ARCHBISHOP HURLEY'S CONTRIBUTION TO THE SECOND VATICAN
COUNCIL
Dr Philippe Denis
University of Natal
The Second Vatican Council had a deep influence on the Catholic Church in Africa. It opened the way to indigenisation and inculturation and assisted the new generation of bishops in dealing with the problems of the post-independence era. Vatican II greatly contributed to the move from a missionary church to a local church. Most observers agree, however, that the African bishops failed to influence in any significant way the work of the Council itself. The African representation - 260 bishops out of a total 2358 at the first session in 1962 - had relatively little weight in the final outcome of the Council. The themes in discussion were perceived as "too European" not only by the African-born bishops, - 61 at the opening of the Council, - but also by the missionary bishops. The importance of the Second Vatican Council for the African continent lies in its reception.(1)
Yet not all the African bishops were ill at ease with the ethos of the Council and its day-to-day working. A minority of them succeeded in having their voice heard and participated in an active way in the conciliar event. One of these bishops was Denis Eugene Hurley, the archbishop of Durban. His declarations, particularly during the first session, raised considerable attention. If his participation in the Central Preparatory Commission of the Council went relatively unnoticed, his role in the Commission for Priestly Formation and Catholic Education can rightly be described as crucial. From the start he belonged to the group of progressive bishops. The Suenens, Liénarts and Frings saw him as one of theirs. He is also remembered for having publicized the conciliar event in his home country through his weekly column in the Southern Cross during the second, the third and the fourth periods.
Archbishop Hurley's biography still needs to be written. We welcome the fact that he currently spends part of his retirement in writing his memoirs. These will certainly include a section on Vatican II. So far, little has been written on his participation in the Council.(2) This is not because sources are lacking.(3) They are, in fact, plentiful. My only ambition, in this essay, is to give a brief outline of the subject. It is hoped that another student of history will deal more appropriately with it in the future.(4)
Archbishop Hurley's papers are kept in good order in the Archdiocesan Archives in
Durban.(5) They extensively document his participation in the Council. His correspondence
with Eric Boulle, his vicar general, and Geoff de Gersigny, his bursar, in particular, is of
great value. The archbishop's papers also contain the drafts of his interventions in aula
and numerous significant documents. Also of interest is his chronicle of the Council, as
published in the South African Catholic newspaper The Southern Cross every week
during the second, third and fourth sessions.(6) Written with frankness and humour, these
articles provide first-hand information on the progress of the discussions, the mechanism
of the assembly, the theological issues at stake and the personality of the principal actors.
Archbishop Hurley's own speeches and written statements are now to be found in the
Acta Synodalia Sacrosancti Concilii Oecumenici Vaticani II, the official Roman
publication.(7) One can also make use of the accounts he gave of the event after the closure
of the Council. They mainly relate to the work of the Commission for Priestly Formation
and Catholic Education.(8) Lastly I should mention the oral sources. For the purpose of this
paper, Archbishop Hurley graciously agreed to be interviewed by one of my students, Fr
Alan Henriques(9), and by myself on several occasions(10). Some time ago, I interviewed
Bishop Gerard van Velsen(11) and Archbishop Owen McCann(12), two of the then surviving
conciliar bishops. More recently, Fr Dominic Scholten, who was the secretary of the
Southern African Catholic Bishops' Conference during the Council, was also consulted.(13)
The preparation of the Council
On 25th January 1959, four months after his pontifical election, Pope John XXIII announced an ecumenical council. In June, like all the Catholic bishops and major superiors in the world, Archbishop Hurley received a letter from the Cardinal Secretary of State calling for suggestions for the Council.(14)
By that time, Hurley was already a prominent figure in his church. Born in 1915 in Cape Town to a family of Irish immigrants, he had joined the Oblates of Mary Immaculate soon after matriculation. His ordination took place in 1939 in Rome, when he was about to complete his studies of theology. His ecclesiastical career progressed very rapidly. His first appointment was as curate of Emmanuel Cathedral, Durban. He has now returned to the Cathedral since his retirement. In December 1943, he became the superior of a new Oblate house of studies in Prestbury, Pietermaritzburg. His interest in theological education dates from that time. Three years later, he was appointed vicar apostolic of Natal and consecrated bishop. At the age of thirty-one, he was the youngest bishop in the world. When the hierarchy was established in Southern Africa in 1951, the Natal vicariate became the Durban archdiocese and he became its first archbishop. There were only five South African-born bishops at the time. Hurley was one of them. In 1953, he became the president of the Southern African episcopal conference. He was still holding this post when the announcement of the Council was made.
At first, Archbishop Hurley did not know what to answer:
I looked at [the letter] and I wondered why the Church needed a Council. There seemed to be no crisis.
Many bishops, I think, felt the same, especially in English-speaking parts of the world where the Church
seemed to be in good shape, with churches well-attended, schools flourishing and vocations multiplying.(15)
Only eight bishops from South Africa, Swaziland and Basutoland responded to
Cardinal Tardini's request. Like many other bishops, Hurley did not see the Council as
a priority. His main concern was the preparation of the plenary session of the bishops'
conference due to be held in January 1960. On 21th March 1960, the secretary of the
Antepreparatory Commission of the Council sent a reminder and this time he responded:
I rolled up my sleeves, pulled out my Latin dictionary and grammar and sent off my conclusions in what
I hoped was comprehensible Latin. Little did I suspect that every document pertaining to the Council would
be published in the record, the Acta. The halting Latin of my humble suggestion lies enshrined in one of
the mighty tomes of those Acta.(16)
Hurley's suggestions - or vota as they are usually called - were in fact among the most elaborate of those coming from Southern African bishops. The majority of the twenty-five Southern African vota dealt with rather minor problems of ecclesiastical discipline and liturgy. The same trend was observed in other parts of Africa.(17) By contrast, Owen McCann, on the other hand, insisted on the necessity of redefining the Catholic doctrine, in response to communism, positivism, materialism and all the errors of the time. Interestingly, one of these errors, according to the archbishop of Cape Town, was "racialism". He also urged the Council to invite all nations, classes and individuals to work for peace.(18) Bishop Gerard van Velsen's vota also expressed new concerns. He pleaded - already! - for a relaxation of the celibacy rule for African clergy and recommended that the church's laws give precedence to charity over discipline in order to promote unity with the "dissident brethren".(19)
Hurley's vota consisted of two parts. In the first one he outlined what he thought the
Tractatus dogmaticus should contain. Quite remarkably, most of the issues he listed in
this section of his vota were later to be discussed at the Council, namely, the church as
Body of Christ, the collegial government of the church, the priests as co-helpers of the
bishops, the role of laity in subordination to the hierarchy, the relationship between
church and state and the imperatives of Christian freedom. Under the heading Tractatus
practicus, he made several recommendations concerning the relationship between the
local churches and the Holy See, the periodicity of episcopal conferences, the liturgy of
the Church, Catholic Action, the catechesis of adults and children and the training of
priests. What was to become one of his main contributions to the Commission for Priestly
Formation and Catholic Education two years later found its first expression here:
The training of candidates to the priesthood in seminaries should take more into account the pastoral
necessities. The current curriculum appears too theoretical. It does not provide a real understanding of
Christ's Mystery (of the whole Christ, Head and Body) and a full grasp of the liturgical and apostolic work
of the Church. Not enough importance is given to the art of announcing the mystery in words as well as
in writing. It would be better to give a first overview of Christ's Mystery to the seminarians, to the best of
their abilities, before they begin the course of philosophy. At the same time they should be taught how to
speak and write properly. In this way, the priestly apostolate will be seen from the start as a practical
service of the Divine Master. If the seminarians always keep this vision and this objective in sight, they will
benefit more from the study of philosophy, theology and other ecclesiastical sciences.(20)
Not long after he had sent his vota to the Antepreparatory Commission of the Council, Hurley was nominated to the Central Preparatory Commission of the Council, the commission established to coordinate the work of the various preparatory commissions.(21) This appointment, according to him(22), was probably due to the fact that the Holy See had an out-of-date report on the Southern African Catholic Bishops' Conference showing him as the president. But he had stepped down from that position in February 1960. The new president was Archbishop McCann. This explanation is typical of Hurley's modesty. The quality of his vota may have been the reason why this rather obscure African archbishop was chosen to be part of a central Roman commission. Two other African bishops, it should be noted, were also appointed to the Central Preparatory Commission. They were Bernard Yago, the archbishop of Abidjan, and Jerome Ratokomalala, the archbishop of Tananarive.
