The interesting report on Alfredo Cardinal Ottaviani’s presentation to the Central Preparatory Commission of the Second Vatican Council which I posted recently, inspires a closer look, albeit brief, at the great man who would later dare put his pen to what became known as the Ottaviani Intervention. After this biographical interlude I will resume blogging on the Preparatory Reports - and believe me, there is good stuff in there!

Born in 1890, Alfredo Ottaviani grew up in the Trastevere, that impoverished and heavily populated quarter of Rome where our beloved Cardinal Merry del Val formed his Association of the Sacred Heart. Ordained on March 18, 1916, he acquired a Ph.D. in civil and in canon law, and became an official in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. After moving to the Congregation for extraordinary ecclesiastic affairs, and then to the Secretariat of State, where he became a specialist in the relations of Church and state, he finally settled into the Congregation of the Holy Office in 1935. In 1959 under John XXIII he was made Secretary of the Holy Office before it was restyled the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith in 1966. Ottaviani headed the crucial Theological Preparatory Commission before the Council, and lead the Curial conservatives during the Council.

Much more could be said about this great Prince of the Church, and any history of the Council will show you how valiantly he fought from the floor - but I will let him speak for himself in quotes taken from Men Who Make the Council: #9 Alfredo Cardinal Ottaviani.

What does he say about his hero, Pope St. Pius X?

“…with courage he faced the laicist power which today is the most feared and the most redoubtable: opinion, and especially the opinion of those who want to diminish the faith in the name of science…His hand never trembled, even when his heart was heavy and full of pain…”

This is the time to declare that laicist is one of my new favorite words.

“The laicists have thrown themselves against the Christian civilization as they never have thrown themselves against Genghis Khan or the many Tamburlaines…Laicism accuses the Church of the great crime of having a stranglehold on politics. According to laicists, the Church is in politics even when she intervenes in matters which directly or indirectly have to do with mixed matters, partly spiritual and partly temporal, or have some connection with morals. But since politics touches the altar, how can one permit the Church and the altar to be profaned? How can one, for instance, permit a sacrament like marriage to be soiled, profaned by laicists?”

What does he say of his position in respect to new theology?

As far as I am concerned I have, apart from my personal views, the duty to safeguard the deposit of Faith. At the same time I must leave full freedom to progress so that Catholic doctrine might be even better explained and more clearly stated. Let us not forget that all that is new is not by fact true and good, just because it is new. There are ideas today in present day theology which, if not downright erroneous, are at least disputable. It is a completely positive action to defend the deliverances of Sacred Scripture and Tradition, when necessary, to prevent the verities of faith from becoming obscured under the pretext of progress and adaptation.”

What does he say about ecumenism, in 1961?

“As soon as the dogmatic and moral constitutions of the Church are fixed in precise terms by the Council, the Church will be able to say to all her Orthodox and Protestant brethren: ‘Look at the face of the true Church of Christ: whoever wishes to recognize in her the face of the Mother of Saints, the image of the celestial city, may come - the doors of the house of his mother are open.’ Once the truth, upon which truth the Church cannot be equivocal, is recognized, all the sons who come back to her will find this Mother ready with all her gifts in the fields of liturgy, spirituality, humanity.”

And later, after the second session in December 1963, the good Cardinal continues in another interview:

Even though the Council was called for the good of the Church, it will bring fruits for society in general, for the good of society depends on the progress of the Christian life. As you know, we concluded the session by talking about ecumenism. Many Fathers have rightly pointed out that we must not only understand by the expression ‘ecumenism’ the reunion of Protestants and the Church. Ecumenism is something which concerns everybody: the pagans, the believers of other religions, in China, in Africa and so forth…True ecumenism is the care of the Church to bring Christian civilization even to those countries which have their own civilization but which are not yet Christian. Certainly, Christian civilization will help those people to develop and move towards progress…”

What does he say about my own cause, the censorship of books?

As soon as the Church intervenes in order to condemn, the critics get upset, misunderstandings arise and the cry of ’scandal’ goes forth. This has always been the case through all of history. One needs to view matters from a certain distance in order to see clearly the rightness of the Church’s actions. The Index, contrary to general opinion, is not a cavalry for superior spirits dragged to the gallows by priests. To the contrary, it is the Calvary of the Church which is being crucified each time by those who defend errors which the Church cannot help but condemn and which she then does condemn. Errors always seem to find sooner or later a champion who arises to defend them. On the Index of Prohibited Books itself we can find examples of obvious errors often backed by powerful men, sometimes even by governments. When, for instance, the Holy Office put on the Index a manual which was obligatory in all the schools of the Reich and the satellite countries, Joseph Rosenberg’s The Myth of the Twentieth Century, the Church condemned a theory which by now has met with oblivion. But behind Rosenberg there was Hitler, who made the world tremble. The Church remained fearless and strong, a rampart of truth and light.

Finally, I leave you with his unsettling words given in a talk at Lourdes in 1958.

Never before has evil taken such vast and apocalyptic forms. Never before has mankind known such peril. From one hour to the next we may lose not only our lives, but also our civilization and every hope. The present may be lost together with the future. We risk not only the loss of our riches but also the ruin of the very bases of life in society. The atomic bomb could create a desert which is less terrible than that which the reigning doctrine of a society without a God produces; there is a Sahara of the spirit which is worst than the Sahara itself. The new weapons may pulverize us since the new doctrines have already pulverized us!”

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