Wednesday, April 12, 2023

The Acta of the Second Vatican Council: Now Freely Available in Their Entirety

Matthew Hazell

It gives me great joy to announce, nearly eight years since I first started this project and three years after the last update, that all sixty-two volumes of the Acta et Documenta and Acta Synodalia of the Second Vatican Council have now been digitised! This means that the entire primary documentation of Vatican II is now freely accessible to both researchers and the general public, via archive.org.

We currently find ourselves in an era where even the highest authorities in the Church are claiming, for example, that the Council changed our fundamental liturgical theology, that the celebration of Mass versus populum is a sign of the “concrete manifestation of the acceptance of the teaching of the Second Vatican Council”, and even that the current farce that is the “synod on synodality” is “at the heart of the work of renewal the Council was encouraging”. All of this revisionist history would, of course, be very surprising to the Council Fathers, and the Acta makes this abundantly clear. As Archbishop Agostino Marchetto has put it, the Council’s Acta are (or should be) the “secure basis” for its interpretation. Now that this mammoth digitisation project has been finished (Deo gratias!), it is my hope that this neglected body of primary source material will be better utilised by historians, theologians, scholars - indeed, by anyone who is interested in what Vatican II actually said!

I would like to express my deep gratitude to all those people who, over the years, have been very encouraging and generous in their support of this project. Particular mention should go to Rev Fr Damonn Sypher, F.S.S.P. and Mr Roger McCaffrey, who were incredibly helpful during my acquisition of some of the out-of-print volumes of the Acta et Documenta, and Mr Fernando Penachin, whose help with scanning AS III.2, III.4 and III.6 has been absolutely invaluable. Many, many thanks!
Pope John XXIII during the preparation of Vatican II

The Antepreparatory Period of Vatican II (1959-60)

Acta et Documenta Concilio Oecumenico Vaticano II Apparando.
Series I (Antepraeparatoria)

Volumen I: Acta Summi Pontificis Ioannis XXIII
This volume contains all the documents, letters, speeches, etc. given by Pope John XXIII in the antepreparatory period of the Second Vatican Council.

Volumen II: Consilia et vota Episcoporum ac Praelatorum
The eight parts of this volume contain the written submissions and replies (vota) to the letter sent to the bishops and prelates of the world asking what they would like to see discussed at the upcoming Council. Parts 1-3 are for Europe, part 4 for Asia, part 5 for Africa, part 6 for North and Central America, part 7 for South America and Oceania, and part 8 for religious congregations.
Appendix voluminis II: Analyticus conspectus consiliorum et votorum quae ab episcopis et praelatis data sunt
The two parts of this appendix to Volume II provide an analytic overview of the vota. They are distilled into 9,348 brief propositions, organised by subject, with each proposition having one or more diocese/religious order cited in the footnotes.
Volumen III: Proposita et monita SS. Congregationum Curiae Romanae
This volume contains the vota of the various congregations of the Roman Curia.

Volumen IV: Studia et vota Universitatum et Facultatum ecclesiasticarum et catholicarum.
The two parts of this volume contains the vota of the various Catholic faculties and universities around the world. Part 1 (in two tomes) deals with the institutions in Rome, and part 2 contains the vota of the institutions outside of Rome.
Indices
The antepreparatory series ends with this index volume, which includes detailed statistics of the responses and response rates for the worldwide Church.
Pope John XXIII signing the apostolic constitution Humanae salutis (25 Dec 1961), solemnly convoking the Second Vatican Council.

The Preparatory Period of Vatican II (1960-62)

Acta et Documenta Concilio Oecumenico Vaticano II Apparando.
Series II (Praeparatoria)

Volumen I: Acta Summi Pontificis Ioannis XXIII
This volume contains all the documents, letters, speeches, etc. given by Pope John XXIII during the preparatory period of the Second Vatican Council.