The task of the Central Preparatory Commission was to review and co-ordinate the position papers - or schemata - submitted by the other commissions. Ten in number, these commissions were charged with specific areas of doctrinal, pastoral and canonical concerns. They were all headed by Curial officials. Also active in the preparation of the Council was the Secretariat for Christian Unity, an entirely new institution in which participated Gerard van Velsen, the bishop of Kroonstad. Born in Holland, this Dominican bishop had gained some experience in ecumenical affairs through his involvement in the Afrikaans apostolate in South Africa.(23)
The Central Preparatory Commission was dominated by conservative Curia cardinals.
Hurley soon realized that there was not much to expect from a commission so constituted:
It did not take long to notice that the members of the Central Preparatory Commission were divided into
conservatives and progressives and the curial representatives, mainly cardinals serving in Rome, were
preponderantly conservative. The procedure gave the curial representatives an enormous advantage. After
we had gone home after each session, a team of them sifted through our votes and amendments to formulate
the final text for the Council. The playing field was anything but level.(24)
Hurley expected a lot more from the Council. His assessment of the current situation
of the Catholic Church found expression in the January 1962 issue of the Irish theological
magazine The Furrow. Atheistic communism and secularism, he explained, posed a
fundamental challenge to Christianity. The church, he went on, had already started
responding to this new situation. A "radical renewal" was underway, with a return to the
scriptural sources in doctrine, a renewal in liturgy and catechesis and the flowering of the
lay apostolate. More, however, was necessary. The church as a whole, and more
especially its priests, were in need of reform:
These developments are bound to result in a transformation in the ordinary life and activity of the
Church. This must inevitably entail a transformation in pastoral methods. Unless the change of methods
is dramatically pursued a first-class crisis will result, for there is no better way of promoting a crisis than
by allowing a situation to drift into change without adjusting the approach of those most directly involved
in the situation.(25)
The Central Preparatory Commission was miles away from these perspectives. As time went on, Hurley became "more and more despondent" about the kind of documents that would constitute the agenda of the Council. But he was not prepared to give up. He established contacts with the members of the Commission who shared his frustration. Most of them were bishops from countries north of the Alps, hence their name transalpini. On 18th April 1962, he sent to Cardinal Suenens a memorandum containing his suggestions for a revision of the work of the Central Preparatory Commission. On 4th May, he had a conversation with Cardinal Frings on the same subject and he gave a copy of his memorandum to Cardinal König.(26) "They all agreed", he later commented, "but saw no way of remedying the situation".(27)
The Commission finished its work in July 1962. A series of seven preparatory
documents duly approved by the pope, was sent to the bishops for comment in early
August. For many of them, it was too late. Hurley, like all missionary bishops, was
already on his way to the Council. He only found the schemata on his arrival in Rome.(28)
The opening of the Council
Archbishop Hurley arrived in Rome on Tuesday 9th October 1962, two days before the opening of the Council, after an extended trip through Katanga and Congo. He soon renewed the contacts established earlier with the transalpini bishops. The seven preparatory documents had now been read by all the bishops. A product of the neoscholastic theology taught in the Roman schools, they caused disappointment and distress among those who expected from the Council a renewal of the church. Only one document, the one dealing with liturgy, seemed to respond to the current needs.
A group of progressive bishops and theologians, however, was preparing a counter-offensive. A reply to the preparatory documents, hastily written by the Dominican Edward Schillebeeckx and duplicated in Latin and in English, was communicated before the opening of the Council to all the conciliar fathers already present in Rome. The distribution continued afterwards. During the first days of the Council, three hundred copies of this document were handed over to Bishop Jean-Baptiste Zoa and Bishop Joseph Blomjous, the respective secretaries of the French-speaking and English-speaking sections of the recently-founded Secretariat of the Bishops' Conferences of Africa and Madagascar.(29)
In September and early October, a Projet de déclaration initiale, written by Marie-Dominique Chenu with the assistance of Yves-Marie Congar, had circulated among progressive bishops. This document, substantially rewritten, was to become the Message to the World, adopted by the conciliar assembly at its third congregation on Saturday 20th October 1962. Fourteen bishops received the initial document. Archbishop Hurley was one of them. Apart from Cardinal Léger, the archbishop of Montréal, he was the only bishop, on the list drawn up by the two Dominicans, who was not an European.(30)
The Council opened on Thursday 11th October. Hurley's correspondence contains a
colourful description of the opening ceremony:
We had to be lined up in the Vatican at 7.30 am. The procession moved off shortly after 8.30 am and true to form the MCs lost the Archbishops! By the time we Archbishops moved off from our assembly point, the Cardinals and the Pope himself had got ahead of us. Consequently we could not make the little trip into the Piazza but were short-circuited along the front portico of St Peter's to join the procession at the main doors. The sight inside St Peter's was without doubt impressive - a mighty canyon of white mitres. The ceremonial was not too badly executed, though as usual, nobody told us when to stand, to sit, to cover and to uncover; so there was a fair amount of mitre-fluttering in that vast canyon.
The ceremony ended somewhere after 1 pm. After that it was a battle to get back to the Vatican and
recover our belongings. Nobody had thought of organising this and of keeping the traffic flowing in one
direction - with the result that at one stage 1250 bishops were trying to go westwards through one door
while 1250 were trying to proceed eastwards through the same. We got home at about 2.30 pm.(31)
On Saturday 13th October the bishops met again for the election of the commissions. Sixteen members had to be elected for each of the ten commissions The Curia expected its candidates to be voted without difficulty. But an alternative list, prepared by the Belgian bishops in association with the other European episcopates, was also circulating, more or less secretly, the days before the vote. This list included Hurley's name, as member of the Commission for Seminaries, Studies and Catholic Education.
At the beginning of the session, Archbishop Felici, the Secretary of the Council, told the bishops to write down the names of their candidates in the book provided to that effect. "There was", related Hurley, "an agonising silence of about two minutes while those of us who knew what was brewing thought we had been sold out. But in due course the voice of Cardinal Liénart came over the public address system, protesting that we had not had enough time to know who to vote for. Cardinal Frings supported him and the Council of presidents upheld the objection. So the meeting was adjourned."
During the following two days, intense lobbying took place. The progressive bishops
tried to canvass support from all the world's episcopates. The final outcome of the vote,
however, was uncertain. The conservative bishops, led by the Curia cardinals, also tried
to mobilize support. In his correspondence, Hurley comes out as an acute observer of the
Council's political dynamics. He shared his analysis with his Durban correspondents on
16th October, the day of Cardinal Liénart's historic intervention:
The best organisation was put together by the Central Europeans - France, Germany, Austria, Holland and Belgium. In due course, they were joined by Switzerland, Scandinavia, Poland, Yugo-Slavia and other Iron Curtain countries. The Latin Americans were also well organised. They have about 600 votes. The United States had its own tight organisation (with about 240 votes) but did not seem to be doing much horse-trading with the others. The English, Irish, Australians and New Zealanders published their own list of candidates. Africa was quietly into the field with continent-wide consultations controlling about 300 votes and Asia was split between India and Ceylon on one side and the Far East on the other.
As there was not enough time to achieve complete international organisation, it is hard to see how the voting will turn out. Central Europe is giving the most vigourous leadership with Cardinals Frings, Liénart, Suenens, Alfrink and König at the centre of things; but Central Europe does not control a great number of votes. However, its influence is extended through German, French, Dutch, Belgian, Austrian and Swiss missionaries. Most of Africa will, I think (or hope), fall in behind it.
