The Global Church Era · 1962-present · Global
The Post-Vatican-II Parish Tradition
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About This Movement
The Second Vatican Council opened in 1962, and what it changed most was the ordinary Sunday. Sacrosanctum Concilium, the constitution on the liturgy, was promulgated on 4 December 1963; Lumen Gentium on the church followed on 21 November 1964; Dei Verbum and Gaudium et Spes came in 1965; the revised Missal of Paul VI appeared in 1969 and 1970. In parishes this meant Mass in the language people spoke, readers and ministers of communion drawn from the pews, and parish councils. In 1972 the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults restored the ancient catechumenate — a first-century pattern coming back after fifteen centuries. Not everyone welcomed it: Archbishop Lefebvre published a declaration in 1974, and the argument over the older rite is documented in the church's own successive rulings, Ecclesia Dei in 1988, Summorum Pontificum in 2007 and Traditionis Custodes in 2021.
Sources
- The council's own documents: Sacrosanctum Concilium (4 Dec 1963), Lumen Gentium (21 Nov 1964), Dei Verbum and Gaudium et Spes (1965); the Missal of Paul VI (1969/70); the RCIA (1972) (primary) — These are the council's own official texts, published by the Vatican. The RCIA restored the ancient catechumenate pattern for preparing converts.
- The lived-parish record: parish-level oral histories, congregational studies, vernacular-liturgy adoption records, lay-ministry and parish-council records (primary) — This shows the council as it was lived in ordinary parish paperwork. The published sociological studies are the accessible record of it.
- The traditionalist-grief record: Lefebvre's 1974 Declaration; SSPX (1970; 1988 consecrations, excommunications lifted 2009); Summorum Pontificum (2007); Traditionis Custodes (2021) (primary) — This traces both the traditionalist grief and the church's shifting official response, in the church's own dated documents, presented evenhandedly.
- John W. O'Malley, What Happened at Vatican II (Harvard, 2008); Alberigo & Komonchak (eds.), History of Vatican II (5 vols, 1995-2006); Mark Massa, The American Catholic Revolution (OUP, 2010) (secondary)
- CHC vol. 9 (the papacy chapter in Part I) (reference)