Volumen II: Acta Pontificiae Commissionis centralis praeparatoriae Concilii oecumenici Vaticani II
The four parts of this volume contains the acts of the Central Preparatory Commission, which met over seven sessions from June 1961 to June 1962 in order to discuss and refine the schemata that would be put before the Council at its first session.
Volumen III: Acta Commissionum et Secretariatuum praeparatoriorum Concilii oecumenici Vaticani II
The two parts of this volume contain the final drafts of the schemata from the ten Preparatory Commissions and two Secretariats.
Volumen IV: Acta Subcommissionum Commissionis centralis praeparatoriae Concilii oecumenici Vaticani II
The three parts of this volume (part 3 in two tomes) contain the acts of the various subcommissions of the Central Preparatory Commission that also examined the draft schemata before the Council started.
The bishops and prelates of the world at the Council

The Second Vatican Council (1962-65)

Acta Synodalia Sacrosancti Concilii Oecumenici Vaticani II

Volumen I: Periodus prima
The four parts of volume I cover the first session of the Council (October 11 - December 8, 1962).
Volumen II: Periodus secunda
The six parts of volume II cover the second session of the Council (September 29 - December 4, 1963).
Volumen III: Periodus tertia
The eight parts of volume III cover the third session of the Council (September 14 - November 21, 1964).
Volumen IV: Periodus quarta
The seven parts of volume IV cover the fourth and final session of the Council (September 14 - December 8, 1965).
Volumen V: Processus verbales
The three parts of volume V contain the documentation relating to the Central Coordinating Commission of the Council in its various forms.
Volumen VI: Acta Secretariae generalis
The four parts of this volume contain the documentation relating to the General Secretary of the Council, Archbishop Pericle Felici, covering the four sessions of the Council (with some of part 4 also going up to 1967).
Indices
This volume, keyed into Volumes I-IV, contains various indices, the major one being the index of names of bishops and prelates at the Council.

Appendices
Although published as part of the Acta Synodalia, the two parts of the appendix also partly cover the antepreparatory and preparatory periods. The first part mainly contains extra material and documentation found in the archives after the publication of the Acta. The second part is mostly extra indices, to be used in conjunction with the relevant volumes of the Acta.

Posted Wednesday, April 12, 2023

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Wednesday, March 11, 2020

The Acta of the Second Vatican Council: Project Update

Matthew Hazell

For a number of years now, I have been working to digitise the primary documentation of the Second Vatican Council, and thus make it more accessible to both researchers and the general public. Personal and professional circumstances as well as the quantity of material (62 folio volumes!) have meant that this work is progressing more slowly than I would like.

However, a couple of milestones in the project have been reached, notably the completion of the work relating to the antepreparatory and preparatory periods, so I thought I would give NLM readers a complete list of the volumes that have been scanned, as well as those still in progress.

Pope John XXIII during the preparation of Vatican II

The Antepreparatory Period of Vatican II (1959-60)

Acta et Documenta Concilio Oecumenico Vaticano II Apparando.
Series I (Antepraeparatoria)

Volumen I: Acta Summi Pontificis Ioannis XXIII
This volume contains all the documents, letters, speeches, etc. given by Pope John XXIII in the antepreparatory period of the Second Vatican Council.

Volumen II: Consilia et vota Episcoporum ac Praelatorum
The eight parts of this volume contain the written submissions and replies (vota) to the letter sent to the bishops and prelates of the world asking what they would like to see discussed at the upcoming Council. Parts 1-3 are for Europe, part 4 for Asia, part 5 for Africa, part 6 for North and Central America, part 7 for South America and Oceania, and part 8 for religious congregations.
Appendix voluminis II: Analyticus conspectus consiliorum et votorum quae ab episcopis et praelatis data sunt
The two parts of this appendix to Volume II provide an analytic overview of the vota. They are distilled into 9,348 brief propositions, organised by subject, with each proposition having one or more diocese/religious order cited in the footnotes.
Volumen III: Proposita et monita SS. Congregationum Curiae Romanae
This volume contains the vota of the various congregations of the Roman Curia.