If South America is conservative and unites with Italy and the United States, we are sunk. Those three
regions could control at least half the votes. But there is no sign of such a tragedy yet. Italy may wake up
to the pleasant surprise that the rest of the world has not such a timor reverentialis of the Curia - and after
that, anything could happen. With Curial officials and missionaries, Italy has nearly 500 votes.(32)
The rest is history. Two days later, a clear majority for change emerged. The minority did not disarm, however, and until the end of the Council compromises had to be negotiated. Archbishop Hurley was elected as a member of the Commission for Seminaries, Studies and Catholic Education with 930 votes. He was the member of the commission with the tenth highest number of votes, out of sixteen. The first to be elected, Patrick O'Boyle, archbishop of Washington, received 2,059 votes. Nine additional members, nominated by the pope, also comprised the commission. On 28th November 1963, another four members were elected by the assembly. Three more were nominated by the pope in 1964 and 1965.
Hurley was the only member of the Southern African Bishops' Conference to be
elected to a conciliar commission during the first period of the Council. Six other African
bishops, Jean-Baptiste Zoa (Yaoundé, Cameroon), Laurent Rugambwa (Bukoba,
Tanzania), André Perraudin (Kabgayi, Rwanda), Joseph Blomjous (Mwanza, Tanzania),
Joseph Malula (Kinshasa, Congo-Kinshasa) and Jean Van Cauwelaert (Inongo, Congo-Kinshasa), were elected with him. A further six African bishops were nominated by Pope
John XXIII, namely, Jérôme Rakotomalala (Tananarive, Madagascar), Stephanos I.
Sidarouss (Alexandria, Egypt), Araste Mariam Yemmeru (Addis Ababa, Ethiopia),
Bernard Mels (Luluabourg, Congo-Kinshasa), Bernard Yago (Abidjan, Ivory Coast) and
Victor Sartre (Tananarive, Madagascar).(33) Bishop van Velsen (Kroonstad), a member of
the Secretariat for Christian Unity since 1960, was maintained at his post at the opening
of the Council, like all the other members of the Secretariat. In November 1963,
Archbishop Owen McCann (Cape Town) was elected to the commission for Bishops.
Finally, in January 1964, Emmanuel 'Mabathoana (Leribe, Basutoland) was nominated
by Pope Paul VI to the commission for Missions.
Interventions in aula and written submissions
Apart from being an active member of the Commission for Seminaries, Studies and Catholic Education, Archbishop Hurley drew attention through the number of the speeches he delivered during the plenary sessions. During the four conciliar periods, he spoke ten times and submitted four written interventions. Only one African bishop, the Tanzanian cardinal Laurent Rugambwa, outnumbered him, with fifteen oral interventions. Two bishops, Sebastião Soares de Resende (Beira, Mozambique) and Elie Zoghby (Nubia, Egypt), delivered the same number of speeches.(34)
Hurley was, by far, the most "visible" South African bishop during the Council. Archbishop McCann, who was the president of the Southern African Bishops' Conference at the time, delivered four speeches, one on behalf of the Conference and three in his own name. He submitted five written interventions on behalf of the Conference and four in his own name. Bishop van Velsen (Kroonstad) delivered one speech and submitted one written intervention. Archbishop Garner (Pretoria) and Bishop Green (Port Elizabeth) each delivered one speech. Archbishop Whelan (Bloemfontein) did not address the Council but he submitted one written intervention.
|
Period |
Congr. |
Date |
Mode |
Bishop |
Conciliar Document |
|
I I I I I I I II II II II II II II II II II II II III III III III III III III III IV IV IV IV IV |
3 4 22 - - 32 - - - 40 44 - 52 - 62 - - 67 79 88 - - 97 98 107 - 123 131 - - 142 142 |
20.10.62 22.10.62 18.11.62 - - 3.12.62 - - - 3.10.63 9.10.63 - 21.10.63 - 7.11.63 - - 14.11.63 2.12.63 25.9.64 - - 8.10.64 19.10.64 22.10.64 - 16.11.64 20.9.65 - - 5.10.65 5.10.65 |
Oral Or/Wrt Oral Written Written Oral Written Written Written Oral Oral Written Oral Written Oral Written Written Oral Oral Oral Written Written Oral Oral Oral Written Oral Oral Written Written Oral Oral |
Hurley Hurley Hurley McCann McCann Hurley van Velsen McCann SACBC van Velsen Hurley McCann Hurley Whelan McCann Hurley SACBC Garner Green Hurley SACBC SACBC McCann Hurley Hurley SACBC Hurley McCann Hurley Hurley Hurley McCann |
Message to the World The Sacred Liturgy The Sources of Revelation The Sources of Revelation Means of Social Communication The Church The Church The Church The Church The Church The Church The Church The Church The Church The Church The Church Ecumenism The Pastoral Office of Bishops Ecumenism Religious Liberty The Pastoral Office of the Bishops The Divine Revelation The Church The Apostolate of the Lay People The Church in the Modern World The Training of Priests The Ministry and Life of Priests Religious Liberty Religious Liberty The Church in the Modern World The Church in the Modern World The Church in the Modern World |
Hurley's first four interventions in aula were his most "political". They were meant to give support to the pastoral approach followed by the emerging majority. During the debate preceding the adoption of the Message to the World, on Saturday 20th October 1962, he recommended that the reference to the papal primacy be dropped, to take into account the sensitivities of the non-believers and of the "separated brethren".(35)
The discussion of the preparatory document on the liturgy started two days later. Deeply frustrated by the method of the debate which consisted in what seemed to be an endless series of monologues, Hurley thought it useless to deliver the address he had prepared but handed in the text. His main point was that the liturgical reform should not be separated from catechetical and moral renewal. It was particularly important, in this regard, to develop lay participation and to adapt the structure and the language of the liturgy.(36)
The debate on the sources of revelation, in which Hurley took an active part, is usually
regarded as a turning point in the first period of the Council. After a week of speeches,
from 14th to 21st November 1962, the document drafted by the Theological Commission
was finally rejected. This was a momentous decision for the future of the Council. Hurley
threw all his weight into the discussion. Everybody agreed that the Council should be
pastoral, he explained. But there was no agreement on the meaning of the word
"pastoral". To be pastoral was it enough to give a firm definition of the doctrine? Or was
it necessary, also, to preach the Gospel to the world? It was because of this disagreement
that 90% of the preparatory documents were causing division among the conciliar fathers.
The work of the Central Preparatory Commission, he concluded, was essentially flawed:
What should we do? In the Central Commission, when we complained that the schemata were
insufficiently pastoral, we were voices shouting in the wilderness. There was nobody to listen to our
clamour and to remedy the shortcomings of the preparatory work. There was no central direction. There
was nobody, nor any commission, to explain the pastoral purpose of the Council, to direct and co-ordinate
the work of the various commissions according to the statutes and to decide which documents were to be
presented to the Council. This was the fundamental defect of the preparatory work. It was, I would like to
say, the original sin of this Council.(37)
In early December, Hurley added his voice to the criticisms directed against the preparatory document on the church by the majority of the bishops. The text, according to him, needed a thorough revision. The pastoral concern was to be "the supreme preoccupation of the Council". The Council, he further said, "was not called to define old truths, but to renew the pastoral action of the Church, which, with God's help, will have an intensification of ecumenical activity as one of its most important results".(38) But the battle was already won. The opposition to the document was so widespread that a vote of the sort that had taken place with regard to the text on the sources of revelation was considered superfluous. On 6th December 1962; it was announced that Pope John XXIII had appointed a Co-ordinating Commission to review all the prepared texts, to decide which of them to retain and to see how to bring these into conformity with the pastoral orientation the Pope wished the Council to reflect.(39)
The public speeches and written submissions Hurley made during the last three periods of the Council were not as momentous as those of the first period. Many of them deal with technical issues, which cannot be reviewed here in detail. It should suffice to mention his interventions on the relationship between church and state, an important subject for a bishop living in a Protestant country dominated by apartheid.
