Sixty years ago this month, the world stood teetering on the razor’s edge between absolute annihilation and wondrous hope. Fr. Kevin was five years old.
First, the annihilation. On October 14, 1962, a Sun- day, Colonel Steve Heyser, flying a U-2 spyplane over the west coast of Cuba, over a town called San Cris- tobel, took 928 pictures. The pictures would reveal that four mobile Soviet missile launchers, capable of firing the SS-4 medium range nuclear missile, had been placed in western Cuba. Other flights would even- tually locate 42 nuclear missiles at ten sites in Cuba.
Two days later, National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy then woke up President Kennedy to advise him that missiles were in Cuba but were not yet operation- al. Kennedy ordered 17 military, political and diplomat- ic advisers, the ExComm, to assemble at the White House at 11:50 a.m. Two days after that, on October 18, a Thursday, U.S. President Kennedy and Secretary of State Dean Rusk met at the White House with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko and Soviet Ambassa- dor to the U.S. Anatoly Dobrynin. The Russians had some “splainin’” to do. Gromyko told Kennedy that Soviet operations in Cuba were purely defensive, and Kennedy did not tell Gromyko that the U.S. had discov- ered that the Soviets had nuclear missiles in Cuba.
President Kennedy met with the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the next day, Friday October 19th, to discuss the mili- tary options for responding to the missiles in Cuba.
USAF Chief Of Staff General Curtis Lemay advocated bombing of the missile sites in Cuba. It is the closest that the world had ever been to all out, full blown, “Katie bar the door”, thermonuclear holocaust.
Meanwhile, at the Vatican…
…a totally different type of showdown was taking place. Sixty years ago, the Second Vatican Council, Vatican II, opened for business. Three years earlier, at St.
Paul’s Outside the Walls, Pope John XXIII stunned the Church by calling for a council. He was supposed to be a “caretaker” Pope, one who would just smile, keep things the way they are and then die so that someone else could take over. But John, though he loved to smile, had other ideas. He wanted to open the win- dows of the Church and let the fresh air in. He con- vened the council and did things that no other Popes did, he wanted women and laypeople to take part. He wanted Christians from other denominations: Protestant and Eastern Orthodox alike to take part.
You see John was not your typical Pope. It was said that he would actually sneak out of the Vatican at night and wander around the streets of Rome. That is where he got the nickname “Johnny Walker.” So when he said he wanted a council, he meant it. As one bishop said: “this holy old boy doesn’t realize what a hornet’s nest he’s stirring up”.
The powers that be at the Vatican had others ideas. If the Pope wanted a Council, we will give him a council. But we will stack the commissions with our guys, with our ideas. We will meet, shuffle some papers, cele- brate a Mass or two, go home and have business as usual. On the second day of Vatican II, the day’s agenda included the election for members of the ten commissions. They were expected to do most of the work of the Council. The Curia was heavily represent- ed, and they would be confirmed as the majorities on the commissions. Not so fast, boys!! A French Cardi- nal Achille Liénart addressed the Council, saying that the bishops could not intelligently vote for strangers. He asked that the vote be postponed to give all the bishops a chance to draw up their own lists. The vote was postponed. The very first meeting of the Council adjourned after only fifteen minutes. Business would eventually be done, but it definitely would not be “as usual.”
We all know what happened. The Church changed, and changed radically. If a Catholic from the 1930’s were to be plopped down into a parish today, he or she would hardly recognize it. And I for one will go on rec- ord as saying, “GOOD!” Everything changed. How we celebrate at Mass, how we think about prayer, how we think about ourselves, how we think about other faiths, how we approach the poor, how we approach the world. There are some who regret Vatican II, but I would hate to think where we would be without it. I for one probably would not be a priest. The pendulum swings back a little, but the Church is better for what we experience.
The legacy that Pope John left us gives us the where- withal to face the issues of our day with courage and faith. It is ironic that the moment of the greatest crisis in the world was also the moment of the greatest promise of the modern Church. He proclaimed hope when others only saw despair. As he once said: Con- sult not your fears but your hopes and your dreams.
Think not about your frustrations, but about your un- fulfilled potential. Concern yourself not with what you tried and failed in, but with what it is still possible for you to do.
And now today, with a new threat of nuclear war be- tween Russia and the Ukraine, and our Archdiocese doing some radical strategic planning of its own, it is easy to give in to despair.
Until we remember Good Pope John. We celebrate his feast day on Tuesday. St. John XXIII, pray for us.
Father Kevin