In the November 21, 1963 entry in his My Journal of the Council, Yves Congar wrote the following in all caps:
“I SEE THAT THERE IS A PROFOUND AMBIGUITY UNDERLYING THE SAME WORD “ECUMENISM,” BETWEEN THOSE WHO SEE ONLY REUNION WITH THE CHURCH (FAVORED BY CHARITY) AND THOSE WHO SEE SOMETHING QUITE NEW AHEAD OF ALL OF US, THAT CALLS FOR A PROFOUND REFORM.”
Congar counted himself among those in this latter group — he saw the need for profound reform, as he emphasized in the 1967 preface to the revised version of his True and False Reform in the Church:
“As for ecumenism, it has become or is on the way to becoming a dimension that touches the church’s entire life, even its internal concerns. This change of perspective will entail reinterpretation, opening and broadening out our thinking to a degree that we cannot at present measure. But this link between ecumenism and the spirit of renewal, which I perceived and emphasized from the beginning, is equally apparent now from the other side; renewal is not only required by ecumenism as a sort of prelude, but renewal is also nourished by ecumenism.”
Congar’s views went from being censured under Pius XII to being instrumental in the program of radical reform unleashed by John XXIII’s Council. And yet, as Congar noted in his November 21, 1963 journal entry above, many Council Fathers had no idea that ecumenism would entail “profound reform.”
As discussed in other articles, Francis’s opening address of the Synod on Synodality aimed to take the radical reform to the next level:
“Dear brothers and sisters, may this Synod be a true season of the Spirit! . . . Father Congar, of blessed memory, once said: “There is no need to create another Church, but to create a different Church” (True and False Reform in the Church). That is the challenge. “ (Francis, October 9, 2021, Address to Open the Synod)
If our Catholic hierarchy had been populated with holy and faithful bishops, these words would have been all they needed to force the end the Synod on Synodality before it started. As it is, though, we now have three years worth of blasphemous Synodal nonsense carried out (falsely) in the name of the Catholic Church.
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