During the debate on religious freedom, Hurley came out as a strong proponent of the church's independence from the political society. He intervened on this subject on two occasions. He first expressed his views on 25th September 1963, when the document prepared by the Secretariat for Christian Unity was discussed for the first time in aula. In the modern world, he argued, the church no longer had any power over the state. And it was better so. There was no need for the church to be united to the state. For practical purposes, like the negotiation of subsidies for Catholic schools, it was enough to sign agreements with the state.(40)
The discussion of the revised document on religious freedom was only held at the beginning of the fourth session and, because the issue was extremely contentious, it continued until the very end of the Council. Hurley made a written submission during the first part of the discussion, in September 1965. He was in agreement with the general purpose of the document - the recognition that religious freedom was a Christian value - but had difficulties with its argumentation. In his view, the schema relied too exclusively on philosophical reasons. Truth, according to this argument, had to be sought in human fashion, that is, by human inquiry. Therefore one could not be coerced in religion against one's conscience. But, the archbishop of Durban argued, the social dimension of religion also had to be taken into account. The role of political authority in matters pertaining to the truth had changed dramatically in recent times. It was this evolution that, according to Hurley, the document needed to highlight. Christian Revelation, he went on, "taught the distinction of the spiritual order from the temporal". The history of the church gave abundant evidence of this doctrine. The state has "no competence" in religious matters. It was true that, from the time of Constantine to the twentieth century, the church had accepted that the temporal society had to recognize, uphold and promote the spiritual. But in recent years this proposition had been re-examined. "Now we are almost unanimous in rejecting state competence in religious matters and its obligation to the true Church".(41)
There is little doubt that, when writing this text, Hurley had in mind the problem of apartheid in South Africa. It was the year before, on 16th January 1964, that he delivered his famous Alfred and Winifred Hoernlé memorial lecture on "Apartheid: a crisis of the Christian Conscience".(42) In this lecture, he demolished one by one the arguments in favour of apartheid. He thus appeared, to the dismay of his fellow archbishop W. P. Whelan, as a resolute critic of the South African government. During the Council, the issue of apartheid was often discussed in private conversations.(43) Hurley even held a press conference on race relations in South Africa, on 15th November 1964.(44) But the subject was never debated in aula, neither by the archbishop of Durban, nor by any of his fellow bishops.
Before concluding this review of Hurley's public interventions, let us say a word on
his eulogy - on 22nd October 1964, during the discussion of the document on the Church
in the Modern World - of the French anthropologist and theologian Pierre Teilhard de
Chardin. He commended the Jesuit scientist for having described in a luminous way the
relations between the natural and supernatural orders. From his "splendid vision", which
was "simultaneously religious and scientific, as well as evolutionary and eschatological",
he argued, the Council had everything to gain.(45) This speech, Hurley commented later in
the Southern Cross, was responsible for "a minor controversy within the major
debate".The following day, Benedictus Reetz, the abbot of Beuron, expressed the view
that Teilhard had not seen enough evil in the world and tended to reflect Origen's
erroneous opinion that there was no eternal punishment. Later on, however, Bishop
Spülbeck of Meissen, East Germany, came to the defence of Teilhard, pointing out the
influence he exerted in scientific circles. The Marxists feared him because his work was
based on science. "So", concluded Hurley, "it ended two-to-one in favour of Teilhard".(46)
Hopes and frustrations
During the last three periods of the Council, the archbishop of Durban managed the tour de force of sending an article every week - with no mention of his name - to The Southern Cross. This gave him the opportunity of sharing with the South African public his hopes and questions regarding the Council.
This chronicle was, first of all, a pedagogical exercise. Week after week, he explained
in simple terms the significance of often complicated and tedious theological discussions.
The former lecturer was at work, as this example will indicate:
The Second Vatican Council finds the Church in the throes of a transition from a theology of concept
to a theology of image. The concept was fine for defensive purposes but is not so good for progressive
pastoral strategy. In swinging to the image, the Church finds itself in a "back-to-the-Bible" campaign. The
Bible is God's poetry, God's word is glowing images. So, the argument in St. Peter's from Tuesday to
Friday on the first chapter of the Schema on the Church, "The Mystery of the Church", revolved around
the best expressions and images with which to present the hidden reality of the Church to the world of the
20th century.(47)
Hurley's chronicle of the Council is a magnificent piece of literature. Thirty years after
the event, it still reads like a novel. The most difficult subjects were treated with humour,
and yet the seriousness of the issues at stake was never lost:
Opposition to the permanent diaconate hinged mainly on the question of celibacy. Some hair-raising
pictures were painted of the conjugal misery to which married deacons could be reduced - unfaithful and
garrulous wives, delinquent sons and fashion-conscious beauty-queen daughters. Married deacons were also
seen as the thin end of the wedge that would one day wreck the celibacy of the Western clergy in general.(48)
Particularly interesting were his descriptions of national characters. This was, for
instance, how he described the intervention of an Italian bishop during the debate on
collegiality:
The speaker was the young, newly-consecrated (five days previously) Auxiliary of Bologna, Bishop
Bettazzi. He charged into the fray spraying a torrent of eloquent Latin and gesticulating magnificently. In
15 hectic minutes that galvanised a weary end-of-the week assembly he marshalled an imposing array of
theological witnesses to prove that the Italian tradition was as surely behind collegiality as any other.(49)
At the end of the debate on collegiality, when the aggiornamento theologians were
expressing publicly their satisfaction, the archbishop of Durban had this to say:
To the Anglo-Saxon mind this theological enthusiasm is a little incomprehensible. The pragmatic Anglo-Saxon is inclined to say that if worldwide episcopal collaboration is a good thing, why not get on with it
without agonising over the academic theological implications? But the Anglo-Saxon mind is not the Latin
mind nor the Transalpine. The Transalpines and the Latins must have theological and philosophical reasons
for doing things. The Anglo-Saxons prefer to do them first and find reasons afterwards.(50)
Like all the other bishops, Hurley had moments of doubt, particularly at the end of the
third period, when the minority persuaded the pope to add a conservative post-scriptum
to the document on collegiality. At times, he complained that the Council was dragging
on, as if it were to last for ever. In such moments, he felt rather despondent, as he shared
with one of his South African correspondents:
The Council is becoming very boring. It takes oceans of words to cover a subject. It took us five weeks
to get through the schema De Ecclesia and now we are launched into the debate on the administrative
aspect of the episcopal office and further oceans of words are going to flow concerning relations between
the Curia and the bishops and the powers of bishops conferences and so on. There is not even the
excitement we had last year of throwing out schema after schema from the middle of November. We realise
now that every time we throw out a schema, we add another year to the life of the Council. In this mood,
we would be prepared to accept any old rag as a basis of discussion. No matter how good or how bad the
schema is, the discussion lasts just as long.(51)
Such times of discouragement, however, never lasted long. Until the end of the Council, Hurley remained an active participant. Part of his time was devoted to the work of the Commission for Seminaries, Studies and Catholic Education, a subject to which we shall soon return. On 16th June 1965, he became a member of the Council for the Implementation of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy.(52) He also got involved in the reform of the liturgy in English. It was at his initiative that the International Commission on English in the Liturgy was established in October 1963.(53) As a member of the Episcopal Committee he took an active part in the work of the Commission, during and after the Council. There was a good spirit of co-operation, he wrote to Boulle and de Gersigny in November 1965, despite the "Homeric" battles with Professor H.P.R. Finberg, an English liturgist, over the use of "thou" and "you" in the liturgy.(54)
