Kneeling Before the World, 60 Years On
As the crisis in the Church continues to deepen and metastasize, faithful Catholics, by their confirmation, are called to remain steadfast in the faith of their fathers.
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What then do we see around us? In large sectors of
both clergy and laity (but it is the clergy who set the example), hardly is the
word “world” pronounced when a gleam of ecstasy lights up the face of one and
all. And immediately what is talked about are the necessary epanouissements
(blossomings of dear human nature) and the necessary engagements (commitments),
as well as the communitarian fervors, and the presences, the ouvertures
(openings to the dear world), and their joys. Anything that would risk calling
to mind the idea of asceticism, mortification, or penance is automatically
shelved as a matter of course…
Accordingly, at least in practice and in their way of acting, and even—for
those who are boldest and most determined to go the whole way—in doctrine and
in their way of thinking (of thinking about the world and their own religion),
the great concern and the only thing that matters for them is the temporal
vocation of the human race, with its march, embattled but victorious, to
justice, peace, and happiness…they make of these earthly goals the truly
supreme end for humanity.
One might think the long quotation above to have come from some “tradCath” corner of the internet, complaining uncharitably about some statement from the hierarchy. Maybe they are upset at an Italian bishop extolling the virtues of John Lennon’s “Imagine” and lauding the idea that “there is no Heaven.” Or maybe they are American Catholics and are up in arms about an American bishop extolling the virtues of a mosque? Or two cardinals thanking Fr. James Martin for his work in normalizing homosexuality? Or perhaps they are simply “backwardists,” who still haven’t learned that equality and social justice are more importantthan chastity and other old-fashioned ideas? Or maybe he was exasperated at another papal visit designed to commemorate the martyrs of one of the contemporary Church’s most cherished doctrines—that of mass migration?
But no, my friends, our author unfortunately—or fortunately—shuffled off this mortal coil long before I wrote this essay. In fact, our author is not a “trad” at all; rather, he was one of the intellectual architects of Vatican II: Thomist philosopher and writer Jacques Maritain. Maritain did as much as any figure to urge the Church to embrace “modernity,” actively urging the Church abandon its longstanding teaching that the state must uphold the true religion and instead embrace modern religious liberty and liberal democracy. Maritain was one of the prime movers behind the United Nations Declaration on Universal Human Rights, issued as a response to the horrors of World War II.
Maritain was also one of those who firmly believed, as his fellow countryman Lamennais had a century before, that only if the Church ceased to insist on the social privileges it had acquired over the course of centuries when it dominated European life could it reach the heart of “modern man” and finally win the approval of that mythical beast. He was harshly critical of many aspects of the Church in the 19th and early 20th centuries and, therefore, enthusiastically welcomed the Second Vatican Council as a monumental step in that direction, an enthusiasm he never abandoned.
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By 1966, however, Maritain had become alarmed at what actually transpired as a result of the council and took up his pen to denounce it in his book of that year, The Peasant of the Garonne. The passages excerpted above are drawn from a section in that book titled “Kneeling Before the World,” in which Maritain excoriates a tendency which every devout Catholic born since that time has encountered, above all in the hierarchy: a worldliness that sets aside every difficult, demanding, or out-of-step-with-the-times doctrine the Catholic Church has held and practiced in the past—seeking, instead, to adapt to contemporary mores.
1966 was the year of the Dutch Catechism, which made the first steps toward undermining the Church’s teaching by adapting it to modern mores. (Paul VI’s “Credo of the People of God” was partly a response to the Dutch Catechism, which Maritain initially drafted.) In fact, a number of catechisms appeared that year which softened or downplayed her teaching on a number of key doctrines. The interim liturgical reforms introduced in 1964 were already causing confusion and chaos, as national episcopal conferences introduced vernacular and other changes into the liturgy—in anticipation of further changes to come. Two years later, Humanae Vitae and its fallout capped what seemed to be an institutional nervous breakdown in the Church.
Maritain, despite reaffirming his critique of the Church in the early 20th century, drew criticisms from all sides. He never again addressed the contemporary situation in the Church, instead publishing theological works and spending the last three years of his life in prayer and contemplation in a monastery. (Paul VI offered to make him a cardinal, but he refused.)
I sometimes wonder what Maritain would make of the Church today. What would he have made of Pope Francis or his still-prefect for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Fernández? Would he see in their efforts the continuation of his legacy or that of Vatican II? It is hard to believe he would.
