The Cambridge Companion to the Council of Trent
Nelson H Minnich (ed)
Cambridge University Press, £29.99, 351 pages
The opening paragraph of Nelson H Minnich’s introduction to his edited history of the Council of Trent is so perfectly constructed that I wish I had written it myself.
The Council of Trent (1545-63) was a major event in the history of Western Christianity that sealed rather than healed the divisions between the Catholic and Protestant communities and shaped Roman Catholicism for the centuries that followed until the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) effectively ended the Tridentine paradigm.
This is no empty claim, for Trent represents the most effective implementation of what is known in some quarters as “a fresh expression of Church” that the world has ever seen. The Church’s response to the challenges of the 16th century – including, but by no means limited to, the pronouncements of Martin Luther and his reforming ilk – was simultaneously exhilarating and pedestrian: nearly two decades of debate that changed the Church forever in both its outlook and its essence.
Given that the Tridentine model nurtured and furthered the work of the Church for four centuries, the existing scholarship about the Council of Trent is legion. In this volume Prof Minnich – who teaches history at the Catholic University of America, edits the Cath- olic Historical Review and is a former member of the Pontifical Committee of Historical Sciences – selects and convenes scholars to distil and discuss its main points of debate including the relationship between Scripture and Tradition; the implications of original sin; the theology of justification; the nature of the sacraments; religious art and music; the religious orders; and the implementation of its own decrees. Perhaps it is in the fields of art and music that the Tridentine legacy remains most tangible in a general sense, especially in the surviving great baroque churches with their soaring altarpieces and fat marble cherubs gambolling on the capitals of pillars, and the great anthems and over-the-top orchestral Mass settings which formed both the backdrop and the soundtrack of the Counter Reformation. Meanwhile the order of Mass codified immediately after the Council of Trent (itself closely related to art and music) brought half the world to faith but now seems to be held in suspicion – confected or otherwise – despite its considerable and enduring appeal, especially among the young in many countries.
At the 450th anniversary of the closing session of Trent, in 2013, Pope Francis noted that the council fathers gathered “not only to guard the sacred deposit of Christian doctrine, but also to enlighten more clearly all men, so that the saving work of the Lord could be diffused throughout the whole world”. One of the historic criticisms of the Council of Trent, however, has been that in the end its fathers allowed their decrees to be interpreted by the pope himself, thus contributing to an increasing centralisation of the papacy and its inevitable burgeoning exaltation which had begun two centuries earlier, continued with the building of the new St Peter’s under Julius II – “to glorify the papal monarchy in stone” – and later reached its apogee with the definition of papal infallibility under Pius IX.
To address the immediate elephant in the room: it is impossible not to read Prof Minnich’s book without one eye on the present and ongoing attempts to suppress (or at least sev-erely limit) the celebration of the Tridentine rite of Mass across the world. With Traditionis Custodes of 2021 and the infamous “Roche Rescript” of earlier this year, which in respect of the liturgy reserves formerly locally-exercised episcopal authority to the Holy See, a pope committed to synodality, collegiality and decentralisation in other matters may now be regarded, ironically enough, as employing Tridentine papal tactics against the historic Tridentine rite. The chapters on bishops, the training of priests and the pastoral care of the laity therefore come into their own in ways that perhaps may not have been anticipated when they were commissioned and written.
In that light the subheadings of Vincenzo Lavenia’s chapter on the episcopal office are particularly enlightening: “The Ideal and the Actual Bishop” – “Questions of Power: A Divine or Human Origin?” – “Questions of Duty: The Shepherd and his Souls”. A major outcome was the emphasis on the desirability of bishops actually living in their dioceses, even if they were not masters of their sees once they were there: medieval incursions into diocesan structures endured from the religious orders, the local secular authorities, and the papacy itself. Trent also, however, saw extended bickering on the question of who was to shepherd the shepherds: in March 1562 the pope refused to allow any discussion of the source of a bishop’s authority, and an argument broke out over whether the Lord’s instruction “Feed my lambs” had been addressed solely to Peter, or to the apostles as a group.
An ongoing theme emerges, as Trent progressed, of the need to meet the threat to the Catholic faith represented by the brickbats that were thrown at the Church as the 16th century wore on. Certainly there needed to be an element of bolstering – and it cannot be denied that many of the criticisms levelled against the Church in that period (frequently against the institution of the papacy itself) were not without justification – but what generally emerged was a helpful reform of the Church at the local level that simultaneously left most of the major players untroubled: “The drama played out at Trent ended by reinforcing the exercise of pastoral care by the bishops and parish priests without compromising either the privileges of the religious orders or the prerogatives of the Roman Curia or the pontiff, both targets of fer-ocious moral and doctrinal criticism from the Protestant camp.”
Drama is about right, for the line-up of the Council of Trent included Paul III, Julius III, Marcellus II (who reigned for just 22 days), Paul IV and Pius IV. They were represented by a succession of legates of varying shades and hue, who interacted with various prelates of differing disposition and temperament – some of whom were very cross indeed. Leading inside-the-tent reformers like Philip Neri and Charles Borromeo played their part, while the nascent Society of Jesus also entered the fray at different points – but inevitably on the side of the papacy and with one eye on China, India, and the New World.
The volume’s contributors are also dispersed across both sides of the Atlantic: mainly in the US and Italy. Although not all chapters are equally colourful there can be no doubting their erudition and interest. This book matters for the same reason that the Council of Trent matters: it is too important a subject to be neglected, even after all this time. Especially in a Church which implements change at a glacial pace and thinks in terms of centuries, Prof Minnich’s book will help its readers understand not only what happened at the great Council of Trent but also perhaps to discern – a century and a half after Vatican I and 60 years after Vatican II – what happened next, and how, and why.
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