1. Everything has one cause or one primary cause (“VCII is the font of all evils in the modern world”).*2. The fallacy of “Post hoc ergo propter hoc” (Latin: ‘after this, therefore because of this’), or “Since event Y followed event X, event Y must have been caused by event X.”
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
What he is expressing here is worthless reactionary slop. I can spot it a mile away. I’ve been following it and critiquing it as serious error for over 25 years. I don’t need to know someone closely to know whether or not they are spewing error. It’s precisely the sort of language he is using that is causing no end of problems in the Church right now. People are losing faith because they see Catholics engaging in mindless “masochism”: bashing their own Church with false and heretical notions. His is textbook / playbook reactionary thought. It hasn’t changed at all since 2002, when I wrote my first book about it. I could quote lengthy sections from that book that interact with exactly the opinions he is expressing now. They’re nothing new.
*
So is, alas, the Bible. There is no heretical group in the world (falsely claiming to be Christian) that doesn’t claim to derive its false doctrines from the Bible itself. I know. One of my first huge apologetics projects back in the early 80s was to undertake massive research on the Jehovah’s Witnesses. So do we ditch the Bible because folks with confused, troubled thinking, “get” their heretical ideas “from” it? Did the Bible actually cause that? By analogy, that’s how you are reasoning.
American Catholicism has barely held its own. But the revival of Catholic apologetics and evangelism and the spate of recent converts (I’m one of those) is a very real phenomenon, of the nature of a minor revival. Again, our problems (like those of Catholics around the world in first-world countries) have nothing to do with Vatican II at all. Yet here you are bashing it as the supposed primary cause. You have thrown away your brain, which is a great shame.
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
Has faith grown or decreased in the last 60 years? [60 years ago = 1962]
CV II has essentially embraced a view dangerously close to liberalism. [classic, quintessential reactionary slop; textbook, playbook]*the growth of Catholicism in some areas of the world has been largely due to an apologetics neglected by CV II. / American Catholicism has grown, despite CV II. [i.e., when the Church thrives, it’s despite VCII, not because of it.]*Why are we increasingly seeing a secular society without faith? [again implying that VCII is the sole or primary cause; never mentioning any other possible reason]
Post-conciliation Catholicism is a total failure. [God’s Church can never totally fail, and this is dogma, as I pointed out. To claim that it can is no different from the revolutionary mentality of Luther and Calvin]
*
*
The fact remains that people in these traditionally Catholic countries like Spain, Portugal, Latin America, and Brazil have decided en masse to reject Catholicism. Even if Vatican II were to blame for that (which I vehemently deny), it doesn’t get all these people who rejected the faith off the hook. It was their personal choice to worship sex and/or secularism and/or Marxism and/or pleasure. They will stand alone before God, and God won’t accept their excuses.
*
I’ll guarantee (as an apologist and social observer and critic these past 40 years) that if we went out and asked any individual who has left Catholicism in Brazil, why they did so, it would not be because of VCII’s position on religious liberty. It would be because of various and sundry lies about the Church that they have accepted, and their own ignorance and lack of catechetical formation. That is the fault of themselves and whatever Catholic teachers they have had: who failed in their task.
*
Again, the problem here isn’t the teaching of Vatican II. It’s all for evangelization. In Lumen Gentium, we find the following:
As the Son was sent by the Father, so He too sent the Apostles, saying: “Go, therefore, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And behold I am with you all days even to the consummation of the world”. The Church has received this solemn mandate of Christ to proclaim the saving truth from the apostles and must carry it out to the very ends of the earth. Wherefore she makes the words of the Apostle her own: “Woe to me, if I do not preach the Gospel”, and continues unceasingly to send heralds of the Gospel until such time as the infant churches are fully established and can themselves continue the work of evangelizing. For the Church is compelled by the Holy Spirit to do her part that God’s plan may be fully realized, whereby He has constituted Christ as the source of salvation for the whole world. . . . The obligation of spreading the faith is imposed on every disciple of Christ, according to his state. (II, 17; my bolding and italics)*
[T]he laity go forth as powerful proclaimers of a faith in things to be hoped for, when they courageously join to their profession of faith a life springing from faith. This evangelization, that is, this announcing of Christ by a living testimony as well as by the spoken word, takes on a specific quality and a special force in that it is carried out in the ordinary surroundings of the world. . . . the laity can and must perform a work of great value for the evangelization of the world. For even if some of them have to fulfill their religious duties on their own, when there are no sacred ministers or in times of persecution; and even if many of them devote all their energies to apostolic work; still it remains for each one of them to cooperate in the external spread and the dynamic growth of the Kingdom of Christ in the world. (IV, 35; my bolding and italics)
*
*
It is through the sacraments and the exercise of the virtues that the sacred nature and organic structure of the priestly community is brought into operation. Incorporated in the Church through baptism, the faithful are destined by the baptismal character for the worship of the Christian religion; reborn as sons of God they must confess before men the faith which they have received from God through the Church. They are more perfectly bound to the Church by the sacrament of Confirmation, and the Holy Spirit endows them with special strength so that they are more strictly obliged to spread and defend the faith, both by word and by deed, as true witnesses of Christ. (II, 11; my bolding and italics)
*
905 Lay people also fulfill their prophetic mission by evangelization, “that is, the proclamation of Christ by word and the testimony of life.” For lay people, “this evangelization . . . acquires a specific property and peculiar efficacy because it is accomplished in the ordinary circumstances of the world.”