Volumen IV: Studia et vota Universitatum et Facultatum ecclesiasticarum et catholicarum.
The two parts of this volume contains the vota of the various Catholic faculties and universities around the world. Part 1 (in two tomes) deals with the institutions in Rome, and part 2 contains the vota of the institutions outside of Rome.
Indices
The antepreparatory series ends with this index volume, which includes detailed statistics of the responses and response rates for the worldwide Church.

Pope John XXIII signing the apostolic constitution Humanae salutis (25 Dec 1961), solemnly convoking the Second Vatican Council.

The Preparatory Period of Vatican II (1960-62)

Acta et Documenta Concilio Oecumenico Vaticano II Apparando.
Series II (Praeparatoria)

Volumen I: Acta Summi Pontificis Ioannis XXIII
This volume contains all the documents, letters, speeches, etc. given by Pope John XXIII during the preparatory period of the Second Vatican Council.

 Volumen II: Acta Pontificiae Commissionis centralis praeparatoriae Concilii oecumenici Vaticani II
The four parts of this volume contains the acts of the Central Preparatory Commission, which met over seven sessions from June 1961 to June 1962 in order to discuss and refine the schemata that would be put before the Council at its first session.
Volumen III: Acta Commissionum et Secretariatuum praeparatoriorum Concilii oecumenici Vaticani II
The two parts of this volume contain the final drafts of the schemata from the ten Preparatory Commissions and two Secretariats.
Volumen IV: Acta Subcommissionum Commissionis centralis praeparatoriae Concilii oecumenici Vaticani II
The three parts of this volume (part 3 in two tomes) contain the acts of the various subcommissions of the Central Preparatory Commission that also examined the draft schemata before the Council started.
The Bishops and Prelates of the world at the Council

The Second Vatican Council (1962-65)

Acta Synodalia Sacrosancti Concilii Oecumenici Vaticani II

Volumen I: Periodus prima
The four parts of volume I cover the first session of the Council (October 11 - December 8, 1962).
Volumen II: Periodus secunda
The six parts of volume II cover the second session of the Council (September 29 - December 4, 1963).
Volumen III: Periodus tertia
The eight parts of volume III cover the third session of the Council (September 14 - November 21, 1964). Parts I, V and VIII have been digitised to date.
Volumen IV: Periodus quarta
The seven parts of volume IV cover the fourth and final session of the Council (September 14 - December 8, 1965). Parts I, II, IV and VII have been digitised to date.
Volumen V: Processus verbales
The three parts of volume V contain the documentation relating to the Central Coordinating Commission of the Council in its various forms. These parts currently await digitisation.
  • Pars I: Consilium praesidentiae (1962). Secretariatus de Conc. negotiis extra ordinem (1962). Commissio de Conc. laboribus coordinandis (Sessiones I-VII: 21 ianuarii - 23 octobris 1963)
  • Pars II: Commissio de Concilii laboribus coordinandis (Sessiones VIII-XVII: 29 octobris 1963 - 7 octobris 1964)
  • Pars III: Commissio de Concilii laboribus coordinandis (Sessiones XVIII-XXIII: 15 octobris 1964 - 1 decembris 1965). Moderatores (30 octobris 1963 - 26 octobris 1965)
Volumen VI: Acta Secretariae generalis
The four parts of this volume contain the documentation relating to the General Secretary of the Council, Archbishop Pericle Felici, covering the four sessions of the Council (with some of part 4 also going up to 1967). These parts currently await digitisation.
  • Pars I: Periodus prima : MCMLXII
  • Pars II: Periodus secunda : MCMLXIII
  • Pars III: Periodus tertia : MCMLXIV
  • Pars IV: Periodus quarta : MCMLXV
Indices
This volume, keyed into Volumes I-IV, contains various indices, the major one being the index of names of bishops and prelates at the Council. Currently awaiting digitisation.

