Bea and Ottaviani square off

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On June 19, 1962, the next to last day of the final session, Cardinals Ottaviani and Bea came into direct conflict. Two schemas were presented: one from the theological commission and the other from the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity. Bea, in presenting his schema, asserted that it was focused on non-Catholics and corresponded to the “aggiornamento” of current living conditions in the Church desired by the pope. Ottaviani vehemently retorted that the secretariat had no right to deal with the question for which the Theological Commission was competent.

Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre recalls this episode, of which he was a [sic] eyewitness:

"I must relate to you a minor incident that occurred in 1962, when I was a member of the Central Preparatory Commision of the council. We held our meetings in the Vatican, but the last one was dramatic. Among the papers given to the Central Commission there were two on the same subject: One came from Cardinal Bea, president of the Commission for Unity , and the other from Cardinal Ottaviani, president of the Theological Commission. When we had read them, when I myself had read the two schemas, I said: “It is very stange that there are two completely different points of view on the same subject, that is religious liberty or the Church’s attitude toward other religions.” Cardinal Bea’s was entitled De libertate religiosa; Cardinal Ottaviani’s – De tolerantia religios. Do you see the difference, the profound difference? What was happening? Why two completely different schemas on the same subject? At that moment, during the meeting, Cardinal Ottaviani stood up and , pointing with his finger, said to Cardinal Bea: “Eminence, you did not have the right to compose this schema, you did not have the right to do it because it is a theological schema and therefore within the competence of the Theological Commission.” And as Cardinal Bea stood up he said: “Excuse me, but I did have the right to compose this schema as president of the commission on Unity; if anything concerns unity, certainly religious liberty does.” He added, turning to Cardinal Ottaviani, “I radically oppose what you say in your schema De tolerantia religiosa”… It was the final session of the central commission, and we could clearly perceive, on the eve of the council, displayed in fron of us, the whole battle that would take place during the council. This means that these things had already been prepared before the council. Cardinal Bea certainly did not compose his schema De libertate religiosa without having reached an agreement with other cardinals."

To get around the doctrinal obstacles, the secretariat proposed a new “para-diplomatic” way of expressing the faith, which consisted of couching dogmatic topics in contemporary terms without addressing them from a dogmatic perspective, but rather leaving them vague in the name of the primacy of the pastoral approach.

The Secretary for Promoting Christian Unity expanded his role, moreover, through the influence that he exerted on the “mixed commissions.” Most of these commissions in fact duplicated the curial dicasteries and were composed of bishops who were faithful to Rome. While the Theological Commission rejected all interference by Bea’s secretariat in the composition of the schemas, other commissions agreed to form “mixed commissions” with the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity, for instance the Commission for the Discipline of the Sacraments. The best Collaboration Occurred with the Liturgical Commission, whose secretary was Father Annibale Bugnini. Bea’s secretariat asked, in February 1961, for “the widest possible use of the vernacular.” In

April Bea himself intervened: “We must strongly oppose the idea that [liturgical] Latin is a sign of unity. It is more a sign of uniformity than a sign of unity.”

On October 22, eleven days after the opening of the council, John XXIII elevated the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unit to the rank of a commission. This new status gave the organization the right to present schemas to the General Assembly and to correct them. Its role would be decisive.

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So for those of you keeping score of what the current Prefect for Promoting Christian Unity, Cardinal Kasper, is doing currently with the marriage issue, let not your hearts be troubled, that position is a pile of rubbish and always has been… lol… we are doomed!... no but seriously LOL!

Calling for a mutual non aggression pact

As much as progressives/liberals drive me mad, I think (and this is my own opinion) that the greatest damage is actually done by those that call themselves Conservatives.  GK Chesterton once stated:

"The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected. Even when the revolutionist might himself repent of his revolution, the traditionalist is already defending it as part of his tradition. Thus we have two great types--the advanced person who rushes us into ruin, and the retrospective person who admires the ruins. He admires them especially by moonlight, not to say moonshine."