The archbishop of Durban's final intervention, during the last week of the Council, regarded the issue of public defence. The document on the Church in the Modern World included a paragraph condemning nuclear war in no uncertain terms. But it also stated that governments could not be denied the right of lawful self defence. In Hurley's view, this was an illogical position. "The out-and-out option", he wrote to his Durban correspondents a few weeks before the vote, "is that the bomb is so bad that the Council should come out in favour of unilateral disarmament - we disarm, the Russians and Chinese don't. ... Some Americans are already upset because there is no commendation in the text of those who are defending what is left of the world's freedom at great sacrifice."(55) Hurley himself agreed with the American position. He did not express his views in aula but submitted a written intervention in which he suggested that the entire second part of the document on the Church in the Modern World, which included the controversial paragraphs on nuclear war, be suppressed and replaced with a statement of principle on the problems facing society in the modern world, at the end of the first part. The Council had not been able to look at those issues in detail, he argued. To say nothing was better than making unprofessional assertions on difficult social and political matters.(56)
On 2nd December 1965, Archbishop Philip Hannan of New Orleans, a former chaplain
to paratroopers, circulated a petition recommending the rejection of the paragraphs
concerning the use of nuclear weapons, on the ground that "the possession of nuclear
weapons has preserved freedom for a very large portion in the world". Hurley gave his
signature, together with nine other bishops, mostly from Northern and Central America.(57)
The petition failed, however, to achieve its objectives. The document on the Church in
the Modern World was voted unaltered, with a strong condemnation of the nuclear bomb
only tempered by the recognition that the disarmament should be bilateral.(58) Thirty years
later, Hurley still defends the position he took during the Council, but he puts it in a wider
perspective:
I felt that we had arrived at a huge contradiction between the right of self-defence and the possession
of nuclear weapons. The contradiction, I fear, remains unsolved until we arrive at universal nuclear
disarmament. Possibly in my supporting Archbishop Hannan the logic of my scholastic training was
exerting too great an influence on me.(59)
The conciliar document on priestly formation
The archbishop of Durban was voted on to the Commission for Priestly Formation and Catholic Education at the second congregation of the Council, on 16th October 1962. The theologians who had campaigned for his election knew him, among other reasons, through the article he had published in The Furrow on the pastoral training of seminarians. This article had been translated into several languages.(60) But, as mentioned earlier, Hurley had already expressed his views on priestly formation in his submission to the Antepreparatory Commission of the Council of April 1960. He had also pleaded for a revision of the programme of priestly formation at the International Study Week on Missionary Catechetics held in Eichstätt, Germany in July 1960.(61) Johannes Hofinger, the organizer of this conference, had come to South Africa in 1959 to give a series of lectures on the catechetical renewal. Hurley's invitation to the International Study Week was a consequence of that visit.(62) In many respects, the opinions expressed in the paper delivered in Eichstätt anticipated those defended two years later in The Furrow. Lastly, the archbishop of Durban had tried to disseminate his ideas concerning seminary training at the Central Preparatory Commission. In June 1962, in particular, he had submitted to the Commission a detailed critique of the document drafted by the Preparatory Commission for Studies and Seminaries.(63)
His interest in theological education went back to the days of his own training in Rome. It was in this rather unlikely ground, he explained to the journalist Desmond Fisher, that the seeds of the liberal ideas which were to make him, a quarter of a century later, one of the leading figures of the aggiornamento were sown.(64) Soon after his ordination, he got involved in seminary training, as the rector of the newly-founded scholasticate of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate in Pietermaritzburg. Once a bishop, he became the first president of the Board of Seminaries of the Southern African Bishops' Conference. He was serving in that capacity when the South African bishops took over the responsibility for St Peter's Seminary, Pevensey, a seminary for black candidates for the priesthood, from the missionary congregation of Mariannhill.
In his article in The Furrow, Hurley insisted that the priests should be, above all,
"competent communicators of the faith". The chief object of the seminaries was not to
promote academic knowledge but to impart "communicable knowledge". The current
system, with a three-year course of scholastic philosophy followed by four years of
theology, was unable, according to the archbishop of Durban, to reach this objective:
At the end of this course of study the average seminarian has a fairly good text-book knowledge of the
faith in terms of magisterial decrees and scholastic definitions. The big question is: has he a communicable
knowledge? Is he filled with fire and enthusiasm for the Word and has he acquired the ability to propound
it in an attractive and compelling style to all manner of audiences? Ask the parishioners in the pews. Ask
the teachers in the schools.(65)
To improve the quality of priestly training, Hurley proposed a radical restructuring of the seminary programme. In the first place, he suggested the institution of an introductory year, during which the young seminarian would receive "a thorough initiation into the Mystery of Christ". Secondly, and this was the most revolutionary aspect of his proposal, he recommended that the courses of philosophy and theology be integrated into one "sacred science". This, he argued, was the approach of Thomas Aquinas. "One of the great drawbacks of Catholic thought in modern times has been the too great insistence on the distinction between faith and philosophy, to the detriment of both."(66) The whole seminary course, philosophy included, had to be built up in such a way that it was "related to life"(67). In this way, the principal objective of seminary studies, that is, the training of pastoral priests, would be met.
The views expressed in this article exerted a fair amount of influence on the Commission for Seminaries, Studies and Catholic Education. Hurley failed, however, to convince the members of the commission to take into consideration the entirety of his proposal, and more particularly the idea of integrating philosophy and theology into one central course, with a heavy pastoral component.
The commission had its first plenary session at the very end of the first conciliar
period, on 3rd December 1963.(68) Its president, Cardinal Giuseppe Pizzardo, only played
a nominal role. Its most influential member was Archbishop Dino Staffa, a Curia official.
Augustinus Mayer, a German Benedictine living in Rome, fluent in many languages and
extremely well organized, served as secretary. Of all the periti, Paolo Dezza, an Italian
Jesuit, was the most active. Another one was German Mártil, the rector of the Spanish
College of Rome, who later wrote a book on the work of the commission.(69) By and large,
the conservative element dominated, as Hurley shared with Cardinal Suenens shortly after
the second meeting of the commission:
Unfortunately, it appears to have been a policy to appoint only "safe" men, men who can be relied upon
to promote conventional curial and juridical views. They are nearly all "Romans" of Italian or Spanish
origin, rectors or professors in Roman seminaries or employed in the Sacred Congregation of Studies. The
"Romans" also include one Irishman (rector of the Irish College) and a German Salesian canonist. The only
outsiders are three Americans who exert little influence and a French Dominican, Father Camelot, who does
not say much. Father Dezza, S.J., is the best of the periti; but it would take some time to get him to shake
off the "Roman" mentality completely. Father Mayer is also good.(70)
The first work session of the commission took place from 21st February to 2nd March 1963. Owing to the short notice given, only fourteen out of twenty-five members were able to attend. The commission divided into three sub-commissions: one on priestly formation, one on schools and academic studies and the third one on the preparation of material for canon law. Hurley was on the first subcommission, with an Italian bishop as chairman. The procedure was to work in sub-commissions first and then report back to the whole commission..
The commission used as its starting point a document compiled by Paolo Dezza which combined the two schemata drafted by the Preparatory Commission for Seminaries and Schools during the preparatory phase of the Council, one on vocations and the other one on the formation of candidates for the priesthood. As one could have expected, Hurley found this document quite unsatisfactory. He therefore submitted to the commission, in January 1963, an alternative document entitled De sacrorum alumnis formandis, preceded by a critique of the document compiled by the Preparatory Commission for Seminaries and Schools.(71) His submission reproduced the views exposed in The Furrow article. The commission also made use of a series of guidelines prepared by the Central Co-ordinating Commission in December 1962.
Given the composition of the commission, Hurley's suggestions were too radical to
gain full approval. Only some aspects of his proposals were taken into consideration. On
28th February, Hurley shared his disenchantment with Eric Boulle and Geoff de
Gersigny:
You can imagine what little sympathy my draft schemata found here. Some made charitable comments
on the interesting features they noticed, but by and large I think they were considered slightly "crack-pot".
He then proceeded to the analysis of what he thought had been his mistake:
The fundamental tactical error on my part was to depart so radically from the previous order and
arrangement. It meant that to understand what I was getting at, the traditionalists had to leave their
customary categories and lines of thought. This, of course, was impossible.