Appendices
Although published as part of the Acta Synodalia, the two parts of the appendix also partly cover the antepreparatory and preparatory periods. The first part mainly contains extra material and documentation found in the archives after the publication of the Acta. The second part is mostly extra indices, to be used in conjunction with the relevant volumes of the Acta.
* * * * *
If some NLM readers are waiting on the material for the latter half of the Council in particular, please be assured that this project continues, and I would like it to be finished by the time the 60th anniversary of the opening of Vatican II arrives. However, I cannot say with any certainty when particular books will be digitised!

Posted Wednesday, March 11, 2020

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Friday, August 04, 2017

The Second Vatican Council and the Lectionary—Part 2: The Preparatory Period (1960-1962)

Matthew Hazell

Note: This is the second part of a three-part series. Part one, on the antepreparatory period, can be found here, and part three will look at the first and second sessions of the Council itself (1962-1963).

On June 5, 1960 (Pentecost Sunday), Pope John XXIII issued the motu proprio Superno Dei nutu, which closed the antepreparatory period and initiated the preparatory period of the Second Vatican Council. The day afterwards, June 6, he established the preparatory Commission on the Liturgy, one of ten commissions and two secretariats under the umbrella of the Central Preparatory Commission (hereafter CPC). Gaetano Cardinal Cicognani was named President of the Liturgy Commission (after his death in February 1962, Arcadio Cardinal Larraona would succeed him), with Fr Annibale Bugnini named as Secretary. [1] The Commission began its work in November 1960, with the draft schema on the liturgy being mostly completed by January 1962.

The discussions of the CPC on all the draft schemata can be found in Volume II of the praeparatoria volumes of the Acta et Documenta Concilio Oecumenico Vaticano II Apparando, some of which have been made freely available here at NLM. [2] The texts of all the draft schemata can be found in Volume III of the same series. [3] Meetings of the Liturgy Commission were held in November 1960, April 1961 and January 1962, with the draft liturgy schema being discussed by the CPC in its fifth meeting (26th March - 3 April 1962). [4]

Pope John XXIII signing the apostolic constitution Humanae salutis (25 Dec 1961), solemnly convoking the Second Vatican Council.
The question of lectionary reform in the draft schema was the responsibility of the second subcommission (De Missa) of the preparatory Commission on the Liturgy. Josef Jungmann, S.J., was the relator (i.e. the one who reported back to the Liturgy Commission), with Theodor Schnitzler as secretary, and the following as consultors: Henri Jenny, Antoine Chavasse, Pietro Borella, Pierre-Marie Gy, O.P., Heinrich Kahlefeld, C.O., and Vincent Kennedy, C.S.B. It should perhaps be noted that, while Bugnini is at pains in his memoir to declare that “every part of the world in which the liturgical movement was active and prospering had to be represented on the commission, and this in a real and not a fictitious way” [5], the De Missa subcommission was very Eurocentric and heavily skewed towards German and French speakers. For the lectionary, this is quite important, as the majority of the (quite radical) proposals for reform in this area had been coming from German-speaking scholars throughout the 1950s. [6]

