Reforming the Catholic Church with Vatican II

Witness History

BBC

History, Personal Journals, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 7 February 2023

⏱️ 9 minutes

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Summary

In January 1959, Pope John XXIII announced a council of all the world's Catholic bishops and cardinals in Rome. It led to sweeping reforms, including allowing Mass to be said in languages other than Latin and an attempt to build relationships with other denominations and faiths. But not everyone was happy with the changes. Monsignor John Strynkowski was a student priest in Rome at the time and told Rebecca Kesby about the excitement and controversy surrounding the council that became known as Vatican II. This programme was first broadcast in 2019. (Photo: Pope John XXIII. Credit: Getty Images)

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the witness history podcast from the BBC World Service.
0:09.6	Today we're taking you back to 1951, when Pope John XXIII made a decision that would
0:15.0	radically change the Catholic Church.
0:17.3	He said he wanted to call all the world's Roman Catholic bishops and cardinals to a council
0:23.0	to discuss the future of the faith.
0:25.2	It became known as Vatican II.
0:27.8	In 2019, Rebecca Kesby spoke to Monsignor John Strinkowski, a priest who witnessed the
0:33.8	historic occasion.
0:35.4	Rome, where this week, there opens the Vatican Council, the largest and perhaps the most
0:40.6	important of any of the conferences in the whole 2,000 years of the history of the Roman
0:45.1	Catholic Church.
0:46.1	Vatican II is probably the most important religious event of the 20th century.
0:51.6	It was absolutely revolutionary, no question about that.
0:54.1	Monsignor John Strinkowski was a student of theology in Brooklyn, New York.
0:59.2	When Pope John XXIII made the somewhat surprise announcement, just a couple of months after
1:04.8	he was elected, it had been nearly a century since the last ecumenical council.
1:09.6	Well, I was hearing in the United States at that time, I was a seminarian studying philosophy,
1:14.2	and of course it shook us all up because there was never an expectation that there would
1:18.1	be a council.
1:19.1	An ecumenical council is a rare occurrence in the church.
1:22.3	The reasons called Vatican is because of its location.
1:25.3	The first Vatican Council took place in 1870.
	...

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