Stop Blaming Vatican II

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Personally, I think that the Holy Spirit is speaking loudest to those who criticize/blame Vatican II. Maybe instead of criticism/blame, approach it thinking, what does God want me to learn by reading these documents? But who has ears to hear?
 
Vatican II fruits need to be addressed by Church Leaders and the Holy See. It definitely produced a number of bad ones, as pointed out many times by serious people.

However, blaming it for every problem in the Church doesn’t make sense. There was no Vatican II when arianism and other christological heresies showed up. There was no Vatican II when the protestant revolution happened. And and there was no Vatican II when Vatican II happened (this means, there was a problem inside the Church that allowed V II to be approved).
 
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MarkRome said:
Personally, I think that the Holy Spirit is speaking loudest to those who criticize/blame Vatican II.
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So you believe the bishops who were there and wrote and overwhelmingly approved the documents didn’t hear the Holy Spirit? Interesting.
 
whatistrue said:
So you believe the bishops who were there and wrote and overwhelmingly approved the documents didn’t hear the Holy Spirit? Interesting.
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I absolutely believe the council was guided by the Holy Spirit. Do you?
 
Where would you have gotten the idea I don’t? But if you believe the Council was guided by the Holy Spirit, then why would you also believe that the Holy Spirit is speaking loudest to those who criticize or blame it? Seems like a disconnect to me.
 
Fasting is still mandated on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, as it was before Vatican II.

Meatless Fridays is not fasting, but abstinence. People still ate fried clams and lobster on Fridays before Vatican II.

I grew up in the Church in the 1950’s and don’t recall mandated fasting outside of Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. If people fasted at other times, it was their own doing, not the Church’s mandate, just as it is today. Vatican II didn’t change anything other than abstinence from meat on Fridays, but Catholics are still suppose to do other acts of sacrifice.
 
MarkRome said:
Well, now because you didn’t answer yes or no.
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That makes no sense. You got the idea before I answered a question that hadn’t even been asked yet because of how I answered… I don’t have enough time left on this earth to waste it discussing things with people who don’t discuss coherently.
 
whatistrue said:
I don’t have enough time left on this earth to waste it discussing things with people who don’t discuss coherently.
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OK. I thought your question was strange that’s why I had to ask. If you don’t want to answer me, that’s fine. It helps frame my response.
 
MarkRome said:
It helps frame my response.
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How does my answer (which is actually pretty clear) have anything to do with your thought process when you seem to accept that the Council was guided by the Holy Spirit and at the same time apparently believe that those who criticize or blame it are also guided by the Holy Spirit? How could anything I say or think have anything to do with such an apparent contradiction?
 
whatistrue said:
How does my answer (which is actually pretty clear)
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If it were clear I wouldn’t have asked.
whatistrue said:
apparently believe that those who criticize or blame it are also guided by the Holy Spirit?
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See, that’s a better question. The answer is in what I wrote. Just because the Holy Spirit is speaking, doesn’t mean that people are listening. He who has an ear let him hear. <— I think you skipped this last part.
 
JimR-OCDS said:
Fasting is still mandated on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, as it was before Vatican II.

I grew up in the Church in the 1950’s and don’t recall mandated fasting outside of Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. If people fasted at other times, it was their own doing, not the Church’s mandate, just as it is today. Vatican II didn’t change anything other than abstinence from meat on Fridays, but Catholics are still suppose to do other acts of sacrifice.
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Fasting was encouraged besides the required days, far more than it is now.
Not the Council itself, but some interpreters, made it sound like fasting and mortifying in general were opposed to renewal, even opposed to Love.

We still get this every lent. The fact that a few people over emphasized mortification 60 years ago “justifies” constant warnings now to generations that never heard of it, as a possible help towards sanctity.
 
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MarkRome said:
Just because the Holy Spirit is speaking, doesn’t mean that people are listening.
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Well, since you said that you believed that the Council “was guided by” the Holy Spirit (implying that the participants listened and followed), that leads me to believe that you believe those criticizing or blaming it are not listening, despite the Holy Spirit speaking loudly. Thanks for that and I am done here.
 
Throughout our salvation history, God has used different means to bring his people back to repentance.

I think VII has been a desert wandering period for the Church.
 
Actually “Vatican II” did not change anything at all about fasting and abstinence.

The universal Norm for the Church remains abstinence on all Fridays of the year.

Back in 1965 the US bishops, completely ‘outside’ of Vatican II, requested an indult ( a dispensation from the norm) so that US Catholics only needed to abstain during Lenten Fridays BUT with the understanding that some sort of penance was still required on the other Fridays that could still be abstinence or could be something else (in case the person happened to be a vegetarian or something).

So again, Vatican II did not change the rules, specific indult requests by bishops changed some without negating the need for penance, and in fact, some countries such as England and Wales about 7 years ago, who had asked for an indult back in the way, asked to have it lifted and returned to ‘the norm’. As could the US bishops. At any time.
 
I believe that the Holy Spirit was present, but I don’t have the ability to say that I know the mind of God or what His plans for the Church are.

I just feel that the decades after VII have not born good fruit. And in those years after the council this spiritual dryness has created another generation of Catholics that are longing for the Traditions of the past.
 
Fasting is still encouraged, no less than before Vatican II, but of course not as much as back in the Middle Ages when people only received Holy Communion a couple of times a year.

Vatican II understood Jesus words better than centuries past

But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners." Matthew 9:13
 
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