What is said about the lectionary in these draft schemata? Let us compare paragraph 46 of the first draft schema (discussed in April 1961) with what would become paragraph 51 of Sacrosanctum Concilium:
46. Ut Fidelibus cum Mensa eucharistica etiam Mensa verbi Dei paretur et praedicatoribus maior copia Sacrae Scripturae praesto sit, thesauri biblici largius aperiantur, ita ut decursu quattuor circiter annorum maior et praestantior pars Scripturarum Sanctarum populo praelegatur. [7]
[46. In order that richer fare may be provided for the faithful at the table of God's word together with the eucharistic table and, to preachers, a greater abundance of Sacred Scripture may be before them, the treasures of the bible are to be opened up more lavishly, so that a greater and more representative portion of the holy scriptures will be read before the people through about four years.]
51. Quo ditior mensa verbi Dei paretur fidelibus, thesauri biblici largius aperiantur, ita ut, intra praestitutum annorum spatium, praestantior pars Scripturarum Sanctarum populo legatur. 
[51. The treasures of the bible are to be opened up more lavishly, so that richer fare may be provided for the faithful at the table of God's word. In this way a more representative portion of the holy scriptures will be read to the people in the course of a prescribed number of years.]
A number of things are obvious. The paragraph in the first draft is longer and more detailed; part of the rationale for lectionary reform is to benefit preachers by giving them more material to preach on. The later conciliar text praestantior pars is ambiguous, as the various vernacular translations of this phrase demonstrate; it can be translated as referring to the quantity of texts (as per the Italian la maggior parte), or the quality of texts (as per the German die wichtigsten Parte). [8] However, the first draft has both the quantity and quality in mind. Lastly, with regard to the quantity, it is noteworthy that a four year cycle of readings is explicitly mentioned in this draft. Indeed, in his capacity as relator, Jungmann did submit an example of such a cycle (designed by Kahlefeld) to the preparatory Liturgy Commission:

Preparatory Commission on the Liturgy, Subcommission II: Proposed Order of Readings (PDF)

Kahlefeld’s proposal is made up of four columns, corresponding to the readings proposed for Sundays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays. This arrangement would be Year A. The four year cycle works by changing the days of the columns, so in Year B, the second column becomes the Sunday column and the first column becomes the Saturday column, and so forth. The majority of the Missale Romanum Gospel pericopes are kept in their places in Year A, (though many of the Epistle readings have been changed), and the proposal for weekday readings on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays is consonant with earlier, pre-Tridentine Roman liturgical books.

By August 1961, the draft text of paragraph 46 had been slimmed down somewhat to the following:
46. Ut Fidelibus cum Mensa eucharistica etiam mensa verbi Dei ditior paretur, thesauri biblici largius aperiantur, ita ut decursu plurium annorum, praestantior pars Scripturarum Sanctarum populo praeleguntur.
[In order that a richer fare may be provided for the faithful at the table of God’s word together with the eucharistic table, the treasures of the bible are to be opened up more lavishly, so that a more representative part of the sacred Scriptures will be read before the people through the running of more years.]
Notwithstanding a couple of transpositions of words, this would be the form in which this paragraph (later numbered 38 as a result of significant alterations in the first chapter of the draft schema) would be presented to the CPC. The text et praedicatoribus maior copia Sacrae Scripturae praesto sit has been deleted, as has the word maior before praestantior (thereby introducing the previously mentioned ambiguity). Perhaps most notably, though, is that a specific number of annorum is no longer mentioned in the schema. The majority vote of the preparatory Commission on the Liturgy was that the precise number of years was something that should be considered either by the Council itself or by the post-Conciliar commission that would inevitably be set up afterwards in order to carry out liturgical reform (though the majority of members favoured a three or four year cycle). [9] This did not prevent the Liturgy Commission from making its own suggestions to the CPC anyway, as Cardinal Larraona did in his relatio at its fifth meeting:
a) In Proprio de tempore, retento hodierno duarum lectionum numero, id est, epistola et evangelium: 1) novae lectiones pro feriis infra hebdomadam, pro tribus feriis, ad minus, ponantur; 2) hae lectiones in dominica resumerentur sequentibus annis; 3) hoc pacto haberetur systema lectionum pro tribus annis; in hoc sensu schemata iam fuerunt publicata.
b) In Communi Sanctorum: in unoquoque Communi addantur lectiones pro quinque, sex vel septem diebus, ita modo ut lectiones de Communi ne repetantur intra unum vel duos menses. [10] 
[a) In the Proper of Time, today’s number of two readings is to be retained, that is, epistle and gospel: 1) new readings for ferias during the week, may be established; 2) these readings may be resumed on Sundays in following years; 3) in this manner, a system of readings for three years may be kept; a draft has already been published with this sense.
b) In the Common of Saints: in each of the Commons may be added readings for five, six or seven days, thus meaning that readings from the Commons are not repeated within one or two months.]
The broad brush strokes of Larraona’s proposals are very similar to that of Kahlefeld above. He does, however, go against the majority of the preparatory Liturgy Commission in appearing to rule out adding a third reading from the Old Testament on Sundays. [11]

