What if the vatican 2 modernisation of the catholic church had never taken place? I'm Irish and we were subjected to a horrific form of it and that was after vatican2! We lived in a theocracy in all but name cetainly until the 1990s, by that stage the majority of the population would have completed high school education and would be able to question dogma! Seemingly the head of the catholic church in Ireland during the Vatican 2 process, archbishop John Charles Mcquaid, a woman-hater to the core, told the nation, nothing had changed when the process was completed.
I wonder what the world would be like without the process and how would catholics and predominantly catholic nations be faring today?
Some of my thoughts - The Northern Ireland rebellion which started late 1960s would be later in comming, Catholics are seen as equal and loyal citizens in Germany, England and the vast majority of predominantly protestant nations today - without Vatican 2 and the faithful as a consequence adhering to outmoded forms of religious practice, catholics would be viewed with suspicion, God knows it is still tough enough in parts of Northern Ireland (virtually the equivalent of Apartheid South Africa up until recently), Scotland and the United States to be as they say Roman Catholic even today! However levels of actual practice amongst catholics has declined sharply in the developed world, so did the Vatican 2 process cause the church's authority to be undermined. Also given, John Paul's role in the collapse of communism, albeit that he was an arch consertvative, would stallinism in Europe have taken much longer to fall? By the way a Cuban political minister was asked about religious practice amongst the population and he responded the only ones who go to mass now are old women of both sexes! Castro, jesuit educated as is that madman Mugabe, promoted protestantism strongly as a religious option once. How delightful it was to see him greet John Paul the Second just at the very time Wild Bil, who was having his spinach sauce difficulties was greeting an emasculated Borris Yeltsin!