Vatican II at Sixty: A Kinder, Gentler Catholic Church, or one Bolder and more Ambitious?

Sixty years ago this week, on October 11, 1962, the Bishops of the Catholic Church gathered in Rome for a solemn ceremony to open what is known as Vatican II. Over four formal sessions during consecutive falls, they would discuss doctrine, and dialogue about how the Global Catholic Church should move forward. It was the most important gathering of the Holy See in half a millennium. What came out of it were sixteen documents that have had a tremendous effect on Catholicism; that Catholics would hear the mass in their own languages instead of only Latin, that there would be a new relationship fostered with non-Catholic religions, and a focus on religious freedom which “recognized that the altar-and-throne alliances of the past were not possible under modern political conditions.” Some critics though say Vatican II was prompted by an antiquated Church body responding to a broader culture moving forward through the sexual revolution, feminism, civil rights, and a whole host of other post-modern philosophies skeptical of tradition. Sorting it all out is Vaticanista George Weigel. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, Weigel, a Distinguished Senior Fellow of Washington’s Ethics and Public Policy Center and the author of several books on the Catholic Church including his biographies on Pope John Paul II, talks about his new book, “To Sanctify the World: The Legacy of Vatican II.” He expands on its historical context and what’s more, the intrigue behind the scenes of why this unexpected meeting was called by the most unexpected of Popes to do so, Pope John XXIII, who would not live to see its conclusion in 1965.