Finally, what did the CPC have to say about the proposals vis-à-vis the lectionary? In actual fact, not a huge amount. Francis Cardinal Spellman said that, in his view, the principle of amplifying the readings of the lectionary was impossible to argue with [12], and Julius Cardinal Döpfner called the same principle “necessary” [13], whereas André-Damien-Ferdinand Cardinal Jullien was concerned that the celebration of Mass not be made longer under false historical pretexts, because temporis praesentis condiciones omnino requirunt caeremoniarum brevitatem [14]. Given this lack of comment, and that no more changes were made to the paragraph, it appears that the CPC had little issue with the principles in it - even though, as we have seen above, those principles could be (and had already been) applied in a number of different ways.

In the final part of this series, we will examine the first and second sessions of Vatican II, and what the Council Fathers had to say about the text of what would ultimately become Sacrosanctum Concilium 51.

Notes

[1] Bugnini’s account of the meetings of the preparatory commission on the liturgy can be found in chapter 2 (PDF) of his book The Reform of the Liturgy 1948-1975 (Liturgical Press, 1990), pp. 14-28.

[2] The praeparatoria volumes of the Acta et Documenta will be referred to in this article by the abbreviation ADP.

[3] The text of the draft schema on the liturgy can be found in ADP III.2, pp. 7-68. Another vital resource for the study of the preparatory Commission on the Liturgy is Angelo Lameri, La « Pontificia Commissio de sacra liturgia praeparatoria Concilii Vaticani II ». Documenti, Testi, Verbali (Rome: Centro Liturgico Vincenziano, 2013). In this book, Lameri reproduces the minutes of the various subcommissions which drafted the different sections of the liturgy schema, and also parallels the three different versions of the draft schema.

[4] Cf. ADP II.3, pp. 26-144 (chapters 1-2), 275-368 (chapters 3-5), 460-492 (chapters 6-8). Other relevant material includes the relatio given by Cardinal Cicognani at the first meeting (12-20 June 1961) of the CPC, updating it on the work done by the liturgy commission up to that point (cf. ADP II.1, pp. 144-147), and the discussion on the use of vernacular languages in the liturgy at the third meeting (15-23 Jan 1962) of the CPC (cf. ADP II.2, pp. 248-258).

[5] Cf. Bugnini, The Reform of the Liturgy, pp. 14-15.

[6] E.g. Heinz Schürmann, “Eine Dreijährige Perikopenordnung für Sonn- und Festtage”, Liturgisches Jahrbuch 2 (1952), 58-72; Heinrich Kahlefeld, “Ordo Lectionum Missae”, Liturgisches Jahrbuch 3 (1953), 54-59, 301-309. (My English translation of Schürmann’s article can be found here.)

[7] Cf. Lameri, La « Pontificia Commissio de sacra liturgia praeparatoria Concilii Vaticani II », p. 232. The English translation of paragraph 46 of the draft is mine; I have tried to stay as close as possible to the Vatican’s English translation of SC 51 in order to make comparisons easier.

[8] Cf. Michael Magee, “The Reform of the Lectionary of the Roman Missal: Evaluations and Prospects”, in Joseph Briody (ed.), Verbum Domini: Liturgy and Scripture. Proceedings of the Ninth Fota International Liturgical Conference, 2016 (Smenos Publications, 2017), pp. 243-244. On this subject, see also Gregory DiPippo’s NLM article Sacrosanctum Concilium and the New Lectionary (11 December 2013).