He nevertheless managed "by hard arguing" to get a few amendments accepted, but,
as he explained to his Durban correspondents, these remained "amendments to old
views". His only hope was that the work of the commission would be rejected by the
conciliar assembly:
Perhaps that is all we can hope for the time being - until the Transalpini turn their guns on our work in
the plenary sessions. How short-sighted, all the same, or just plain mean of those responsible to load the
dice so overwhelmingly in favour of one view, when they must know by now they cannot hope to get away
with it in the Council.(72)
The document which emerged from the meeting, a twelve-page long schema divided into twenty-seven articles, was little more than an abridgment of the original schema. Paolo Dezza, a "master of concision", was its author.(73) It was immediately submitted to the Co-ordinating Commission. This rush, according to Hurley, was due to Pope John XXIII's desire to have all the conciliar documents in shape before his death, which he knew could not be far off.(74)
Seeing that he could not make any further progress, Hurley decided to go directly to the Central Co-ordinating Commission. He wrote down his comments on the schema prepared by the Commission for Seminaries, Studies and Catholic Education, and, on 18th March 1963, he sent them, with an accompanying letter, to Cardinal Leo Josef Suenens, one of the members of the Co-ordinating Commission.
In the letter, he recommended that "five or six new periti"be added to the commission so as to give "the right orientation and spirit" to its work. The schema on priestly formation could be amended, he further said, provided that "one good man with the ability to grasp theory and practice in an unified vision" helped Dezza and himself to put the finishing touches to the document. The schema on schools and universities, on the other hand, required "a total overhaul". Hurley suggested a few names as possible periti. The first on his list was the American Jesuit John Courtney Murray.(75)
In his comments, he spelled out his objections to the schema on priestly formation. He
commended the efforts made to indicate "both in general and in particular" that the whole
orientation of priestly formation should be pastoral. But he had reservations concerning
the paragraph on minor seminaries, which he thought was out of place. According to him,
all references to minor seminaries were to be grouped under a special heading at the end
of the document. His most important comment concerned the place reserved for spiritual
formation in the schema. In his view, spiritual and pastoral formation were intimately
related. Their separation, like the separation of practical pastoral formation from
theology, was a manifestation of a "departmental" mentality which was prejudicial to the
quality of priestly formation:
The tendency to treat spiritual formation before doctrinal and pastoral formation betrays, I think, the
old "departmental" mentality, according to which there is a real dichotomy between a priest's spiritual life
and his apostolic life. It is not my intention to argue that doctrinal and pastoral training are more important
than spiritual formation, but to maintain that doctrinal and pastoral training is logically prior to spiritual
formation and that this logical priority should require the order of treatment.(76)
Hurley's letter to Suenens was communicated to the secretary of the Council, Pericle Felici, who sent it, together with other reactions to the Commission for Seminaries, Studies and Catholic Education. It had no immediate effect. The composition of the commission remained substantially the same and the schema on priestly formation was accepted in principle by the Co-ordinating Commission. It was then approved by Pope John XXIII for discussion in general congregation and distributed with other schemata to the Council Fathers. The schema on schools, on the other hand, was sent back for revision to the periti residing in Rome, with the request to make it sound "more pastoral". "I doubt very much", commented Hurley, "whether they will be able to do this."(77)
Hurley's main achievement, if one looks at what the commission has done during the
intersession, was to have brought to the fore the pastoral dimension of seminary training.
The idea of an introductory year focussing on the mystery of Christ at the beginning of
seminary training is also his.(78) But his suggestion to consider the spiritual and the pastoral
training together, instead of treating the spiritual formation as a separate topic and dealing
with it at the beginning of the document, did not gain any support among the other
bishops. He lost that battle, as he admitted in a recent interview:
After a long discussion in which I was almost alone fighting for a definition of the object of priestly
formation, they finally agreed to define the purpose of training for the priesthood. I think that helped a lot,
because it brought out the pastoral dimension quite strongly. The only time I lost an argument was over
spiritual training. To know what spiritual training the students should get, we need to see to what pastoral
training and to what theology this spiritual training is related. It needs to be related to the whole process.
But they did not agree with me on that. The spiritual training had to be the first. I had to go along with
them. I could not win the argument.(79)
The commission met again during the second session of the Council to consider the various comments that the secretary had collected in the meantime. Some changes were made to the schema on priestly formation but they concerned more the style and the emphasis of the document than its content.(80)
During the second intersession, the commission received the injunction to reduce the draft to a series of votable propositions. The Co-ordinating Commission was so anxious to accelerate the conciliar process that it even considered submitting the document to the vote without discussion. But this plan was not very practical. When the Council reassembled for the third session in September 1964, the commission was asked to give more flesh to the document and it was subjected to a discussion in aula.(81)
Fearing a difficult debate, the secretary of the commission, Augustinus Mayer, picked up speakers from the commission to respond to the anticipated criticisms of the document. Hurley was one of them. He intervened at the end of the debate, on 16th November 1964. He insisted on what he thought was the key aspect of the document, that is, the "harmonious integration" of the pastoral, intellectual and spiritual aspects of the priestly training. The purpose of seminary formation, he added, was to train "pastoral priests". Repeating an argument already used in The Furrow, he noted that Thomas Aquinas himself wanted to integrate, in a single approach, theology and philosophy.(82)
Unlike other texts presented during the same session, the schema on priestly formation
was well received by the conciliar fathers.(83) The only bone of contention was the mention
of Thomas Aquinas as an authoritative doctor of the church, but a compromise solution
was found eventually. On the whole, the document reflected the mood of the Council.
This was due, in no small measure, to Hurley's influence in the commission. An observer
noted at the time that "the author of the document ... had somehow managed to escape
from the predominantly conservative influence of the curial Congregation for Seminaries
and Universities and to keep that influence at arm's length".(84) This anonymous homage
primarily concerned Mayer and Dezza, the main two authors of the document, but it also
referred to the archbishop of Durban.(85) The most praised paragraph was the first one,
which handed over the responsibility of the seminary programmes to the episcopal
conferences. This considerably reduced the power of the Congregation for Seminaries and
Universities, of which, interestingly, Staffa was the secretary at the time of the Council.(86)
Hurley, whose opposition to excessive ecclesiastical centralization was well-known,
certainly contributed to the insertion of this paragraph at the beginning of the document.(87)
Archbishop Hurley and Vatican II
Hurley's contribution to the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa has been widely recognized, not only among the members of his church but also in the ecumenical movement, nationally and internationally. But he fought many other battles. The Second Vatican Council is one of them. He was involved in its preparation and attended all four sessions, from 1962 to 1965.
Few people realize how important Hurley's contribution to this major historical event has been. There was no guarantee that the ecumenical Council called by Pope John XXIII in 1959 would produce any result at all. On the contrary, the Central Preparatory Commission, almost entirely dominated by Curial officials, was determined to maintain the status quo at any cost. It was because of the determination of a small group of progressive bishops, helped by theologians like Chenu, Congar, Küng, Rahner, Häring and Schillebeeckx, that the aggiornamento wanted by the Pope eventually took place. Hurley was one of those bishops. In September 1962, a month before the opening of the Council, he was on a list of sixteen bishops identified by Congar and Chenu as key allies in the fight for a truly ecumenical event. From the start, he had a clear view of what the Council was meant to achieve, as shown by the vota he submitted to the Antepreparatory Commission in April 1960, his contribution to the International Study Week on Missionary Catechetics in July 1960 and his article on priestly ministry in the January 1962 issue of The Furrow.
Of all the South African bishops, he was by far the most active, as far as the number of oral interventions and written submissions were concerned. The speeches he delivered during the first period of the Council were particularly critical. He took an active part in the fight for the rejection of the documents prepared by the Central Preparatory Commission and the setting of a new agenda for the Council. Among the interventions he made during the last three periods, one can single out those in favour of the church's independence from the state and his apologia for Teilhard de Chardin.
Hurley's primary concern was to encourage and nurture the church's pastoral commitment. Trained as a scholastic theologian, he was deeply conscious of the limitations that the traditional way of thinking imposed on the church's ability to confront the challenges of modern society. He became one of the key members of the Commission for Seminaries, Studies and Catholic Education. Despite the fairly conservative composition of this commission, he succeeded in giving the document on seminary training a distinctly pastoral note. During all the meetings of the commission and again in plenary session, he pleaded for a "harmonious integration" of the pastoral, intellectual and spiritual aspects of the priestly training. In theological education, the cardinal sin was "departmentalism". He was adamant that the philosophy and the theology course had to be integrated if the seminaries were to produce "pastoral priests".
