Unfinished Journey: The Church 40 Years After Vatican 2 Essays for John Wilkins

When the world's Catholic bishops gathered in Rome forty years ago, they triggered a revolution: a new vision of the Church for the modern world. No longer a lighted castle in a dark world, the Church was now seen as a pilgrim, sharing the joys and anxieties of all peoples -- a reinvigorated and renewed Church that was semper reformanda. But today there is a sense of disappointment among many Catholics that the reforms of the Second Vatican Council (1962-66) have been truncated, ignored, or even undermined in the contemporary Church, which continues to suffer from clericalism, centralism, male domination, and institutional defensiveness. There is a sense of a journey unfinished. What went wrong? How can the Church better be faithful to the promises it made at the Council? To mark the retirement of John Wilkins, the long-serving editor of the London Catholic weekly, The Tablet, 19 of the most distinguished Catholic writers of the age were asked to suggest answers to those questions. The result is a fascinating series of essays on a huge range of topics by a truly international cast of theologians, commentators and journalists, including Hans Kung, Joan Chittister, Eamon Duffy, Timothy Radcliffe, Nicholas Lash, Michael Novak, John Cornwell, Rembert Weakland and Clifford Longley. Unfinished Journey also includes a tribute to John Wilkins by the late-lamented Guardian columnist, Hugo Young. Book jacket.