*
*
*
You have chosen to think like a liberal dissident and a Protestant, and I am worlds apart from either view. I rejected social and political liberalism for good in 1982 and the errors of Protestantism in 1990. I always utterly despised theological liberalism, going back to my Protestant days. But you seem enthralled with both, so I don’t see how you would benefit from my writings.
I believe all that Holy Mother Church teaches, and that includes Vatican II as the most highly developed manifestation of the Mind of the Church. I’m a Catholic because a Catholic friend of mine, back when I was Protestant, blocking abortion clinic doors and getting arrested for it, took seriously its advice to share the faith in ways that people can understand. He talked to me about the Catholic faith for nine months (the first thing I changed my mind on was contraception), and then I gave up my groundless objections and joyfully embraced the fullness of the faith (shocking all who had observed me fighting so zealously for evangelical Protestantism).
*
*
*
*
All of these additional comments (which I did read, but will not further respond to, except in this statement) add up — in sum — to one thing: you are blaming Vatican II for the perverted interpretation of it promulgated by theological liberals. You’re “throwing out the baby with the bathwater”, as the saying goes.
You have the council itself confused with innumerable liberal falsehoods and lies. That is your fundamental error, and the devil rejoices over it. I can and do heartily agree with almost all of your social criticisms. But I profoundly disagree that Vatican II brought about this state of affairs. We don’t disagree on the secular results and the tragedy of the loss of faith in societies, institutions, and individuals. We totally disagree on the causes.
Vatican II was butchered and distorted, and hardly even read, by these faithless, witless theologically liberal morons — sometimes literally wolves in sheep’s clothing — who invoke it in order to supposedly bolster their damnable errors. What could make the devil more happy than to see zealous Catholics like you and multiple millions out there who now think like you do, bashing Vatican II, when the real target ought to be the liberal dissidents who have tortured and abused and misrepresented the council?
This is identifying with the oppressor. In fighting so hard against the liberals and theologically liberal rotgut, you started thinking like them. In fact, they reject Vatican II because they know (unlike you) that it is thoroughly in line with previous Catholic tradition. That’s precisely why they have to misrepresent it. This is what liars and manipulators of public opinion always do. They take what is accepted and respected and pretend that it is something other than what it actually is. And now you mirror their error and lie.
By (in effect) persuading you to bash what is a perfectly good and proper Catholic council, their victory over you is complete. Now they have you working for them within the Church — causing all kinds of havoc and division — , as a useful idiot. This is the most insidious aspect of reactionary dissidence.
I have tried my best to get you to see this, but so far you don’t. Well, then, maybe some others who are reading this will see how dangerous and destructive your error is. They can’t unread what I have written, if they have read it, and will henceforth be responsible for what they have read. I’m sounding the alarm and issuing the warning: to you and your readers. Take it or leave it. Your choice.
You can lead a life of bitching and pissing and moaning within the Church, about the Church: doing those things that St. Paul roundly condemned over and over (and told us to separate from those who did it), or you can decide to join me and many others in defending Holy Mother Church, including her solemn ecumenical council, Vatican II.
You can continue to think like a dissident liberal or like Luther and Calvin did (rejecting councils), or you can think like a consistent, devout, observant Catholic and cease and desist with this destructive, damnable rhetoric.
I detest and comment upon the problems among Catholics as much as anyone does. You have nothing on me in this respect. But I don’t attack Holy Mother Church herself. Theological liberalism and pick-and-choose dissidence is the problem, not Vatican II. Read my 12-part defense of the council over against a rabid reactionary critic of it: which would — what a novelty! — actually bring about a real dialogue about the council.
***
Practical Matters: Perhaps some of my 4,000+ free online articles (the most comprehensive “one-stop” Catholic apologetics site) or fifty books have helped you (by God’s grace) to decide to become Catholic or to return to the Church, or better understand some doctrines and why we believe them.
Or you may believe my work is worthy to support for the purpose of apologetics and evangelism in general. If so, please seriously consider a much-needed financial contribution. I’m always in need of more funds: especially monthly support. “The laborer is worthy of his wages” (1 Tim 5:18, NKJV). 1 December 2021 was my 20th anniversary as a full-time Catholic apologist, and February 2022 marked the 25th anniversary of my blog.
PayPal donations are the easiest: just send to my email address: [email protected]. You’ll see the term “Catholic Used Book Service”, which is my old side-business. To learn about the different methods of contributing, including 100% tax deduction, etc., see my page: About Catholic Apologist Dave Armstrong / Donation Information. Thanks a million from the bottom of my heart!
***
Summary: Brazilian Catholic writer Oliveira Leonardo has decided to start bashing and trashing Vatican II. I defend it and note that his oppositional zeal is utterly misplaced.