Archbishop Hurley became an enthusiastic popularizer of the Second Vatican Council. The conciliar event had a deep impact on him. It is worth noting that one of his strongest public denunciations of apartheid took place in 1964, between the second and the third periods of the Council. There is little chance that his subsequent involvement in the anti-apartheid movement would have been the same if he had not taken part in the Council.
The archbishop of Durban was, and still is, a son of the Council. But he was also one of its fathers - if one may be forgiven for using this politically incorrect term. It is hoped that this essay, incomplete as it is, will contribute to highlighting this essential aspect of his life.
1. On the African participation in the Second Vatican Council, see Georges Conus,"L'Église d'Afrique au Concile Vatican II", Neue Zeitschrift für Missionswissenschaft, vol. 30 (1974), pp. 241-55 and 31 (1975), pp. 1-18, 124-42; Claude Prudhomme, "Les évêques d'Afrique noire anciennement française et le Concile", in Étienne Fouilloux, ed., Vatican II commence... Approches Francophones (Leuven: Bibliotheek van de Faculteit der Godgeleerdheid, 1993), pp. 163-88; Claude Soetens, "L'apport du Congo-Léopoldville (Zaïre), du Rwanda et du Burundi au Concile Vatican II", ibid., pp. 189- 208; J. P. Messina, "L'église d'Afrique au concile Vatican II: origines de l'assemblée du synode des évêques pour l'Afrique", Mélanges de Science Religieuse, vol. 3 (1994), pp. 279-95; Matthijs Lamberigts,"Der Beitrag Afrikas während der Konzilsdebatte über die Liturgie", in Wolfgang Weiss, ed., Zeugnis und Dialog. Die katholische Kirche in der neuzeitlichen Welt und das II. Vatikanische Konzil. Klaus Wittstadt zum 60. Geburtstag (Würzburg: Echter, 1996), pp. 186-207. The reception issue is discussed by Adrian Hastings, "The Council came to Africa", in Alberic Stacpoole, ed., Vatican II by those who were there (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1966), pp. 315-23. See also Adrian Hastings, "The Post-Conciliar Church in Eastern Africa", in African Catholicism. Essays in Discovery (London: SCM and Philadelphia: Trinity Press International, 1989), pp. 122-37.
2. On Hurley's participation in the Council, see Desmond Fisher, Archbishop Denis Hurley (Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1965), pp. 31-47. For a shorter version of this study, see Men who make the Council: Portraits of Vatican II Leaders (University of Notre Dame, Indiana, 1965). Reedition in Guardian of the light. Tributes to Archbishop Denis Hurley OMI on the Golden Jubilee of his priestly ordination, 1939-1989 (Durban: Archdiocese of Durban, 1989), pp. 15-23.
3. On the problem of sources for the history of Vatican II in Africa, see François de Medeiros, "Les Archives Africaines", in Jan Grootaers and Claude Soetens, Sources locales de Vatican II. Symposium Leuven - Louvain-la-Neuve 23-25-X-1989 (Leuven: Bibliotheek van de Faculteit der Godgeleerdheid, 1990), pp. 95-97.
4. A lot is to be expected, in particular, from Fr Alois Greiler's KUL doctoral thesis on the history of the conciliar document on priestly formation. This dissertation will deal extensively with Archbishop Hurley's contribution to this document. I would like to express my gratitude to Fr Greiler for the invaluable assistance he gave me in this research.
5. These archives are kept in 24 boxes distributed as follows: Central Preparatory Commission (4 boxes); 1st session (3 boxes); 2nd Session (3 boxes); 3rd Session (2 boxes); 4th Session (2 boxes); Commissio de Seminariis et de Educatione Catholica (4 boxes); other commissions (6 boxes).
6. See Alan Henriques' article in this same issue of the Bulletin for Contextual Theology. Hurley also expressed his views in an interview conducted at the end of the first period of the Council. See D. E. Hurley, "Freeing the Word of God", in V. A. Yzermans, A New Pentecost. Vatican Council II: Session I (Westminster, Maryland, 1963), pp. 276-83.
7. Rome: Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis, 5 vol. For an English translation of Hurley's most important speeches in the Council, see Peter C. Finn and James M. Schellman, eds, Shaping English Liturgy: Studies in Honor of Archbishop Hurley (Washington, DC: The Pastoral Press, 1990), pp. 15-30.
8. Denis Eugene Hurley, "The training of priests", in D. E. Hurley and J. Cunnane, eds, Vatican II on priests and seminaries (Dublin and Chicago: Scepter Books, 1967), pp. 171-211; "Initiation into Priestly Formation", in St Joseph's Scholasticate 1943-1968 (Cedara, 1968), pp. 44-46; "Bishops, Presbyterate and the Training of Priests", in Adrian Hastings, ed., Modern Catholicism: Vatican II and After (London: SPCK, 1991), pp. 141-50; "The Second Vatican Council", in We Give Thanks. Ukwanda Kwaliswa Umthankathi. St. Joseph's Scholasticate - Theological Institute, 1943-1993 (Cedara: St Joseph's, 1993), pp. 23-26.
9. Interview conducted in Durban on 21st February 1995
10. Interviews conducted in Durban, April-October 1996.
11. Interview conducted in Zwolle, Netherlands, on 23th January 1991.
12. Interview conducted in Cape Town on 30th April 1992.
13. Letter to the author, Senekal, 20th May 1996.
14. Cardinal Domenico Tardini, Secretary of State, to Archbishop Hurley, Rome, 18th June 1959. Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
15. Hurley, "The Second Vatican Council", p. 24.
16. Ibid.
17. For instance in Congo. See Soetens, "L'apport du Congo", p. 193.
18. Acta et Documenta Concilio Oecumenico Vaticano II Apparando. Series 1: Antepraeparatoria. Volume 2: Consilia et Vota episcoporum ac praelatorum. Part 5: Africa (Rome: Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis, 1960), p. 537. Vota dated 22nd August 1960.
19. Ibid., pp. 543-44. Vota dated 6th October 1959.
20. Ibid., pp. 537-39. Vota dated 15th April 1960.
21. Archbishop Pericle Felici to Archbishop Hurley, Rome, 5th July 1960. Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
22. Hurley, "The Second Vatican Council", p. 24.
23. Bishop Gerard van Velsen, interview conducted in Zwolle on 23rd January 1991.Van Velsen (1910-1996), a Dutch Dominican who arrived in South Africa in 1937 and was consecrated bishop in 1950, was one of the six resident bishops invited to be members of the Secretariat for Christian Unity. See R. Burigana, M. Paiano, G. Turbanti and M. Velati, "La messa a punto dei testi. Le commissioni della fase preparatoria del Vatican II", in Fouilloux, ed., "Vatican II commence...", p. 30. Bishop van Velsen's life story, including his impressions of the Council, was recorded in 1988 by the Dutch journalist Cees Veltman (HN Magazine. Hervormd Nederland Oecumenisch opinieweekblad, vol. 44, nr 6, 13 February 1988, pp. 6-9). His papers are kept in the Dominican Library in Cedara, KwaZulu-Natal. They mostly contain official documents, which are easy to find elsewhere.
24. Hurley, "The Second Vatican Council", p. 24.
25. Hurley, "Pastoral emphasis in seminary studies", The Furrow, vol. 13, January 1962, p. 16.
26. See G. Routhier, "Les réactions du Cardinal Léger à la préparation de Vatican II", Revue d'histoire de l'Église de France, vol. 80 (1994), p. 281; Giuseppe Alberigo and Joseph Komonchak, eds., History of Vatican II, vol. 1: Announcing and Preparing Vatican Council II. Towards a New Era in Catholicism (Maryknoll: Orbis and Leuven: Peters, 1995), p. 340-42. A copy of the memorandum submitted to the transalpini is kept in the Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
27. Hurley, "The Second Vatican Council", p. 24.
28. See Jan A. Brouwers, "Vatican II: derniers préparatifs et première session. Activités conciliaires en coulisses", in Fouilloux, ed., Vatican II commence..., p. 353. Only seven documents out of the ca 70 that had been drafted by the Central Preparatory Commission were sent out.