[9] Cf. Lameri, La « Pontificia Commissio de sacra liturgia praeparatoria Concilii Vaticani II », pp. 107-108.

[10] Cf. ADP II.3, p. 114.

[11] P.-M. Gy, for example, appeared very keen on adding an OT reading (cf. Lameri, La « Pontificia Commissio de sacra liturgia praeparatoria Concilii Vaticani II », p. 107), and when H. Jenny asked about it at the January 1962 meeting of the preparatory Liturgy Commission, Bugnini replied “si parli in modo generico, lasciando alla Commissione postconciliare [speak in a generic way, leave it to the post-conciliar Commission]” (Lameri, ibid, p. 448). Cardinal Larraona’s words retento hodierno duarum lectionum numero are not exactly generic!

[12] Cf. ADP II.3, p. 117.

[13] Cf. ADP II.3, p. 123.

[14] Cf. ADP II.3, pp. 139-140.

Posted Friday, August 04, 2017

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Friday, July 14, 2017

The Antepreparatory and Preparatory Documents of Vatican II (1959-1962)

Matthew Hazell

Some time ago, I started on a project to make the primary sources of the Second Vatican Council more accessible to the general public. The Acta Synodalia of both the first session and second session of Vatican II have already been made available electronically on NLM, and I am working (albeit slowly!) on the third and fourth sessions.

However, I can now also present scans of some of the other very interesting material of the Council: the Acta et Documenta Concilio Oecumenico Vaticano II Apparando. These volumes, documenting all the discussions and work done leading up to Vatican II, have long been out of print, and provide a major part of the background necessary for a proper understanding of the Council.

The Acta et Documenta is split into two series: the Antepraeparatoria, covering the pre-preparatory work done in 1959 and 1960 (including the individual responses of the worldwide episcopate to the question of what to discuss at the Council), and the Praeparatoria, which deal with the work of the Central Preparatory Commission and the related commissions between 1960 and 1962. Unfortunately, due to the scarcity of the volumes not all of them are available here, but I do hope to rectify this eventually.

Pope John XXIII during the preparation of Vatican Council II

Antepreparatory Period (May 1959 - November 1960)
Acta et Documenta Concilio Oecumenico Vaticano II Apparando. Series I (Antepraeparatoria)

Volumen I: Acta Summi Pontificis Ioannis XXIII (1960)

This volume contains all the documents, letters, speeches, etc. given by Pope John XXIII in the antepreparatory period of the Second Vatican Council. It is perhaps worth noting that, at the time, this was the only antepreparatory volume made available to the public; all others were sub secreto for the exclusive use of the pre-conciliar commissions.

Volumen II: Consilia et Vota Episcoporum ac Praelatorum. Pars I: Europa (1960)

Volume II contains the written submissions and replies (vota) to the letter of Domenico Cardinal Tardini and the follow-up letters of Mgr (later Cardinal) Pericle Felici, asking the bishops and prelates of the world what they would like to see discussed at the upcoming Council. It is split into eight parts: one part for Italy, two parts for the rest of Europe, one part for Asia, one part for Africa, one part for North and Central America, and one part for South America and Oceania. Three parts are available here: part 1, part 2 and part 8.

Part 1 contains the vota from the following European countries/territories: United Kingdom, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Gdansk/Danzig (now part of Poland), and Germany.

Volumen II: Consilia et Vota Episcoporum ac Praelatorum. Pars II: Europa (1960)

Part 2 of Volume II contains the vota from the following European countries: Gibraltar, Greece, Switzerland, Republic of Ireland, Spain, Netherlands, Hungary, Iceland, Yugoslavia (now split into the countries/territories of Bosnia & Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia), Latvia, Luxembourg, Portugal, Malta, Norway, Poland, Monaco, Sweden, and Turkey (European).

 (Parts 3-7 of Volume II are unfortunately not available as yet.)