We all know the madness that progressives wish to thrust upon us and can clearly point out the inherent problems with their thinking.  Yet too many are so willing to let the so called conservatives get away with taking a stance that is untrue and even damaging to the well being of others.  The greatest attestation to progressives that we can give is that they are very much against the truth.  Yet the conservatives who seemingly play on the right side of things are more than willing to forego their stated "principles" in favor of compromise.  Such people are neither hot or cold like their counterparts in progressive movement, but are lukewarm opting for a mutual non-aggression pact so as not to create tension.  And don't think this is limited to the secular world.  Take for instance the vice presidential debate from the 2012 elections where Joe Biden was called out for his visual support of abortionists.  Left untouched by the so called orthodox Catholic Media was how Congressman Paul Ryan was more than willing to compromise his "stated position" as being fully pro-life so as not to cause a notable difference between himself and Mitt Romney during the presidential run.  I can think of no one that called him out for being lukewarm on this matter, for seeking compromise with the practitioners of death out of convenience.  In fact the only one I remember saying anything about this was...well Voris...but thats obvious and hes obviously wrong because hes just a reactinary, anti-Vatican II, uncharitable bigot...Right?

But I want to now get into another so called conservative/libertarian that is often credited for being a standard bearer, and controversial at the same time.  Im speaking here of one of my favorite talkers Glenn Beck (and I actually do like his show, but some days he just makes me face palm), who today on his radio show was calling on all people of good will, especially Christians to come together and defend those in the Middle East who are under fire.  I can agree with him here, I too hope that people of good will can come together on this issue specifically and push for peace in the region.  Yet the ends don't justify the means, and in this case the way that he went about calling for this is a means that violates the truth so bad that it creates false groundwork where peace is supposed to be built on.

So what did he say, you might ask that has caused this dumber ox to write up a million word TPS report on the matter?  Simply this: He stated that people need to come together and not act as the early Christians who refused to help each other because they looked at each other as not being Christian and therefore forewent their responsibility to protect each other.  Now fore context sake Mr. Beck is an apostate Catholic, turned remarried Mormon...no gossip here its out there and its freely admitted.  First consider that this statement is being made by a Mormon who believes that the Church went wrong following the death of St. John, and that the Church (both East and West) was the result of Constantine's decree and therefore a man made institution built on worldly power despite the one they professed.  But moving past this, the Church did not look on the others, even the Monophysites (Coptic Orthodox) as being unworthy of help.  Mr. Beck so often will bring up topics like the Crusades or the Inquisition in passing to gin up feelings among non-Catholics to as to make a point.  As compotent as Mr. Beck might be on American ideals and history, he is not competent on Church history including relations among the major Sees, nor is he competent about the crusades or the inquisition.  He is the same on that will condemn the Crusades outright as being evil, while condemning the Earliest Christians for not fighting.  Well which way does he want it?  If he took off his Americanist glasses for but a moment and delved into the early church he would notice that the Roman Pontiff only took the step of allowing the crusade when getting the appeal from the semi-schismatic Greeks (at the time) calling for help.  So too the early church didnt battle for each other because physical violence wasn't necessary.  If his point is that we were not fighting for the rights of Arians, Pelegians or other heretics at the time he misunderstands rights and tolerance.  No one has a right to error, they might hold to it and do so against the very wishes of Christ, but its not inherent that they have a right to do so.  If someone cuts themselves off from the Church and refuses the Churches council, how can you help them?  The answer is that you cant.  Help is freely offered and freely received, if one of those things are violated we have disorder.

My point is that conservatives are just as guilty as progressives in putting forth deceit (known or not).  Truth does not belong to either party and the ends don't justify the means, and the Truth is worth fighting for because it is a person.

+HOLY MOTHER CHURCH IS THE TRUTH BECAUSE SHE IS HIS BODY+    

+JMJ+