29. Ibid., p. 364. The Secretariat of the Bishops' Conferences of Africa and Madagascar was established on 17th October 1962.
30. André Duval, "Le message au monde", in Fouilloux, ed., Vatican II commence..., p. 111.
31. Archbishop Hurley to Eric Boulle and Geoff de Gersigny, Rome, 16th October 1962. Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
32. Ibid. The Durban Archdiocesan Archives contain a three-page typewritten document entitled "Impressions of the Council", dated 27th October 1962 and addressed to Douglas Woodruff, the editor of The Tablet, in which Hurley shared a similar, but more detailed, analysis of the forces at play.
33. See Conus, "L'Église d'Afrique", vol. 31, p. 3-5.
34. See Conus, "L'Église d'Afrique", p. 7.
35. Acta Synodalia Sacrosancti Concilii Oecumenici Vaticani II, vol. 1/1 (Rome: Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis, 1970), p. 238.
36. Ibid., p. 327-28. On this intervention, see Lamberigts, "Der Beitrag", p. 192.
37. Ibid., vol. 3, p. 199. In his essay on "La discussione sullo schema constitutionis dogmaticae de fontibus revelationibus durante la I sessione del Concilio Vaticano II" (Fouilloux, ed., Vatican II commence..., p. 316) Giuseppe Ruggieri highlights the "great lucidity" of Hurley's intervention.
38. Ibid., vol. 4, p. 198.
39. See Joseph A. Komonchak, "The initial debate about the church", in Fouilloux, ed., Vatican II commence..., p. 344.
40. Acta Synodalia, vol. 3/2, p. 515-18.
41. Ibid., vol. 4/2, p.188-89.
42. Denis E. Hurley, Apartheid: A Crisis of the Christian Conscience (South African Institute of Race Relations, 1964). This lecture was also published in The Southern Cross (22nd January - 19th February 1964). Hurley's first major public pronouncements against apartheid date from 1957. It was at his instigation that, in the same year, the Southern African Bishops' Conference declared apartheid "intrinsically evil".
43. Archbishop McCann, interview conducted in Cape Town, 30th April 1992.
44. G. Vallquist, Das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil (Nuremberg, 1966), p. 204.
45. Acta Synodalia, vol. 3/5, p. 342.
46. The Southern Cross, 4th November 1964. On this debate, see Antoine Wenger, Chronique de la Troisième Session (Paris: Centurion, 1965), p. 410; Xavier Rynne, The Third Session. The Debates and Decrees of Vatican Council II, September 14 to November 21, 1964 (London: Faber and Faber, 1965), pp. 125-26. Hurley quoted Teilhard de Chardin's Le Milieu Divin in the above-mentioned Alfred and Winifred Hoernlé memorial lecture on apartheid.
47. The Southern Cross, 16th October 1963.
48. Ibid., 30th October 1963.
49. Ibid., 23rd October 1963.
50. Ibid., 13th November 1963.
51. Hurley to J. Coates, Rome, 6th November 1963. Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
52. See Finn and Schellmann, Shaping English Liturgy, p. 9. When the Council ceased to function in 1969, Hurley was appointed to the newly-established Congregation for Divine Worship. He remained a member of that Congregation until 1974.
53. Frederic R. McManus, "ICEL: the First Years", in Finn and Schellmann, Shaping English Liturgy, pp. 436-38. Hurley was elected chairman of ICEL's Episcopal Board in August 1975. In the subsequent years, he was reelected several times to that office by the bishops of the board.
54. Hurley to Boulle and de Gersigny, 15th November 1965. Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
55. Hurley to Boulle and de Gersigny, 23rd September 1965. Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
56. Acta Synodalia, vol. 4/3, p. 205-206.
57. A copy of the petition, dated 2nd December 1965, is kept in the Durban Archdiocesan Archives. On this episode, see The Southern Cross, 2nd December 1965; Xavier Rynne, The Fourth Session. The Debates and Decrees of Vatican Council II September 14 to December 8, 1965 (London: Faber and Faber, 1966), pp. 225-30; Antoine Wenger, Chronique de la Quatrième Session (Paris: Centurion, 1966), p. 277.
58. The Church in the Modern World, 79-82.
59. Hurley, letter to the author, Durban, 31st October 1996.
60. Hurley, "The Second Vatican Council", p. 25.
61. Hurley, "The Bishop's Role in the Catechetical Renewal", in Johannes Hofinger, ed., Teaching All Nations. A Symposium on Modern Catechetics (Freiburg: Herder and London: Burns and Oates, 1961), pp. 341-56. This volume was originally published in German. It was also translated into French. The second part of Hurley's contribution (pp. 351-56) deals with seminary studies.
62. Fisher, Archbishop Denis Eugene Hurley, p. 19.
63. "Observationes super schemate De Sacrorum Alumnis Formandis", 11th June 1962. Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
64. Fisher, Archbishop Denis Eugene Hurley, p. 16.
65. Hurley, "Pastoral Emphasis in Seminary Training", p. 18.
66. Ibid., p. 23.
67. Ibid., p. 27.
68. On the work of the commission, see German Mártil, Los Seminarios en el Concilio Vatican II. Historia y comentario (Salamanca: Ediciones Sigueme, 1966); Denis E. Hurley and Joseph Cunnane, Vatican II on priests and seminaries (Dublin and Chicago: Scepter Books, 1967); A. Mayer and G. Baldanza, "Genesi storica del decreto "Optatam Totius", in A. Favale, ed., Il decreto sulla formazione sacerdotale (Torino, 1967), pp. 15-48; Jean Frisque,"Le décret Optatam Totius. Introduction historique", in J. Frisque and Y. Congar, eds, Les prêtres. Décrets "Presbyterium Ordinis" et "Optatam Totius". Textes latins et traductions françaises (Paris: Cerf, 1968), pp. 187-89.
69. See previous note. In his book, Mártil refers rather sympathetically to Hurley. See for example p. 51: "La idea sobre la que Mons. Hurley machacó insistentemente, de diversos modos, con una cierta noble rudeza, fue ésta: la formación sacerdotal no tiene más que un fin, el de preparar sacerdotes pastores."
70. Hurley to Suenens, [Rome], 18th March 1963. Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
71. Mártil, Los Seminarios, p. 50.
72. Hurley to Boulle and de Gersigny, Rome, 28th February 1963. Durban, Archdiocesan Archives.
73. Hurley and Cunnane, Vatican II on priests and seminaries, p. 174.
74. Ibid., p. 173.
75. Hurley to Suenens, [Rome], 18th March 1963. Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
76. "Comments on the schema De sacrorum alumnis formandis", [mid-March 1963]. Durban Archdiocesan Archives. A similar observation is made in Hurley and Cunnane, Vatican II on priests and seminaries, p. 174: "Father Dezza's abridgment had not redeemed the schema from its original sin of departmentalism."
77. Hurley to Whelan, [Durban], 4th April 1963. Durban Archdiocesan Archives.
78. See Karl Rahner, Zum Reform des Theologiestudiums (Freiburg: Herder, 1969), p. 55.
79. Hurley, interview conducted by Alan Henriques, Durban, 21st February 1995.
80. Hurley and Cunnane, Vatican II on priests and seminaries, p. 177.
81. Ibid., p. 177-79.
82. Acta Synodalia, vol. 3/8, pp. 21-23.
83. The final vote of the decree on the training of priests (Optatam Totius) took place a year later, on 13th October 1965. It was promulgated on 28th October 1965.
84. Xavier Rynne, The Third Session, p. 216. The real name of Rynne was Francis Xavier Murphy, a Redemptorist who published a chronicle of the Council in The New Yorker. See Jan Grootaers, "L'information religieuse au début du Concile", in Fouilloux, ed., Vatican II commence..., p. 220.
85. On the authorship of the draft see M. von Galli and B. Moosbrugger, Das Konzil. Kirche im Wandel (Olten, 1965), p. 53.
86. Ibid., p. 217.
87. This is suggested in Hurley and Cunnane, Vatican II on priests and seminaries, p. 177.