Volumen II: Consilia et Vota Episcoporum ac Praelatorum. Pars VIII: Superiores Generales Religiosorum (1961)

Part 8 of Volume II contains the vota from the superior generals of religious congregations.

Appendix Voluminis II: Analyticus Conspectus Consiliorum et Votorum quae ab Episcopis et Praelatis data sunt. Pars I and Pars II (1961)

These two volumes are better known as just the Analyticus Conspectus, and provide an analytic overview of the eight volumes of the vota. All the responses of the bishops, prelates and religious are distilled into 9,348 brief propositions, organised by subject, with each proposition having one or more diocese/religious order cited in the footnotes. The Analyticus Conspectus is a very handy tool, and has been largely neglected by historians of Vatican II due to the anti-curial bias evident in, for example, the Bologna School.

Part 1 deals with the following subjects: Chief Doctrines; General Norms of the Code of Canon Law; Persons; Clerical Discipline; Seminaries; Religious; Laity.

Part 2 deals with the following subjects: The Sacraments; Sacred Places; Precepts of the Church; Divine Worship; Magisterium of the Church; Benefices and Goods of the Church; Processes (re. Canon Law); Offences and Punishments; The Missions; Ecumenism; The Activity of the Church.

 (Volume III, a stand-alone volume which contains the responses from the Roman Curia, is unfortunately not available as yet.) 

Volumen IV: Studia et Vota Universitatum et Facultatum Ecclesiasticarum et Catholicarum. Pars II: Universitates et Facultates extra Urbem (1961)

This volume contains the vota of the various Catholic faculties and universities around the world. It is split into two parts in three tomes: Part 1 (two tomes) deals with the institutions in Rome, and unfortunately is not available at the present time; Part 2 contains the vota of the institutions outside of Rome.

Indices (1961)

The antepreparatory series ends with an index volume, which includes detailed statistics of the responses and response rates for the worldwide Church.

Preparatory Period (November 1960 - July 1962)
Acta et Documenta Concilio Oecumenico Vaticano II Apparando. Series II (Praeparatoria) 

(Volume I, a stand alone volume containing the documents, letters, speeches, etc. of Pope John XXIII in the preparatory period of Vatican II, is unfortunately not yet available.)

Volumen II: Acta Pontificiae Commissionis Centralis Praeparatoriae Concilii Oecumenici Vaticani II. Pars I: Sessio prima (12-20 Iun 1961), Sessio secunda (7-17 Nov 1961) (1965) and Pars II: Sessio tertia (15-23 Ian 1962), Sessio quarta (19-27 Feb 1962) (1967) and Pars III: Sessio quinta (26 Mar-3 Apr 1962), Sessio sexta (3-12 Maii 1962) (1968) and Pars IV: Sessio septima (12-19 Iun 1962) (1968) 

Volume II, split into four parts, contains the acts of the Central Preparatory Commission, which met over seven sessions from June 1961 to June 1962 in order to discuss and refine the schemata that would be put before the Council at the first session.

Volumen III: Acta Commissionum et Secretariatuum Praeparatoriorum Concilii Oecumenici Vaticani II. Pars I and Pars II (1969)

Volume III, split into two parts, details the acts of the ten Preparatory Commissions and two Secretariats involved in drafting the schemata.

Part 1 contains those prepared by the following five Commissions: Theological Commission, Commission for Bishops and the Governance of Dioceses, Commission for the Discipline of the Clergy and the Christian People, Commission for Religious, and Commission for the Discipline of the Sacraments. 

Part 2 contains those prepared by the other Commissions and the two Secretariats: Commission on the Sacred Liturgy, Commission for Studies and Seminaries, Commission for the Oriental Churches, Commission on the Missions, Commission for the Apostolate of the Laity, Secretariat for Communications Media, and Secretariat for Christian Unity.

(Volume IV, the acts of the various Subcommissions of the Central Preparatory Commission, split into four parts, is not yet available.)

Posted Friday, July 14, 2017

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